Printable foam roller exercise sheet

9 Foam Roller Exercises - Printable PDF

After publishing my original foam roller post at the beginning of the year I've had a number of my clients ask me if I could put together a printable sheet of foam roller exercises for them.

After doing this separately 4-5 times I thought it would be best to put a sheet of exercises here on the blog, so everyone can benefit.

If you are interested in using the foam roller for your own 'self massage' click here for my first post on how to use the foam roller, there is a useful video on the basics there.

Once you've done that click here and print off a program sheet of exercises.

Finally read this...

3 top mistakes when using the foam roller

1) You're rolling too fast - most people I see roll up and down the foam far to fast. Slow down. As you're rolling you should be 'scanning' your muscles for trigger points, knots and scar tissue. To make it easier if you are rolling a large muscle group like your thigh (quads) then roll them in two halves. The top half, then the bottom half separately. As a rule it's better to roll too slowly then too fast!

2) You're not stopping on the trigger points - When you're rolling you should be 'scanning' for the knots and trigger points. You'll know you're on them as the area will be pretty uncomfortable once you've got pressure on them. Unfortunately these are the areas that need the work, much like if you were having a sports massage the focus will be on the problem areas. The same goes for when you're foam rolling, when you find these areas spend some time going SLOWLY backwards and forwards over them.

3) You're not doing it for long enough - Everyone asks me how long you should foam roll for. This is a 'how long's a piece of string' type question. The time required will differ hugely between individuals. However here is a good rule for effective use of the foam roller: Roll your trigger points long enough for your discomfort (some times pain) levels to drop by 50%. Depending on where you're rolling this may take as little as 30 seconds all the way up to 5 mins. However long it takes your aim is to reduce your discomfort level 50% - Simple!

The better back, neck and shoulders stretching challenge

Below are a list of 5 great morning stretches that I've specifically picked out to address areas of tension and immobility that cause pain and discomfort.

These stretches are ones I prescribe on a regular basis (daily) to clients with neck, lower back and shoulder pain.

This post is an effort to get my clients (and blog readers) to become more 'mobile' in their spine and in turn end up 'pain free'.

My challenge to you...

For the next 28 days (4 weeks) complete these stretches EVERY morning.

Once the 4 week period is up you can then chose if you want to keep doing them or leave them out.

I'm pretty certain that if you do manage to complete the 4 week period you will not want to leave them out of your morning routine.

My aim is to convert as many of my clients (and blog readers) to put this stretching program into their daily routine.

I've just been going over these stretches as I've been writing this post and my neck, shoulders and lower back feel 10x better already - give them a try yourself now.

I'll be completing the challenge myself, alongside everyone else for the next 28 days.

Click this link if you would like a printable pdf version of the stretching program.

***N.B. This program is for individuals who presently have no acute pain, the program is designed as a general starting place for a healthier back, shoulders and neck. If you have acute pain you will need a detailed consultation and specific advice***

The Stretches

You will need 10 minutes set a side for this routine.

Make sure you've been up and moving for about 10 minutes before you do these.

Complete each stretch twice and hold for 30 seconds each time (any less will be in-effective).

1. Spinal rotation

Lie on your back with your knees bent, your hands together and arms out straight.

Rotate your knees one way and your hands the other way.

You should feel a 'rotational stretch' in your spine.

Move slowly and repeat 20 times.

2. Knee to chest

Bring both knees in to your chest and gently pull in with your hands to increase the stretch.

Hold for 30 seconds.

3. Door stretch

Face the door frame and place your forearms on the frame.

Push your body through the door frame to feel a stretch in your chest and shoulder area.

Hold for 30 seconds.

4. Neck 'extensor' stretch

Drop your head towards your shoulder and down towards the floor, in a diagonal direction.

You will feel a stretch in your neck / upper shoulder.

Hold for 30 seconds.

5. Thoracic extension

Stand (or sit) straight with your hands behind your head.

Extend back pushing your chest upwards and squeeze your shoulder blades together.

Hold for 30 seconds.

Knee pain in children 10 - 16yrs (Osgood-Schlatters?)

This is a post for any parents who have children that are complaining of knee pain... Their pain may be Osgood-Schlatters Disease (OSD).

OSD is a problem seen in active children between the age of 10-16yrs.

The reason I'm writing about this injury now is that I've had 3 different sets of parents bring in their children who have been complaining of symptoms of OSD over the last 6 weeks.

They were ALL aged 14yrs (2 girls / 1 boy) and had varying degrees of knee pain.

The main symptom of OSD is pain which will be felt at the front of the knee just below the knee cap (where the quadriceps attach to the bone).

Symptoms are most commonly found after a 'growth spurt' - though not always. The pain is caused by the muscle pulling on the site where it attaches to the bone (the Tibial Tuberosity). This pulling causes inflammation at the attachment site.

