The rotator cuff muscles are what support the glenohumeral joint. A lot of people think there’s just one rotator cuff, but guess what? You’ve actually got four of them.

A lot of people damage their rotator cuff because the big muscles supporting it aren’t in optimal shape.

They’re not very powerful muscles, and they are used to keep the arm in the socket, so a lot of people injure or tear a rotator cuff because the big muscles supporting the shoulder – like your latissimus, rhomboids, and serratus – are not working efficiently. This leaves you trying to use more of these stabilizing rotator cuff muscles for strength and power, and they don’t like that. So you end up injuring one or more rotator cuffs.

To keep your shoulders healthy and strong, I’m going to share with you:

1. How to use manual therapy to improve your problem areas.
2. Some basic and natural movements that will build shoulder strength.

The Supraspinatus

Of the four rotator cuff muscles, the supraspinatus is the main one people tend to injure, especially in any traumatic accident. Falling on your shoulder is a good way to tear this muscle. So, first things first, either don’t fall when you’re climbing or make sure to fall properly.

“[I]f you have a problem with the supraspinatus, look for a trigger point in that area (one of those big knots you feel). Work on that point and see if it helps you move your shoulder and arm more freely and with less pain.”

Your supraspinatus comes down from deep in your upper trap on top of your scapula – which is where most people want to have their shoulders rubbed after sitting in a chair and being stressed out all day – and inserts right into the top of the humerus. That’s your upper arm. So, if you have a problem with the supraspinatus, look for a trigger point in that area (one of those big knots you feel). Work on that point and see if it helps you move your shoulder and arm more freely and with less pain.

If you have a problem with the supraspinatus, look for a trigger point in that area.

The Other Three

Of the other three rotator cuff muscles, you’ve got the infraspinatus and the teres minor that allow you to externally rotate your upper arm. Then there is the subscapularis, which allows you to push down and forward. Think of it as lightly throwing something. Your subscapularis muscle is a bit like your armpit muscle, and it integrates with the serratus anterior to provide essential stability and motion to the scapula.

“This is a sore and sensitive area for most regardless of whether there’s an issue to be dealt with or not. Proceed slowly and be cautious of nerves.”

A lot of people who have pain deep in their shoulder or even their upper back are actually experiencing subscapularis problems. Working on the trigger point in front of the scapula, as well as in your armpit area, can provide dramatic results. Sounds fun, doesn’t it? How do you do determine if this is your problem?

Lay supine (on your back) and bring your upper arms out perpendicular to either side of you. Then, let your forearms fall back (ninety degree elbow hands facing up). Can your forearms touch the floor? Are they equal left to right? That range of motion is going to be most dependent on your subscapularis muscle. If you’re having issues, then look for trigger points up in your scapula and see what you find.

Beware: This is a sore and sensitive area for most regardless of whether there’s an issue to be dealt with or not. Proceed slowly and be cautious of nerves. If you experience numbness or tingling sensations, then move out of that area.

The Rhomboid

Another important muscle that stabilizes the shoulder blade is the rhomboid. These muscles attach the inner part of your shoulder blade to your spine and oppose the action of your serratus. This is where people would tend to say, “I have pain between my shoulder blades.”

If you feel pain when you try to move your arm toward or away from your body, your rhomboids may need work.

You could have pain anywhere in your shoulder blade as you move, but if the problem occurs when you try to move your upper arm toward or away from your body (rather than forward or backward), then the rhomboids may need some work. The trigger points are typically easy to find, as they’re right in between your shoulder blade and spine. You can roll on a tennis ball or ask your friend (or enemy, if you want it deep) to stick an elbow in that area.

A lot of times, the rhomboid that needs to be treated is on the side where you’re not feeling pain with movement. These muscles have to balance each other. So, if the right one is bothering you, the weakness might actually be on the left side and it’s causing the right one to spasm. Therefore, you want to treat the trigger points on the side of weakness.

Latissimus

You also have the large latissimus muscle attaching to the upper arm. This raises your arm up and helps you pull things down. Your latissimus muscle helps you both with shoulder motion and shoulder power. People think of their lats when they’re climbing, but as you know, it’s much more than just that muscle responsible for the natural motion of climbing.

Climbing is actually a great tool for keeping your shoulders strong and healthy. It will help you develop selective tension, improve your upper body strength, and improve the mobility of your shoulders. The climb up, as well as passive and active hanging will help develop your shoulder joints and especially the mobility of your glenohumeral joint.

How to Do the Climb Up

MovNat founder Erwan LeCorre demonstrates the climb up.

The climb up is used when hanging from a vertical surface, to extend yourself up and reach a higher point:

1. From the hanging position, keep the arms lengthened and walk the balls of the feet
2. towards knee or waist level. The higher you can place the feet, the greater the force you can
3. be generated through the legs. Depending on the surface and the grip, the legs can be parallel or staggered, flexed or extended.
4. From this setup, drive through the legs and feet (or push off the surface with the legs if beginning with the legs in extension).
5. As the legs are extended, continue driving and generating force through the balls of the feet.
6. Keeping the heels high, drive the hips forward and extend one or both arms to secure a higher point of support with the hand(s).

I also like to have my clients and patients rotate their shoulder blades in a full circle while hanging to develop full motion and strength, especially in the lats and rhomboids. Check out my video below – at 13:54, I show this motion.

The side swing traverse is the next essential Natural Movement skill to master, and then onto getting yourself up and over a horizontal bar. This is a rewarding accomplishment that will get your shoulders developed like no other drill. Plus it’s practical and you’ll look awesome doing it.

So crawl and climb, and then climb and crawl some more to develop, sustain, and rehabilitate your shoulders!

More Like This:

• How to Self-Diagnose Your Shoulder Pain
• The Dynamic Duo of Shoulder Impingement
• How to Crawl Your Way Back to Shoulder Health
• New on Breaking Muscle Today

Photo 1 courtesy of By Dr. Johannes Sobotta, via Wikimedia Commons.

