Don't Allow Your Athletic Posture Become Your Daily Living Posture

There is a quote that has been rattling around in my head for a while,

so long in fact I have it a little mixed up and am no longer even

convinced of the source.

However, it's a quote I have paraphrased a lot, especially these last

couple of weeks with a number of clients.

"Do not allow your athletic posture become your everyday posture" -

possibly from Grey Cook and butchered by Dave Hedges.....

If someone has heard this and has confirmation of both the source and

correct wording, I'd be grateful if you'd pass it on, google has come up

short so far.

Anyhow, sources and diction aside, what does it mean and why is it

important?

In short, all sports have strengths and weaknesses.

Some sports are one sided

Some sports favour certain positions

For example, if you're a Golfist, you'll likely always swing the club in

the same direction, usually left to right

If you're a Tennis player, you strike the ball with the right hand (yes,

I'm generalising for right handed folk simply because there are more of

you, doesn't mean I don't know about you lefties)

Striking martial arts folk tend to favour a particular leg forward

Grapplers live in scapula protraction

And we could go on.

These positions and movements mentioned are perfect for the activity,

but may not be ideal for outside of said activity.

Many is the time I would have a Muay Thai fighter come to me with a sore

shoulder or knee.

It would plague them all day, even affect their sleep.

These flare ups usually happened in the lead up to a fight when the

training became more voluminous and more intense

Yet, they mostly didn't notice it in training.

And when I asked them to take a fighting stance, they suddenly looked

relaxed and comfortable, pain no longer felt

This athletic posture had become their default position

The exact same thing happened when a young Olympic Lifter was brought to

me for back pain.

This lad was a horse of a man, dwarfing me. But had back pain on one

side that he just couldn't shift no matter who he saw, and he'd been to

every therapist in his area.

I checked his posture and noticed his pelvis sat a bit shifted and bit

hiked on one side.

No matter what we looked at, it wouldn't come level.

Until I asked him to show me his catch position on the Jerk.

And this lad could Jerk my Deadlift, he was a big boy.

So he got into the catch, essentially a lunge position, and I checked him.

Plumbline.

Hips level, spine straight, pain not present.

This position was his place of safety. This is where he was used to

catching massive amounts of force.

His nervous system wanted him here as it's likely where it felt the most

safe.

Lifting posture became living posture, it became a "training scar"

Stories like these fascinate me and I could go on.

I had a hockey player the other day, similar story

Hurler, similar story

Each person may receive their own individual interventions, as their

body and symptoms require, but the nature of the issue was always the same.

This is why we do supplemental training in the gym.

It's why we do mobility and things like the 100 Rep Warm up

(https://youtu.be/HrgizUMCY0A?si=Sp80CkD0DKs-abyR) to remind the body to

move in all manner of ways.

To remind the "somatosensory cortex" that joints can and should access

both ends of their movement spectrum

And then adding load by way of lifting weights, well that ought to

strengthen all these movement patterns.

For our Olympic Lifting kid, who's sport IS lifting weights, I advised

him to spend some time lifting "goofy" ie opposite foot forward. Of

course this is to be done during off-season or well away from

competition times.

As a basic rule, keep the gym training as general as possible, forget

this idea of sports specific training, it's nonsense.

The sport specific training is the training for the sport.

The gym is about strength, mobility and endurance.

It's as much about filling the gaps left by the sport as it is prepping

you for the sport

And the prep is mostly done by way of ensuring good movement mechanics,

good force production and good energy system development.

Skills are not improved in the gym, that done out in the arena,

Now, as always this is your newsletter, for you, so have your say.

Hit reply and send in your questions, your comments.

Hit forward and share it with someone who you think may benefit from

this information

And I'll chat soon

Oh, and before I forget, all Online Training clients should be getting

an invite to an Online Meet Up to get together and discuss who the

training is going. I have promised this in the past but not followed

through, but as several folk have asked for better accountability, this

is how we're doing it.

What I want is for this to become a peer support call, yes, I'll do the

expert bit, but you checking in and and chatting with fellow trainees is

where the gold lies.

You can have the craic, brag about PR's, ask questions about your

program and much more.

I don't expect everyone to show up every week, maybe only show up if you

have things to say or ask, but it would be great to see you there.