The reason this problem occurs in children aged between around 10 - 16yrs is because at this stage their bones are still developing and yet to fully harden. This leaves the boney attachment vulnerable to heavy loading.

In severe cases the bone can start to be pulled away causing a calcification at the knee. The picture above (taken from the British Medical Journal) shows what can occur in a severe case of OSD - note the 'bump' on the child's knee.

In most cases your child will eventually 'grow-out' of OSD, however it must be managed carefully in the interim.

It is a relatively common issue, my sister had it on and off for about 18 months as a child - unfortunately for her it wasn't managed very well at the time!

Treatment for OSD will involve:

1. Rest (or relative rest) - by 'relative rest' I mean that ALL activity must be pain free. If an activity causes pain then rest must be enforced.
2. Soft tissue techniques (massage) to free up the tight muscular tissue.
3. Bio-mechanical screening - to make sure no unnecessary force is being generated at the knee
4. Light stretching - only when appropriate.
5. Ice / cold treatment - to help manage the inflammation.

Two things you must not allow your child to do if they have OSD:

1. Train / play through pain.
2. Stretch heavily if it causes pain.

N.B. As always this is a very brief overview of this type of injury, there are many other problems that can occur at the knee that will need to be ruled out in an assessment.

11 pictures taken on my iPhone

It's been a busy 6 months since opening up in the new clinic location. So over the last few days I've been having a catch up on all of my admin - bookkeeping, paperwork etc.

A couple of nights ago I was going through the 312 photos stored on my iPhone - deleting a few on the way through (I've managed to use much of my available phone memory - luckily I'm not too far away from an upgrade).

Anyway although I try and keep most of my posts on this blog related to the clinic and sports injuries I occasionally put up some 'personal' posts here too.

For that reason I thought it would be fun to share some of the photos on my iPhone.

1. Gemma (my Girlfriend) at Go Ape - Moors Valley.

2 + 3. Visiting my sister in the UAE - In the desert.

4. Ready to go out for Dinner - UAE.

5. Donkeys in the New Forest (Nr Moyels Court).

6. BBQ at Durdle Door.

7. Working from my Dad's 'office' while up visiting my parents in Scotland.

8. The Urban Beach (Boscombe) - one of my favourite spots on a summers evening.

9. After finishing 'the great south run' 10miles - don't ask my time, it wasn't good.

10. The wood burner at my parents house - great on a winters day.

11. Visiting the Lime Wood (Lyndhurst) for my Birthday lunch - others arrived in helicopters. It's all right for some!

Have you got IT Band Syndrome (ITBS)?

ITBS is more commonly known as 'Runners Knee'.

The Iliotibial band is a thick, very strong section of connective tissue that runs from the top of the hip down the outside aspect of the leg. It connects to the bottom of the knee at the fibula bone, with some of it's fibres running into the patella.

In the case of IT band syndrome rubbing takes place at a bony point called the lateral epicondyle. If the IT band is tight it will rub over this bony point when walking, running or jogging.

If you have ITBS you will find pain on the outside aspect of the knee, which is caused by the band rubbing on the bone. If left for a long period scar tissue will develop in this area.

Downhill running and high impact activities will typically cause the most problems.

As with many injuries you will most often find that there is some underlying bio-mechanical issue or inefficiency in the body. An example of this is that there may be a specific weakness in the hip musculature. This weakness is likely to cause tension to build up in the IT band. If this is the case then the treatment must focus on addressing both the painful knee area AND the issue in the hip too.

If the painful knee area is treated without 'fixing' the underlying weakness (or bio-mechanical problem) elsewhere then this injury will re-occur almost straight away on returning to training.

My National 3 Peaks Challenge Story

(Picture: Piper - The Highlands)

The 3 tallest mountains in the UK.

21 hours 50 minutes, 57214 steps, 25 miles and 11170 feet.

The three peaks challenge completed!

To those of you who haven't come across the

National 3 Peaks Challenge the aim is to climb Ben Nevis (Scotland), Scafell Pike (England) and Snowdon (Wales) in 24 hrs - including driving time.

This is a short post on how Matt (who talked me into doing the challenge) and I got on completing the 3 Peaks.

We started in Scotland at Ben Nevis on Friday 17th June and finished in Wales at Snowdon 21h50 later.

BEN NEVIS - The Start

(Picture: The Start - Ben Nevis visitor centre car park)

(Picture: Summit Ben Nevis)

Summit time: 2h05

Total time: 3h24

Height: 4409 ft

Steps (Pedometer): 21858

We were planning to start the challenge at 7pm (Friday), with the aim of getting up and down the Mountain before dark at around 10.30pm. However due to poor weather and less evening light we changed our plans and started early at 6.40pm.