Photo 2 by Anatomography, via Wikimedia Commons.

Photo 3 by Anatomography, via Wikimedia Commons.

Photo 4 courtesy of Erwan LeCorre, from “The Practice of Natural Movement.“

The post Climb Your Way Up and Heal Your Neglected Shoulders appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

The shoulder area is one of the most neglected areas of the body, especially when an injury occurs and therapy is implemented. Many therapists like to isolate certain muscles, especially the rotator cuffs, even though our bodies never move in such isolated ways.

Moving naturally is not only one of the best ways to develop strong, stable, and mobile shoulders, but also to rehabilitate them if you’re recovering from an injury. In this article, I will discuss how to create superior mobility, stability, and strength in your shoulders using highly effective MovNat techniques.

Crawling is a safe, fun, and effective way to build strong, mobile shoulders.

Dissecting the Shoulder

Most people think of the shoulder as a muscle, but it’s actually an area, much like your groin. It’s comprised of three joints, three bones, and a lot of different muscle groups. It’s a dynamic area that, unfortunately, most people don’t use very well.

If you think about it, you can go about most of your day without using your shoulders fully. You often don’t have to reach too far over your actual head if you’re washing or brushing your hair. You might not need to reach behind you unless you’ve got a back itch. And why reach too far across your body when you can just move your body a bit more – reaching is just too much work!

“Crawling movements can be quite physically strenuous as it’s easy to increase the complexity by crawling up or down an incline or crawling on a natural surface such as a log.” 

Going through your day with limited range of motion and without full use of your shoulders is actually very easy – unless you’re doing some natural movements such as swimming, climbing, crawling, and throwing. If you want to improve your shoulders, your gait, and your entire body, then adding in these activities is ideal.

I’m going to focus on some specific muscles, as well as two of the three shoulder joints and how these relate to the natural movement skill of crawling. I’m going to discuss trigger points, too, as they are effective in healing injured muscles and fascia, as well as improving joint function even if there is no injury present.

The Orchesta of Shoulder Movement

When thinking of the shoulder joint, most people think of the rotator cuff muscles. The rotator cuff muscles are what most people injure, or at least think they injure. But there’s a lot more that can and does go wrong with the shoulder aside from a rotator cuff injury.

The three joints of the shoulder all need to work in harmony with one another, as they’re connected by fascia, ligaments, and muscles. Your right and left scapulas work for and against one another and, as I’ve mentioned in my articles on gait , your hips have a lot do with how your shoulders move – and, therefore, how you move.

Several muscles attach to and cross over the shoulder joint, making it one of the most complex areas of the body.

If you’re not moving well, then tendonitis, bursitis, and other ailments can arise. Maybe you suddenly can’t raise your arm above your head and there’s pain on the outside of your deltoid muscle. Typically, this is because the acromioclavicular (AC) joint is not moving freely. Of the three joints of the shoulder, the AC can most easily become problematic, resulting in inability to raise your arm over your head. If you can’t do that motion without pain, then that’s still a problem, too.

If you trace your collarbone (clavicle) to the outside toward your arm, you’re going to hit a little bump. This is the acromion of your scapula (shoulder blade). Now, if you come down and in a bit here at a 45-degree angle, you’ll find a dip. There you have what’s called your coracoid process. This coracoid process, along with the acromion, helps to stabilize your shoulder – and that’s important if you want to crawl and/or develop power in your shoulder.

“If you’re having a problem crawling, then look for trigger points in the serratus muscle, which for the most part will be over the sides of your body over your ribs.”

You’ve got three major muscles attaching to your coracoid process and, therefore, affecting your AC joint. One of your pectoralis muscles, your pec minor, spans up from your chest and inserts into that coracoid process. This muscle helps bring your arm forward and across your body. Also attaching to your coracoid process are your biceps, the short head of the biceps to be precise, responsible for flexion of the arm.

Finally, there is a very important muscle called your coracobrachialis. This is the muscle we associate when someone has pain while washing or combing his or her hair or if he or she just can’t get the arm up to that area. If your shoulder hurts when just raising your hand to your head, it’s probably this coracobrachialis muscle that’s to blame.

Locating Trigger Points

We can locate a trigger point that will help us when it comes to this coracobrachialis muscle. Again, come down from the end of your collarbone, dip down and in a bit, and right in the divot of your shoulder, where your pec comes into your shoulder joint, look for a tender area in there and rub that out. If you hold that area with some deep pressure and can move your arm more freely or with less pain, then you know you’re on the right track.

The Origin of Shoulder Stability

One major muscle that stabilizes the shoulder area is the serratus anterior muscle. It expands over the sides of the ribs and is responsible for a lot of pushing power – bringing your scapula forward. Think punching motions here, but also crawling. When crawling, you’re going to be using the serratus to support and stabilize your scapula and entire shoulder girdle.

The MovNat knee/elbow crawl is a fantastic way to restore scapular strength and stability.

If you’re having a problem crawling, then look for trigger points in the serratus muscle, which for the most part will be over the sides of your body over your ribs. You don’t have to go too far forward to find where the majority of the trigger points are, and you don’t have to go too far back. Like you did with the previous muscle, find that tender area and rub it out.

Crawling Techniques

So now that you know how your shoulder works and some techniques for freeing up both your muscle and movement. It’s time to get moving. One of the best ways to create some strength, mobility, and stability in the AC joint is to do some crawling. Crawling movements can be a great way to reestablish function and motor control, as well as improve core strength and posture.

The push/pull crawl is another excellent crawl variation for shoulder health.

Crawling movements can be quite physically strenuous as it’s easy to increase the complexity by crawling up or down an incline or crawling on a natural surface such as a log. The MovNat foot-hand crawl, which many think of as a bear crawl, is a great way to get some strength back in the shoulder area as well as stability.

There are also many other crawling motions to do, all of which will benefit your shoulder joints. So start crawling to regain your motion and strength in your shoulder joints.