Non Online training folk, I may allow you lot to all join in maybe once

per month as an open forum chat. What do you think?

Chat soon

--

Regards

Dave Hedges

www.DaveHedges.net

Box 7, The Cube, 2 Coalisland Road · Dungannon, Co Tyrone BT71 6JT · United Kingdom

Pete asks: "What's your broad advice to start moving?"

This is a great question in from Pete:

"Hey Dave Long time no speak, here's a question for you

And it relates to myself in particular, but would cover a broad audience.

Background: Completely sedentary life, due to working long hours at a computer, 5 days a week, etc. "Living time" is very minimal, you could call it physical fatigue, brought about due to mental fatigue, i.e literally no motivation to move beyond turning off computers, and vegging. Medical complication: Recently knackered left knee due to moving house, crutches, stretch exercises done to get flexibility back up Question: With myself, and plenty of others living a mostly sedentary life, what would your broad advice be to get people up and moving. Is it a case of going for a simple walk, or mentally preparing oneself to literally "move".

--------------------------------------

Hope all is well with you Pete (yes the long haired git that used to be at the lunchtime sessions at Wild Geese)"

First of all, of course I remember you mate, and I'm delighted you still receive these emails and took the time to reach out with your question.

Now, of course, I responded to Pete privately before writing this, but like Pete says, this is a topic that reaches across a broad spectrum of the population.

Let's divide the population up into broad categories to help illustrate a point.

1. People who were athletic as kids and maintained a training habit their whole lives

2. People who were athletic as kids and gave up due to college/career etc and came back later in life

3. People who were athletic as kids and gave up due to injury, not trying to get back

4. People who weren't athletic as kids but got into training later in life and are struggling to develop a foundation

5. People who were never athletic as kids and are now looking to stave off age related decline

These are very rough categories, but these are identifiable across the population I have personally worked with.

And I have nothing but respect for every person who's ever come to me for help and put in some effort.

Pete's question is for those in category 5.

Of the 5 categories, it's those in 5 that potentially have the hardest battle.

1's, it's easy. I am a 1, I've never not trained for more than a handful of months, it wasn't always training in one thing, it might have been and activity determined by the locality, but I've always trained, and I can't see myself stopping anytime soon

2's are probably the largest percentage of my old clientele in Dublin, people who stopped for good reasons and then restart later in life.

3's next, these guys have it hard, as they need to rebuild and that can be test of patience.

4's would be the next most common I've worked with.

and 5's. I love 5's.

But with no habit or training discipline, it's tough.

So what's my advice?

Everybody is busy.

Everybody.

We all have our priorities.

For the 1's, training is a priority

The 2's and 3's, it was formerly a priority and it's relatively easy to to get it back as it was likely never far from your mind. It's just a matter of how.

The 4's and 5's it was never a priority so to suddenly go from nothing to something is a tough ask.

Especially, as Pete points out, you are mentally exhausted by the end of the work day There is a disconnect here. Just because you are mentally burnt out, that doesn't necessarily mean you are physically burnt out.

The stresses of work and the sheer amount of calories the brain burns (approx 1/3rd of our BMR is the brain) can leave us feeling wiped. And starting an exercise or training routine while feeling like this is an uphill struggle.

James Clear's book Atomic Habits contains many strategies that can help start the process of exercising, which needs to become a habit.

I would highly recommend it (this is an amazon affiliate link to the book: https://amzn.to/3BAso7d)

But even still we need to break a lot of things down.

Step one, how can we lower the barrier of entry to exercise?

In recent conversation with a client who's working through just that problem, we started exercising at home, which wasn't working.

So she told me she has 2 gyms from the same chain local to her house. Both within a 15 minute cycle.

So we set a target, simply cycle to one of the gyms 2x/week immediately after work.

She doesn't have to go in, she can, and hopefully she does, but she has to get there.

That gives here around 30 minutes cycling, 15 minutes each way.

And that is a start.

It's a minimum standard.

Always achieve the minimum and you will have achieved something.

And something beats nothing. And who knows, once there, she may go in and smash a workout?

This lady works from home. If you're in the office, find a place on your commute and get in before you get home.

Setting this up for success starts at least one day before.

The day before you have organised your food, so you're energised and ready to exercise You've gotten your kit ready and left the bag by the door ready to be lifted in the morning.