The climb was in fairly poor weather; rain and cold, with thick cloud at the top. This made things fairly hard going, visibility at the top was down to about 15 feet.

We could easily see how people get in trouble on Ben Nevis, the cloud cover was fairly disorientating.

We managed to get up and down in fairly good time (3h24), with much of the descent done

running. By the time we reached the bottom I wasn't sure if we had gone off too fast and should have left 'more in the tank' for the next two mountains.

On getting down we managed to leave the Ben Nevis visitor centre car park fairly quickly. We got in the car for a 6 hour journey down to Scafell Pike (Lake district). At this point Matt and I did our best to get some sleep as we were being driven by my Mum and Gemma (my girlfriend).

SCAFELL PIKE

(Pictures: Top of Scafell Pike)

Summit time: ???

Total time: 3h58

Height: 3210 ft

Steps (Pedometer): 20356

After traveling to Scafell Pike overnight we arrived at about 4am. We were not sure how our legs were going to be functioning after 6 hours sitting still in the car. As it turns out the legs were actually OK, however this was the least of our worries.

After quickly getting out of the car at just after 4am we headed off on what we thought was the right track. We quickly caught up with 4 other walkers doing the 3 Peaks and checked with them that we were on the correct route. They confidently said "yes" so we got our heads down and got cracking - big mistake. To cut a long story short we had headed off on the wrong track. We had been 'at it' for 40 minutes before we realised that we had gone the wrong way! What was more soul destroying was that we realised that the quickest way to get back on track was to run right back to the start and begin again, there was no other obvious 'short cut' to get back on the correct trail from where we were.

By the time we had reached the bottom again we had wasted exactly 58 minutes, but more importantly we had sapped valuable energy out of our legs. Disaster. There was no other choice but to get started again. Although Scafell Pike is the smallest mountain in terms of height it seemed to be the toughest of the three mountains. There is a boulder field about mid way up and the top section is covered in scree which makes things hard work.

As with Ben Nevis the weather was poor so we reached the top in almost zero visibility and ice cold driving rain. We made a quick stop to take the photos and headed back down. Due to our mistake at the start we took almost 4 hrs on a mountain we were planning to complete in under 3 hrs. In low spirits we quickly got changed into dry gear and got in the car for the 5 hour journey to Snowdon.

SNOWDON

(Picture: Snowdon - at the peak)

Summit time: 1h35

Total time: 2h56

Height: 3560 ft

Steps (Pedometer): 1500 - approx

Although we wasted an hour on Scafell Pike we were still on to complete the challenge in the allotted 24 hrs - all was left to play for.

Our aim was to finish strong. That meant we had to complete Snowdon in under 3 hours. We knew it was going to be painful.

For the first time we set off without any rain, which was a great change.

We were most confident about completing Snowdon as it was the only mountain we had climbed prior to the challenge. In fact we had climbed it twice in one day while we were doing our training.

We managed a very fast time to the top, by our standards, making the peak in 1h35. The top was packed with other walkers so we quickly got our photos and began back down. By this time our legs were like jelly and are knees were sore but we had to get down quickly to make sure we made it in under 3 hours.

After what seem like an age we rounded the final corner, the visitor centre car park was in sight. We knew we were going to complete Snowdon in under 3 hrs! With 4 minutes to spare we jogged into the car park and had completed the National 3 Peaks Challenge in a total of 21h50.

Tired, beaten up but very proud we had managed to do all three of the highest mountains in the UK under 24 hours.

A great achievement.

21 hours 50 minutes, 57214 steps, 25 miles and 11170 feet.

What is a trigger point (or Knot)?

I get asked what a trigger point is on almost a daily basis.

For that reason I thought it would be best to write a short post with some basic information on trigger points.

What is a trigger point?

In the most simple terms a 'trigger point' is a section of muscle that has gone into a localised spasm. This spasm causes the muscle fibres in that area to become contracted.

Why do trigger points develop?

Trigger points can develop for a number of reasons but the most common cause are prolonged poor posture, acute injury or poor biomechanics.

Where do triggers points most commonly occur?

Trigger points can occur all over the body, however the most common area I personally treat is in the neck and shoulders. The calves or gluteus are another area I see on a regular basis.

Why do trigger points cause pain?

Triggers points cause pain in two ways.

The first is due to mechanical pressure that is caused by the tension in the trigger points.

The second is due to chemical irritation, due to the build up of lactic acid (and other waste products) in the muscles.

How can trigger point be treated?

Firstly the underlying reason for the trigger points development must be addressed. For example poor posture must be corrected.

Secondly trigger points respond well to (relatively) deep pressure. Trigger point therapy is very effective as the 'mechanical' pressure will be released. Alongside this extra lactic acid can be removed using varying soft tissue techniques.