Check out these related articles:

• Ground Control – How to Move Efficiently on All Fours
• Reset Your Mobility With These 3 Essential Movement Patterns
• Primal Move Workout – Mobility and Crawling
• What’s New On Breaking Muscle Today

Photo 1 courtesy of Emily Socolinksy at Fivex3 Training.

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Proper ankle mobility and stability will decrease your risk of injury and dictate, if you do fall, whether you get back up hobbling or not.

The Ankle Support System

Your ankle is supported with the help of sturdy ligaments whose job is to also provide mechanical feedback to the rest of your body so you can move smoothly and efficiently. These ligaments are a huge part of proprioception, which along with your eyes and inner ears let your brain know where you are in relation to your environment.

“When ankles become fatigued, they fail to provide the necessary feedback so our movements become slow, clumsy, and dampened.”

These ligaments help support muscles and tendons that store elastic energy for propulsion. They’re not meant for power. When ankles become fatigued, they fail to provide the necessary feedback so our movements become slow, clumsy, and dampened. A common sign of this is when one ankle easily rolls inward while landing during the gait cycle – maybe not to the point of injury (a sprain) but enough for you to take notice.

You may blame this occurrence on an uneven surface or some rocks you had to scurry across during a trail run, but the true cause comes down to the fact that your body is fatiguing. This is due to several reasons I will discuss, as your ankles are one of the first places to let you know your body is breaking down.

Stress + Excess Stimuli That Alter Proprioception = Injuries

Proprioception and kinesthesia are terms commonly used to describe position and movement:

• Proprioception is a sense of where your body is as determined by the conscious feedback it receives from muscular, tendon, and articular sources and the unconscious feedback from the cerebellum of your brain.
• Kinesthesia is a sense of that movement, also highly dependent on the information received from your tissues back to your nervous system.

The articular sources (joints) are supported by the ligaments that connect them. The amount of external stress your ligaments can handle will be influenced by the other aspects that affect position and movement. That means if there are tendon and muscular problems, which are common in athletes, there will be more stress to the joints and ligaments. It also means that other types of stress, both internal (e.g. poor lifestyle or diet) and external (e.g. past injuries and improper footwear), can affect proprioception and kinesthesia, and can therefore cause ligament problems.

“The amount of external stress your ligaments can handle will be influenced by the other aspects that affect position and movement.”

In addition to proprioception, body position and movement are also determined by your eyes and inner ear (vestibular system). Excessive stress to your nervous system can alter your body orientation and movement patterns. This can occur from too much training or racing, poor recovery, sleep, or diet. Eventually your eyes can lose fine focus throwing your balance off, and for those who race long hours in any event you know exactly how important this is.

This is why if you close your eyes, it’s much harder to keep your balance, especially if your musculoskeletal feedback system is fatigued (or simply not trained). Stand on one foot with your eyes open and then close your eyes and see how you do. Your balance should be equally as good, yet most people cannot balance and many fall over when they do this.

Muscle imbalances can occur in the head and neck region affecting the inner ear and thus altering body position and movement, too. Now more stress is placed on other tissues of the body, especially ligaments, as muscles and tendons fatigue. These tissues must work extra hard to control movement and posture. Next thing you know, you’re starting to trip on just slightly uneven surfaces and roll an ankle again and again. This is a perfect and rather common example of how a problem in one area of the body (head/neck) can affect a distant area (ankle/foot).

“Additionally, when running and jumping, energy is constantly stored and released in the connective tissues of the foot and especially the ankle. The weaker these tissues are, the less power and speed you will generate.”

Additionally, when running and jumping, energy is constantly stored and released in the connective tissues of the foot and especially the ankle. The weaker these tissues are, the less power and speed you will generate. Conventional footwear often alters proprioception significantly. This can not only result in weakened structural tissues, but also in poor balance and movement.

Orthotics can promote problems, too. If your body isn’t exactly sure how your foot is moving and how it is loading, unloading, and recovering with each and every step, you’re at a high risk for injury. Add in the chronic nervous system and hormonal stress most people are dealing with every day and you’re just waiting to injure your knee or roll an ankle.

Care for Your Ligaments

Ligaments do need some rehabilitation. Walking, standing, moving, and running (if you enjoy it) barefoot or in a shoe that does not alter biomechanics and proprioception are the simplest and most effective ways to aid in ligament repair and recovery, as well as increase overall strength.

“Trigger point work on ligaments is sometimes necessary, but you should be careful if you’re inexperienced and are performing this type of therapy on yourself as you can cause more damage.”

Balancing on one foot or walking across a flat board as we teach in MovNat is ideal for the further development of balance and connective tissue health. Of course, you should never stretch ligament injuries, as ligaments cannot retain their original shape and tension when stretched too much or too often past a certain point. Dynamic movements are good, but prolonged static stretches are not.

Trigger point work on ligaments is sometimes necessary, but you should be careful if you’re inexperienced and are performing this type of therapy on yourself as you can cause more damage. I often advise staying off the actual area where the injury is felt, and instead treat the surrounding “more meaty” muscles, and sometimes tendons. This helps get those tissues working again so the ligaments don’t need to do work they’re not meant to do. That means treating the calves and surrounding lower leg muscles rather than the actual ankle ligaments.

Move Your Whole Body

Focus on your whole body when you move, and even when you need to rehabilitate an area. We don’t move as isolated units. We are dynamic, versatile, vital human beings meant to adapt to a variety of surfaces and conditions. Train your body to do so by challenging it often in a natural environment and it’ll be ready for anything that comes your way.

You’ll Also Enjoy:

• Fix Your Weak Foundation: Your Ankles
• 2 Drills to Injury Proof Your Ankles
• Effects of Ankle Taping on Performance and Safety
• What’s New on Breaking Muscle Today

Photos courtesy of Shutterstock.

The post Build Strong and Stable Ankles for a Strong and Stable Body appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

If you do fall, how you land will greatly determine if you get injured or not. I recently saw a guy who slipped on ice and landed on the back of his head. That was his first point of contact and obviously not a good one. He’s suffering symptoms of a concussion, which for many can last a year if not longer. Some people die from similar falls.

