Injury Prevention, part 2

Yesterday we discussed in-workout strategies for injury prevention.  Today we’ll look at general lifestyle choices that help.

The first big thing to do to prevent injury is to get enough sleep.  Tired people make mistakes and workout mistakes make injuries.  Getting enough sleep can be a challenge in our all-hustle-all-the-time culture, but please, let’s fight the dominant paradigm enough to get our rest.  It’s worth it.

 

Another basic choice for injury prevention is proper nutrition.  When we don’t have the nutrients we need to build our bodies or to run our cellular processes, we are less resilient, more likely to get hurt, and more likely to take a long time to heal.  Our bodies can only run so long on caffeine and sugar.  Throw the cells a vegetable now and then, please.

 

Another thing we can do to help keep ourselves injury free is to reduce our overall muscle tension.  The cheap way to do that is to spend quality time with a foam roller or tune-up balls.  The luxurious way is to make massage a habit.  The time and money we spend on relaxing are investments in our wellbeing.

 

So:  sleep, eat, relax.

Injury Prevention, Part 1

We’re going to spend a couple of days talking about injury prevention.  Today we’re focusing on things to do during our workouts that help and tomorrow we’ll talk about lifestyle changes that keep us less likely to get hurt.

The first thing we want to do in our workouts to prevent injury is to warm up.  I have to admit that I was a slow adopter of warm-ups.  Some of that is just that I was younger then and my body was more forgiving.  And, even if I wasn’t a big believer in it, it doesn’t mean that my body didn’t have to warm up; my movement naturally got better and bigger and stronger once my body warmed up by doing whatever I was going to be doing anyway.  Those of us who are smarter than I used to be will want to do an intentional warm-up of at least five minutes before jumping into the main part of our workout.  Gentle cardio, some stretching, and a few body weight exercises are good choices for that.

 

We also want to protect vulnerable body parts.  What that means will vary with our bodies.  Some of us will need to be extra careful about having supportive shoes.  Others of us will want our ankle support or our wrist support.  Obviously, the bikers among us need to wear helmets.  We may also want to use some kinesiology tape to increase blood flow to particular areas.

 

During those workouts, we want to ensure that we spend some time working on core and balance work.  Practicing balance helps us prepare for life’s little surprises.  A strong core means that we can react gracefully to whatever comes along.

 

Proper form is crucial to injury prevention.  When, say, we do our lunges without paying attention to knee alignment, we add strain to our knee ligaments.  Similarly, a lack of focus on glute engagement can put pressure on our knees.  We want to work with our best possible alignment from top to bottom to make our movements as efficient and safe as possible.

 

Finally, we want to make sure we stretch.  Flexibility training gives us the appropriate range of motion to do our workouts safely.

 

Now go play.

Monday Workout: Planes!

We are working in every plane this week: sagittal, frontal, and transverse.  In other words, we’re going back and forth, side to side, and twisting!  This, plus the asymmetric exercises, will help with our balance and core control.  Three rounds.

 

jacks	30
renegade rows	20
pushups	10
overhead curtsy	30
deadlifts	20
1 leg squat	10
side lunge 1 arm row/raise	30
lateral raise	20
brains	10

 

The Amazing Stickie and Multiplanar Lunges with Reach

The Amazing Stickie loves making a basic exercise more challenging.  Today she is doing multiplanar lunges with reaches.  What that means is that she takes her basic front lunge, side lunge, and transverse lunge (or curtsy) and adds a reach with her upper body toward the floor.  It makes the movement bigger, which means it’s harder.  Additionally, it shifts the body weight more, making it more of a core challenge to return to the starting position.  She usually does a set of five in each direction.

Stand!

A lot of us have back pain and tight shoulders and hips that creak and stiff legs.  One possible culprit?  Too much sitting.

Those of us who commute don’t have too much choice.  We’re stuck in that car for as long as we have to be.  Then, when we arrive, we’re often stuck at our desks.  We get home and we plop on the couch for yet more sitting.

 

We may not be able to fix all of that, but there are a few things we can do.  Desks that adjust to allow us to stand or sit are really useful.  Failing that, we can choose to walk over to talk to our coworkers rather than call them or message them.  We can make sure we drink plenty of water—standing up and taking a bathroom break is a guaranteed way to keep us from sitting for too long at a stretch.

 

Our lives are designed to keep us sitting a lot.  We have to tweak that design where we can to allow our bodies to move like they prefer to do!

Mom Says

Our moms probably just wanted some space when they told us to go outside and play.  Kid noise isn’t as intense when it isn’t bouncing off the walls.  But even if that was the whole reason, our moms were on to something.

Today, I’m everybody’s mom:  go outside and play.

 

We human animals need natural light.  It helps us sleep better and have more energy while we’re awake.  We need fresh air.  We need movement.

 

For bonus points, we can find some nature to hang out in.  We were not designed for concrete living.  A glimpse of sky and some trees or flowers will do us a world of good.

 

If you need a “scientific” reason, it’s about the Vitamin D, which we get from the sun.

Monday Workout: Sideways!

Working in the frontal plane (that is, side to side, like we do with squat to leg lift) is goo practice for when life goes sideways on us.  Three rounds.

 

kb alternate arm swing	30
kb hammer curl	20
kb halo	10
squat to leg lift	30
bench press	20
skullcrushers	10
mountain climbers	30
flies	20
V sit press	10