And you have an idea of what you're going to do, where you're going at what time, at what cost to do what activities.

This maybe you've reached out to me and I've built you a training plan to start you at an appropriate pace with exercises that will rebuild that knackered knee.

Or it's an exercise class

Or a martial arts class

But you never just walk into a gym hoping for a flash of inspiration to hit you when you get there.

Have a plan.

For people in Pete's world, it's not easy.

This idea of setting a minimum standard is the most successful idea I've used with people

The act of turning up, even if you do nothing more, at least you have turned up.

Exercise for the length of one song from your favourite playlist as a minimum. If you carry on, that's a bonus, but at least you have hit the minimum.

There's a lot to said for being kind to yourself.

Just not too kind.

And for a final point, make it easier by reaching out and getting help.

It maybe a buddy, it maybe going to a structured class, or it maybe my online training service.

But it's some sort of help, some sort of support, some sort of accountability.

It's simple, not easy

But if you have successes in your life, you know you can achieve when you put your mind to something, why should this be any different?

Have a comment on this or a question of your own? Hit reply and send it in

Chat soon --

Regards

Dave Hedges

www.DaveHedges.net

Guiding Principles: Rule 1, Muscles Lengthen before they contract

Thanks to everyone who reached out after the last couple of newsletters,

my inbox has been busy

In particular, the post about principles and Gary Wards 2nd Rule of Anatomy in Motion saying Joints act, muscles react.

Some of you asked to hear about the other rules.

So lets do the sensible thing and go to Rule 1.

Muscles Lengthen Before They Contract

In my mind, rules 1 & 2 are interchangeable and say similar things, just looking at it from a different perspective.

This idea of perspective is important, when we consider most viewpoints on the human animal are all talking about the same things but from different perspectives, then we can quickly and easily cut through the crap.

For example, Powerlifting and Yoga may seem like absolute opposites, but they both look at trying to improve the human body in some way, one from the perspective of moving the most weight, the other from the perspective of creating great flexibility.

Are these two goals mutually exclusive?

Only if you're looking for extremes. Most people if they did a bit of both would get stronger and move better. It's rarely a case of doing this excludes you from doing that, we're all looking to upgrade our human animal, why not learn from as many sources as possible and utilise the resources that best suit our current needs?

Anyhow, back to Rule 1. Muscles Lengthen Before They Contract

In the Chinese Martial Arts there are little riddles they use to teach movement principles.

One goes:

"To go up, first go down. To go left, first go right"

That is Rule 1 from a different perspective.

Consider throwing a ball.

The first thing we do is move the ball backwards, usually behind us if we're looking for a big throw, then we rotate the body to whip the arm through.

That whole action puts length, a stretch into the muscles that need to contract to throw the ball.

We reflexively, intuitively wind up by lengthening the muscles before they contract.

Now, think about basic walking or running.

Our weight lands into the foot as it contacts the ground, what happens?

As our weight sinks into the foot, the calf, the quads, the upper hamstrings, the glutes and so on, will stretch as they absorb that weight. The body loads up like a spring, muscles are lengthening like bungie cords.

And as they lengthen, the sensory organs within the tissues send signals up to the central nervous system saying "we're under strain, send orders" and the nervous system says "Contract!" and we bounce forward into the next step

The leg behind us as we step, the hip flexors are all stretching as out weight shifts forward of the foot, that stretch is what "pings" the leg through to land in front of us ready for the next step

By utilising the stretch, we almost gain free energy, we become incredibly efficient and effective in our movement.

Muscles lengthen before they contract

To go left, first go right

To swing the kettlebell up better, swing it back faster

The second rep of a deadlift always feels better than the 1st

If ever there was a perspective to explain why I prioritise things like skipping, jumping, joint mobility, dynamic range of motion exercises and kettlebell lifts, clubs, etc

As well as talk about "elasticity" as a property we should aim to develop as part of our training Rule 1 is it

Look me up on YouTube, go to the playlist on my channel marked Mobility Collection

and the one with the 100 Rep Warm Up examples and start to follow the info found there.

Become and remain elastic, and you will be effecient

There's plenty of time for being stiff when you're dead

Chat soon

Dave

www.DaveHedges.net