So to lessen your chance of sustaining an injury, I want to first discuss how to walk on any surface, and particularly on ice, and then what to do if you happen to fall.

Walk Over Your Feet

You may have heard to “walk like a penguin” on ice as this puts your center of gravity more over the foot and leg that your weight is being transferred to (often your front leg). This is good advice because it stabilizes you more and your leg is not way out in front of you with your body left behind. Otherwise, your leg will go more forward on a slippery surface and you’ll go behind, perhaps on your behind.

Think about how you should always be walking if you move naturally in unaltered fashion. Your feet should contact the ground closer to where your center of mass is rather than extended forward. Many people have poor gait mechanics, either due to or exacerbated by poor footwear, so their leading leg extends out too far and they strike the ground with the back end of their heel. There is little support doing this and if the surface is slippery, then you can quickly lose your footing.

As you may imagine, the footwear of choice in the winter is something warm, like a boot, and these often have a thick heel. A thick heel is going to make it so your gait is extended – your stride will be longer than what it normally should be. Many people walk like this all the time because they’ve always worn such footwear. Take your shoes off and see how far you extend your leg out to walk. It won’t be nearly as far as if you have some thick-heeled shoes on.

“A thick heel is going to make it so your gait is extended – your stride will be longer than what it normally should be.”

If you’ve read anything about barefoot running or minimalism, then you’ve heard that when you run you should land more mid- or forefoot, as opposed to on your heel. When you walk, it’s rather normal to touch your heel, but striking hard with an over-extended leg is not a good thing, especially if you’re on ice.

You should softly land on the heel and then nicely roll forward and push off from the big toe. This double-contact phase recreates the arch and adds power and spring. That’s a healthier gait than striking hard on the heel, flopping your foot down, and then using more energy to push off on the toes. Actually, many people don’t even push off correctly. They sort of pick up their foot and carry it forward again.

So, yes, walk more forward over your feet when on ice. But when not on ice, don’t walk so far back.

Move Naturally on Every Surface

I’ve discussed the benefits of being barefoot in a previous article. It’s an essential first step if you want to move well. If your foot is moving as intended, it sends an accurate message to your brain and will tell you where you are at all times. This is because the mechanoreceptors on your feet are firing properly as you move.

Mechanoreceptors are sensory nerve receptors that respond to mechanical stimuli, such as pressure, touch, and movement. You want as much healthy sensory stimuli getting to your nervous system as possible. Put on a shoe that alters these mechanoreceptors and your brain will get confused.

“You want as much healthy sensory stimuli getting to your nervous system as possible. Put on a shoe that alters these mechanoreceptors and your brain will get confused.“

If your brain gets confused then your proprioception will be altered. Proprioception is the sense of where your body is as determined by the conscious feedback it receives from muscular, tendon, and articular sources and the unconscious feedback from the cerebellum of your brain. Your cerebellum plays a key role in your motor control, so it’s rather important if you chose to move well. If you get car sick, for example, you most likely have some cerebellum issues. If you get dizzy while rolling on the ground and it takes a while to get your bearings, then your cerebellum is compromised.

So basically, if your foot moves poorly, then your brain gets confused and your position is compromised. This might not affect you too much until you’re on an unstable surface such as uneven ground or, of course, ice.

Fall the Correct Way

If your brain and foot are in precise connection with one another, you’ll definitely increase your odds of getting down your icy steps and across your frozen driveway. But, hey, sometimes sh*t happens – you just aren’t paying attention and you slip. When I think of this and talk to patients about falling, one of my favorite movies, Joe Dirt, comes to mind, specifically where he said, “My neck broke my fall.” Don’t be like Joe Dirt and land on your head or neck.

In MovNat, we teach how to fall properly. This may sound silly at first, but it’s a great thing to learn. The more you practice, then the more likely this protective movement will become second nature to you if you really do fall. So practice falling – it’s also some great eccentric conditioning.

When you fall forward, (not as likely on ice, but it does happen), you want to land with your hands close together in front of your face, palms down. The harder you fall, the quicker this movement needs to happen. If you get to the point where your face might become part of impact, then you should turn your face to one side. The way to practice this is on some nice soft grass while facing up hill. The steeper the hill the better to start – you won’t have far to fall. You can even start while on your knees.

“When you fall forward, (not as likely on ice, but it does happen), you want to land with your hands close together in front of your face, palms down.“

If you feel like you’re falling more to the side and not as straight forward, then definitely do not reach out with an extended arm. This is how people break their clavicle (collarbone) all the time. It’s a good way to break your wrist, too. Ideally, you lightly touch with your hand and then quickly tuck that arm under you – way under your body – and roll to the back of your shoulder. So you’ll either roll some or land on your back.

If you fall backward, which is most common on ice, the first thing to do if you only do one thing is tuck your chin and keep your head up. This requires some neck strength. Strengthen your neck by lying on the ground, lifting your head, and holding it there for twenty to thirty seconds at a time. Also, as you fall backward, you will want to slap both your hands and forearms to the ground to help dissipate the shock of the impact – palms down and forearms flat. Your shoulders should stay off the ground, too, along with your neck and head.

Next month, I will discuss another important aspect of walking and moving well – your ankles. The stronger your ankles, the less likely you will be to tumble down.

You’ll Also Enjoy:

• Barefoot Basics: How to Regain Your Footing
• 4 Tips for Acclimating to Winter Training
• Fight the Freeze: Prevention and Treatment of Frostbite
• What’s New On Breaking Muscle Today

Photos courtesy of Shutterstock.

The post Breaking Your Fall: Gait Mechanics for Injury Prevention appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

Moving with good form requires the right kind of fuel. Simply look at triathletes finishing an Ironman or runners finishing a marathon. Often they are bent over, twisted, and shuffling. Their gait patterns have been broken. Their bodies have been broken.

