By Dr. Shayne Baylis, Doc Hockey
“Hi, can I help you?”
“Yes, is this the massage booth? My son just raced and would like to get a massage.”
“Well, Active Release Technique is like a therapeutic sports massage geared to specific areas of complaint.”
“Oh, my son does not have any injuries.”
“Your son looks like a good athlete, is he able to touch his toes?”
(Son reaches down, 8 inches from the ground)
“That is not good! How old is he?”
“12 years old.”
“He should have better flexibility than that. I worry about future injury.”
This was just one conversation I had with a parent who was at the Brockville triathlon last year with her son.
We all seem to think we don’t have a problem unless we can physically see it or we feel some sort of pain and discomfort.
I am often asked about stretching and consistently have people telling me they stretch all the time but do not seem to be making any gains in flexibility. If we are all really healthy and had normal muscle tissue, stretching would be perfect and everyone would be more flexible by just stretching.
However, we have a substance called adhesion, or scar tissue, that accumulates in our soft tissues (muscles, ligaments, fascia, nerves) decreasing our flexibility, weakening our muscles, and causing pain in our body.
Therapy helps performance
When stretching, we are basically only lengthening our healthy normal muscle tissue, but this is not able to break down the limiting factor that is adhesion. The adhesion is caused by a repetitive contraction or long holding postures, like sitting, that decrease the oxygen to the muscles.
Without the flexibility, there is more pressure placed on the joints and injury is more likely to occur. This is why it is so critical for the athletes to have a good soft-tissue therapist to maintain good flexibility and force production for speed and strength during performance.
Dynamic stretch key to warmup
When asked about stretching before and after activity, I propose to warm up with the activity you are going to do. Running you jog, skating you skate.
When I do stretching before activity I focus on the major muscle groups (quads, hamstrings, groins, calves, glutes etc.) utilizing a dynamic stretch where I stretch until I feel the tension in the muscle and then I back off and repeat for 10 reps.
Static stretching with long holds before activity can actually decrease your power and speed. I perform 10-metre sprints 25%, 50%, 75%, 100%, then 5 forward long jumps, 5 side jumps (both sides), 5 backward jumps.
These are all done just before activity or the game to warm muscles and especially to excite the nervous system. That’s why sprinters do the high knee jumps rapidly just before racing.
After exercise, I will then perform static stretching with long holds and will flush out the muscles with a foam roller for better muscle recovery.
If you are unable to touch your toes or you want a little more information on flexibility and health, come to Fit Day at the Ottawa Convention Centre on Saturday, June 16th and visit Doc Hockey and the Orleans Chiropractic Booth.
Visit dochockey.ca for more information.