FITNESS FACTS

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The key concept is that the body and brain work together to keep you balanced.  Some of the ways your body/brain keep you balanced can quickly become a problem, though.

Insight: Most people think about fitness as physical exercises, yet it is about what is most effective for you –as a unique individual.  Knowledge of how every muscle, every nerve, and every tendon interacts is required for effectiveness and safety.

Fitness Fact #1  

Core Strength is also linked to balance, muscle compensation and neuromuscular health.  The “core” muscles are the foundation to all movement and balance. And, without a strong core/foundation, muscle compensation is likely to begin and as time goes by will affect your entire the body. As explained, muscle compensation can result in inhibited neuromuscular communications between the brain and the muscles, causing the weaker muscles to fire less and less.  By evaluating the active range
of motion of your core, we can determine a proper exercise protocol for you.  The more stable the middle “core” of your body is, the more stable you are throughout your body.  Typically we start by having you train in one plane on a stable surface; then when your neuromuscular connections are active again, we help you progress to multiple planes and unstable surfaces.

Fitness Fact #2

Stretching seems to be a natural, healthy thing to do –or at least that is what we learn at a young age.  You hear people say, “Stretch first.”

Let’s examine the evidence for this practice, though.  Typically, people stretch
because they want more flexibility or they “feel” tight.  The key question is WHY do they feel tight?  Consider that the body will only allow for movement it can control.  In other words, the brain will cause muscle compensation so control and stability
can be maintained.  Remember, muscle compensation often results in the stronger muscles working harder. This can result in “tightness”.

Looking at the situation through the eyes of someone who understands compensation and neuromuscular health, we can see that the “tight” muscles are usually working just fine, in fact, they are working too hard to compensate for the other muscles.  If that is the case, passive stretching can actually cause joint instability and less control!
Even worse, passive stretching to get “rid of the tightness” can cause you to temporarily fool the body into thinking you can achieve a range of motion that cannot be sustained. When that happens, you are actually making yourself less stable, and less in control of your balance, which puts you at risk for an injury such as a pulled muscle, injured joints, twisted ankles, knees, wrists, etc.

Fitness Fact #3

Slips and falls can result in bruises, broken bones, sprains and strains. Neuromuscular health makes it more likely for you to avoid that ankle injury from a mishap on steps, for example.  Why? Because your nerves will communicate more rapidly and effectively to your brain when your foot picks up the fact that there is a bad step on a flight of stairs.  Your brain will communicate back to your ankle about how to react –all in split seconds to help you avoid a fall and a twisted ankle.

It’s called proprioception and it is the process by which the body can vary
muscle contraction in immediate response to incoming information regarding
external forces by utilizing stretch receptors in the muscles to keep track of
the joint position in the body. Now you know!