You’d be surprised at how rapidly your gait falls apart when your gas tank is low.You may start out your run with fluid motion and with swift and efficient form. Yet after twenty or thirty minutes – or maybe at mile twenty, for you marathoners – you may look as though you ran through a minefield, dragging one leg, swinging one arm out to the other side, scuffing your heels, and drooping your head.And at the finish line, you look even worse as you’re leaning to one side or hunched over because your lower back is in agony.

Did an injury occur during your run? In a way, yes, but not so directly.

Consequences of Muscle Imbalance

When your body is stressed due to dehydration, glycogen depletion, and other nutrient imbalances, the muscles no longer have the correct fuel to keep them functioning at their best, so they fatigue. The glucose or fluid isn’t there to keep the muscles firing properly or maybe electrolytes are so depleted the muscles can’t contract as well as they should.

Hydration is much more than just taking in water. Your body has to absorb the water to use it. Fatigued adrenal glands from too much physical, nutritional, or emotional stress cause the body to lose excess sodium so it cannot hold onto the water. This makes sense to the person who drinks and drinks and drinks, but always feels thirsty or urinates often.

“Muscle imbalances result in gait imbalances. Gait imbalances essentially create biomechanical problems – stability, balance, and movement problems.

Athletes in this state are not only dehydrated, but their gait (and therefore exercise performance) is suffering. Any endurance athlete is familiar with white salt lines or caking on their cycling or running shorts. It’s a sign of too much sodium loss. These hydration issues and electrolyte imbalances result in muscle imbalances.

The muscle imbalances then result in gait imbalances. The gait imbalances essentially create biomechanical problems – stability, balance, and movement problems. Next thing you know, you’re injured (if not immediately, then soon enough).

The Insulin-Gait Link

Improper carbohydrate metabolism is another big factor that can affect gait. Insulin resistance occurs when a person is making too much insulin because their body is no longer responding to the current hormone level needed to get the job done. It often occurs from consuming too many refined sugars and flours, but can also be from too many carbohydrates in general.

The pancreas must manufacture more and more insulin to process the same amount of glucose that it once only used a little amount to handle. Over time, the pancreas becomes less efficient in metabolizing the carbohydrates, so too much insulin is produced and the person winds up with signs and symptoms of blood-sugar handling problems. These include irritability, cravings for sweets, excessive appetite, afternoon drowsiness or headaches, getting the shakes, and trouble sleeping, just to mention a few.

“Many people who go off their high-carbohydrate diet resolve most of their aches and pains for this reason. Adjusting your diet away from bagel-and-sugary-coffee breakfasts most likely will result in dramatic changes in your health and performance.”

These people also have irregular gait patterns, which explain why most, if not all of these individuals, have some chronic ache, pain, or injury. Essentially, insulin levels affect how you move.

This insulin-gait link is a relatively new concept to most. If it’s too radical a concept for some (perhaps you), then look at it from a strictly neurological perspective. High levels of insulin affect the brain directly – not just mental function, but also physical function. Of course, a healthy, functioning brain is needed to move, so the more the brain is lacking proper nutrition, then the more it will be impaired, and therefore gait will suffer.

Many people who go off their high-carbohydrate diet resolve most of their aches and pains for this reason. Adjusting your diet away from bagel-and-sugary-coffee breakfasts most likely will result in dramatic changes in your health and performance.

The double-edged sword is seen when you add the fact that under high-stress situations, such as overtraining, the body makes too much cortisol, which in turn raises insulin levels, at least in the short term. So not only does the burden of high insulin levels need to be dealt with, but chronic hormonal stress will lead to weakened ligaments (that’s what high cortisol levels do), muscle breakdown, and inflammation.

When to Eat to Move Your Best

Gait is affected by insulin levels so much that it is important to not only know what to eat or drink, but also when to do so. One major mistake many endurance athletes make is that they drink a carbohydrate solution right up until the start of a race.

“Gait is affected by insulin levels so much that it is important to not only know what to eat or drink, but also when to do so.”

I have seen people at the start of a half marathon or Ironman race packing in the fluid replacement drinks or, even worse, consuming a gel pack. They have quickly increased their blood sugar and insulin levels and begun the sugar-burning process despite the fact the race will demand the majority of energy come from the body’s plentiful fat stores, as in any aerobic activity. An improper gait usually follows, and natural movement is now lost.

The proper thing to do is stop all carbohydrate consumption one hour prior to your event. Then, do not consume any carbohydrates until at least fifteen to thirty minutes into the race. After fifteen minutes, thebody’s cells will respond to glucose without the insulin surge from the carbohydrate consumption. At the end of the event,especially those lasting well over one hour, try to consume the majority of your carbohydrates within sixty minutes, as well as some protein.

Eat Well to Move Well

Remember, muscle imbalances can come from everything and anything – and most often are a result of too much stress (including excess training) and a poor diet. Consuming too much refined sugar or inflammatory-type fats, such as refined vegetable oils or hydrogenated fats, will result in muscle imbalances and therefore trigger points (in essence, an injury).

“Remember, muscle imbalances can come from everything and anything – and most often are a result of too much stress (including excess training) and a poor diet.”

Training too hard (many high-intensity workouts) or getting inadequate recovery (or poor sleep) will also cause various muscle imbalances. These most commonly occur in the knee, lower leg, ankle, and foot and result in injuries and trigger points. Yes, the trigger points need to be addressed, but it is as important, if not more, to address why they’re there. These are concepts traditional medicine does not recognize or understand.

The reality is, many people, including “fit athletes” eat poorly, are under substantial stress, and train improperly. So, what happens? Well, they get injured. The injury is a result of biomechanical imbalances that affect natural movement. To avoid this vicious cycle, adhere to a proper diet and, in turn, your body will move much more efficiently.

You Might Also Enjoy:

• How to Use Manual Therapy to Restore Essential Gait Mechanics
• How to Move Better and Relieve Pain
• Shred-telligent Design: How to Ramp Up Your Major Lifts
• What’s New on Breaking Muscle UK Today

Photos courtesy of Shutterstock.

The post Understand the Link Between What you Eat and How You Move appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

You’d be surprised at how rapidly your gait falls apart when your gas tank is low. You may start out your run with fluid motion and with swift and efficient form. Yet after twenty or thirty minutes – or maybe at mile twenty, for you marathoners – you may look as though you ran through a minefield, dragging one leg, swinging one arm out to the other side, scuffing your heels, and drooping your head. And at the finish line, you look even worse as you’re leaning to one side or hunched over because your lower back is in agony.

Did an injury occur during your run? In a way, yes, but not so directly.

Consequences of Muscle Imbalance

When your body is stressed due to dehydration, glycogen depletion, and other nutrient imbalances, the muscles no longer have the correct fuel to keep them functioning at their best, so they fatigue. The glucose or fluid isn’t there to keep the muscles firing properly or maybe electrolytes are so depleted the muscles can’t contract as well as they should.

Hydration is much more than just taking in water. Your body has to absorb the water to use it. Fatigued adrenal glands from too much physical, nutritional, or emotional stress cause the body to lose excess sodium so it cannot hold onto the water. This makes sense to the person who drinks and drinks and drinks, but always feels thirsty or urinates often.

“Muscle imbalances result in gait imbalances. Gait imbalances essentially create biomechanical problems – stability, balance, and movement problems.

Athletes in this state are not only dehydrated, but their gait (and therefore exercise performance) is suffering. Any endurance athlete is familiar with white salt lines or caking on their cycling or running shorts. It’s a sign of too much sodium loss. These hydration issues and electrolyte imbalances result in muscle imbalances.

The muscle imbalances then result in gait imbalances. The gait imbalances essentially create biomechanical problems – stability, balance, and movement problems. Next thing you know, you’re injured (if not immediately, then soon enough).

The Insulin-Gait Link

Improper carbohydrate metabolism is another big factor that can affect gait. Insulin resistance occurs when a person is making too much insulin because their body is no longer responding to the current hormone level needed to get the job done. It often occurs from consuming too many refined sugars and flours, but can also be from too many carbohydrates in general.

The pancreas must manufacture more and more insulin to process the same amount of glucose that it once only used a little amount to handle. Over time, the pancreas becomes less efficient in metabolizing the carbohydrates, so too much insulin is produced and the person winds up with signs and symptoms of blood-sugar handling problems. These include irritability, cravings for sweets, excessive appetite, afternoon drowsiness or headaches, getting the shakes, and trouble sleeping, just to mention a few.

“Many people who go off their high-carbohydrate diet resolve most of their aches and pains for this reason. Adjusting your diet away from bagel-and-sugary-coffee breakfasts most likely will result in dramatic changes in your health and performance.”

These people also have irregular gait patterns, which explain why most, if not all of these individuals, have some chronic ache, pain, or injury. Essentially, insulin levels affect how you move.

This insulin-gait link is a relatively new concept to most. If it’s too radical a concept for some (perhaps you), then look at it from a strictly neurological perspective. High levels of insulin affect the brain directly – not just mental function, but also physical function. Of course, a healthy, functioning brain is needed to move, so the more the brain is lacking proper nutrition, then the more it will be impaired, and therefore gait will suffer.

Many people who go off their high-carbohydrate diet resolve most of their aches and pains for this reason. Adjusting your diet away from bagel-and-sugary-coffee breakfasts most likely will result in dramatic changes in your health and performance.

The double-edged sword is seen when you add the fact that under high-stress situations, such as overtraining, the body makes too much cortisol, which in turn raises insulin levels, at least in the short term. So not only does the burden of high insulin levels need to be dealt with, but chronic hormonal stress will lead to weakened ligaments (that’s what high cortisol levels do), muscle breakdown, and inflammation.

When to Eat to Move Your Best

Gait is affected by insulin levels so much that it is important to not only know what to eat or drink, but also when to do so. One major mistake many endurance athletes make is that they drink a carbohydrate solution right up until the start of a race.

“Gait is affected by insulin levels so much that it is important to not only know what to eat or drink, but also when to do so.”

I have seen people at the start of a half marathon or Ironman race packing in the fluid replacement drinks or, even worse, consuming a gel pack. They have quickly increased their blood sugar and insulin levels and begun the sugar-burning process despite the fact the race will demand the majority of energy come from the body’s plentiful fat stores, as in any aerobic activity. An improper gait usually follows, and natural movement is now lost.

The proper thing to do is stop all carbohydrate consumption one hour prior to your event. Then, do not consume any carbohydrates until at least fifteen to thirty minutes into the race. After fifteen minutes, the body’s cells will respond to glucose without the insulin surge from the carbohydrate consumption. At the end of the event, especially those lasting well over one hour, try to consume the majority of your carbohydrates within sixty minutes, as well as some protein.

Eat Well to Move Well

Remember, muscle imbalances can come from everything and anything – and most often are a result of too much stress (including excess training) and a poor diet. Consuming too much refined sugar or inflammatory-type fats, such as refined vegetable oils or hydrogenated fats, will result in muscle imbalances and therefore trigger points (in essence, an injury).

“Remember, muscle imbalances can come from everything and anything – and most often are a result of too much stress (including excess training) and a poor diet.”

Training too hard (many high-intensity workouts) or getting inadequate recovery (or poor sleep) will also cause various muscle imbalances. These most commonly occur in the knee, lower leg, ankle, and foot and result in injuries and trigger points. Yes, the trigger points need to be addressed, but it is as important, if not more, to address why they’re there. These are concepts traditional medicine does not recognize or understand.

The reality is, many people, including “fit athletes” eat poorly, are under substantial stress, and train improperly. So, what happens? Well, they get injured. The injury is a result of biomechanical imbalances that affect natural movement. To avoid this vicious cycle, adhere to a proper diet and, in turn, your body will move much more efficiently.

You Might Also Enjoy:

• How to Use Manual Therapy to Restore Essential Gait Mechanics
• How to Move Better and Relieve Pain
• Shred-telligent Design: How to Ramp Up Your Major Lifts
• What’s New on Breaking Muscle Today

Photos courtesy of Shutterstock.

The post You Move As Well As You Eat: The Link Between Food and Gait appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

Many people have poor gait mechanics that limit their ability to perform to their fullest potential. Sometimes this limitation results in pain. Other times there may be no pain, but perhaps diminished power, speed, or strength.

Gait is really how we move in any environment, hopefully in a natural movement. There will always be times when movement isn’t quite “natural,” such as skiing or rowing. But by adapting to our environment we can move efficiently and effectively.

RELATED: How Gait and Posture Change With Age and Exercise

The loss of proper gait often comes from injury patterns, both past and present, poor movement habits developed over time, and overall health. Believe it or not, your health and particularly your nutrition can actually influence your gait.

Refocus on the Mind-Body Connection

Natural gait movements are essential not just for proper joint mechanics, but also for a healthy nervous system. Take, for example, a quadrapedal motion (QM), such as the MovNat foot-hand crawl. This cross-crawl pattern is something we’ve all probably done in our lives, but most likely not for a long time.

When you revisit this movement as an adult, you’ve got to focus on it to redevelop the pattern. Perform the movement going backwards and you really have to concentrate until your nervous system picks up the pattern and takes over. If your body is stressed out for whatever reason, the motion will be more difficult to do, and may prove impossible for some.

FREE WORKOUT: Regain Your Original Strength Through Crawling

Who hasn’t looked right when someone asked you to look left? Or been asked to step forward with your left leg, yet you step with your right? Many doctors, including myself, would call this neurological disorganization, and it’s a sign something is taxing the health of the nervous system. Performing a cross-crawl pattern like a foot-hand crawl forward, and especially backward, is not only a great exercise for your muscular and cardiovascular systems, but it’s also a great way to improve the health of your nervous system. 

“Muscle imbalances, often due to past and present injuries, are a major reason for gait disturbances.”

Sometimes these patterns just don’t work right, and no matter what coaching cues you receive you can’t get it. Maybe it’s because you’re in pain. Or maybe it’s because your nervous system is too stressed – it’s essentially disorganized – and natural movements are a long forgotten pattern. Often this problem is because of injuries or dietary issues causing muscle imbalances (more on the nutrition aspect in my next article).

Muscle Imbalances and Gait Imbalances

Muscle imbalances, often due to past and present injuries, are a major reason for gait disturbances. These muscle imbalances will almost always have some trigger point associated with them, either in the muscle itself, or perhaps distant from that muscle, making it sometimes difficult to figure out a treatment point.

RELATED: You’re Not Getting Stronger Because You Don’t Know How to Move

Trigger points are termed as hyperirritable points in the muscle and fascial matrix that alter nervous system function and can therefore alter gait. They are described as hard nodules, tight bands of fiber, or “knots” in the muscle or fascia.

Where there is a gait disturbance, muscles are (ab)normally working against one another – for example, a hamstring and a quadriceps. But opposite limb joints can be also get of sync – for example, a left hip and a right shoulder. Stretching will not change a muscle that is neurologically facilitated (in spasm) and exercise of any type will not benefit a muscle that is neurologically inhibited (weak) more than temporarily.

Many hold onto the belief that these approaches provide healing benefits, but the balance of muscle function, and therefore the balance of gait, comes after muscle function is restored via manual therapy techniques such as trigger point therapy.

“Trying to push through and alter the gait to make it look better when you have muscle imbalances is like painting over rust.” 

Trigger Points

A trigger point is more often in the inhibited muscle. That’s the one that feels weaker to you. Many want to treat the muscle that feels tight and is perhaps in spasm, so they stretch and do some deep pressure therapy in that muscle. But this often does nothing but perhaps temporarily relieve pain. Mechanical sensory receptors, after all, are larger than pain receptors. So any direct therapy to an area will typically provide some pain relief, even if it’s temporary.

But instead of this, look for the trigger point in the muscle you feel isn’t functioning well or in an area that, when you hold a specific point (the trigger point), you experience more range of motion. For example, if you are having trouble raising your arm over your head and your deltoid is just killing you, press with the fingers of your other hand into various areas of that delt and the surrounding muscles. Find one that helps you raise your arm higher. That’s the treatment point.

“The loss of proper gait often comes from injury patterns, both past and present, poor movement habits developed over time, and overall health. “

Ideally, when you treat a trigger point, you’re pressing on it just hard enough, but not too hard. It’s something you have to get a feel for, and it can sometimes be difficult to do on yourself. You can hold a trigger point, rub it in a circular motion (either direction), or work the trigger point in a back-and-forth direction. One method may provide a better result than another on a case-by-case basis.

RELATED: 7 Essential Elements of Rest and Recovery

Apply pressure or rub out the trigger point for at least ten to thirty seconds. If the pain is improving as you treat the point, then continue until there is no further relief. Sometimes you can actually feel the trigger point disappear beneath your fingers.

Start With the Basics

Trying to push through and alter the gait to make it look better when you have muscle imbalances is like painting over rust. The rust prevails. This is not to say you shouldn’t work on form. It is necessary to some degree. But it is to say your gait is a significant reflection of your overall health and fitness. The wonderful thing about gait is that when it’s all working correctly, performance takes off and you’ll feel better overall.

So work on correcting muscle imbalances with the method I described and see how it affects your overall gait. Then practice various gait skills often – not just walking, but crawling, running, swimming, climbing, and pretty much everything that moves your body.

Next time, I’ll discuss how a proper diet and nutrition are essential to proper gait mechanics.

Photos courtesy of MovNat.

The post How to Use Manual Therapy to Restore Essential Gait Mechanics appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

Do you think you’re moving as well with shoes on as you could be without them? You’re most likely not. Furthermore, if you think you’re moving even somewhat normally with orthotics or some silly arch supports, then you’re really deceiving yourself.

Move Naturally Barefoot

Most humans have essentially lost their ability to support themselves without secondary support, either because of poorly developed biomechanics or underlying health problems. Walking or running barefoot is an ideal way to improve your proprioception (sense of position) and kinesthetic sense (the feedback your nervous system receives from your feet).

Natural, unaltered motions of the human body provide optimal neurological input resulting in optimal biomechanical output. That’s just a fancy way of saying, “The better you allow your body to move, the better it will let you move.” Natural movement starts with removing anything unnatural between your feet and the ground.

RELATED: Train Barefoot to Increase Your Lifts and Avoid Injury

Bare Your Foot

You may not wish to go barefoot, but you should be able to. If you’ve been wearing traditional shoes for some time, you will need to gradually transition into barefoot, but a healthy person can achieve this feat. You have to work your way toward barefoot just as you do health – they are both processes.

Most footwear, and especially inserts such as arch supports and orthotics, negatively alters nerves called mechanoreceptors. Mechanoreceptors are sensory nerve receptors that respond to mechanical stimuli, such as pressure, touch, and movement. You want as much healthy sensory stimuli getting to your nervous system, which includes your brain, as possible. This is what awakens and vitalizes your nervous system, and this is accomplished by interacting with your environment.

“If you’re wearing orthotics, talk to your prescribing doctor about weaning out of them so you can walk naturally again and not support your dysfunction – that’s essentially what orthotics do.”

But there is a fine line between too much and not enough sensory stimulation, and the source from which those signals come matters, too. Many people are already in such a state of sensory overload from excessive lifestyle stresses that they can’t tolerate walking barefoot because the added mechanoreceptor stimulation and kinesthetic sense excites their nervous system too much, too fast.

So people dampen this system with either conventional footwear or orthotics, and they feel better for it. But dampening the mechanoreceptor activity because of too much external “noise” is not the way to correct the problem. It just temporarily hides it. This is not much different than calming your nervous system with alcohol at the end of a long exhausting day at work. (Please, no comments saying I’m linking orthotic use to alcoholism.)

PROPRIOCEPTION IN TRAINING: How to Cure a “Motor Idiot”

Orthotics Support Your Unnatural Dysfunction

Many people wear orthotics or various types of “arch supports” because they either have flat feet or pain in their arches. Some people have never fully developed the arches in their foot, often due to poor footwear. Many adults have what appears to be an arch when they are non-weight bearing, but the arch flattens or fatigues when they stand due to muscle, tendon, and ligament weakness in the lower leg and foot.

“Most humans have essentially lost their ability to support themselves without secondary support, either because of poorly developed biomechanics or underlying health problems.”

The problem with orthotics and arch supports is they don’t support the arch of the foot where it actually needs to be supported. To properly support any arch, such as a bridge over water or the arch of the foot, either end of the open space should be supported. In the case of the foot, the heel and the forefoot should be supported, not the space in-between the ends.

FLAT FEET? Causes and Treatment for Fallen Arches

To truly strengthen the entire foot and all the arches, it’s important to position the foot correctly at all times. This means the heel should be flat on the ground, as should the forefoot (think barefoot or zero-drop) and the toes should be allowed to naturally splay apart. Typical shoes with a heel higher than the forefoot and a narrow toe box will only further weaken the foot and arch, especially with the addition of an open-space arch support or orthotic. This all means your movement will be anything but natural.

Transitioning Toward Barefoot

Yes, too many people are getting injured by switching from their current footwear to minimalist footwear or even barefoot. This gives the traditional medical doctor, podiatrist, or therapist reason to believe that humans today are not meant to be barefoot and that we need to protect our feet with more supportive shoes.

I get a fair share of hate mail from these people who think that because we don’t live in wild jungles we need support on our feet to get through the day on our unnatural surfaces. Of course, I don’t agree with this, but the typical unhealthy person who has always worn supportive footwear or orthotics can’t make the shift in a drastic manner. Many of them do, and subsequently get injured. When the doctors and therapists see these people in their office, rather than educating the patient on overall health, (diet, lifestyle, and foot care), they convince him or her that going barefoot is evil and humans need shoes all the time.

“If barefoot is bothersome to you outside then use a minimalist shoe at first.”

You must transition to barefoot slowly and carefully so you do not become injured. Start by walking barefoot inside your house as much as you comfortably can. Natural movement doesn’t necessarily need to be difficult or strenuous. If it’s painful, then you can start with a minimalist-type (transitional) shoe and eventually work out of those toward being barefoot. It’s okay and often advised to alternate between your current traditional shoes and a minimalist shoe/barefoot if you have pain.

READY TO GET STARTED? 2 Rules For Beginning Barefoot Running

If you’re wearing orthotics, talk to your prescribing doctor about weaning out of them so you can walk naturally again and not support your dysfunction – that’s essentially what orthotics do. If your doctor doesn’t think it’s possible for you to rehab your feet in such a way, then I’d find another doc, unless your situation truly warrants a supportive device (which is rare).

Practicing Barefoot Movement

Once you can comfortably walk barefoot, then work on MovNat balancing drills depending on your current skill level.

Next, venture outside onto hard, smooth surfaces such as a driveway. Yeah, that might not be natural, but you can’t just head into the woods barefoot if you’re used to living in a zoo-human world. Slowly build up barefoot time as comfortably as you can. Eventually make your way onto other surfaces such as grass and gravel. Of course, make sure these areas are safe to walk on. If barefoot is bothersome to you outside then use a minimalist shoe at first.

After you’re walking barefoot outside comfortably, then try a bit of barefoot running on a flat, hard surface. Don’t do too much at first or you’re likely to quickly develop sore feet and calves, and nobody wants to hear your whining.

Over time, your body, especially your nervous system, will thrive more than you could ever expect.

Photos courtesy of Shutterstock.

The post Barefoot Basics: How to Regain Your Footing appeared first on Breaking Muscle.