Reasons to be cheerful, part 3

1. You woke up this morning
2. You can touch your toes with your knees straight.
3. You can't touch your toes with your knees straight (great, something to work on!)
4. You are already doing a stretching program to improve your flexibility and posture.
5. You are contemplating doing a stretching program to improve your flexibility and posture.
6. You just finished your stretching program to improve your flexibility and posture.
7. You find yourself sitting in stretching postures, like half lotus at work in your chair.
8. You've moved aside everything in your cubicle so you can stretch while you work.
9. You sit on the floor in front of the television instead of the couch, and work on half lotus.
10. You find it is no longer an effort to stretch, but an enjoyable challenge that is relaxing.
11. You sleep better at night, you eat less, you wake up feeling refreshed with no body pains.
    

Why Posture is Important

How can you improve your stretch, strength, and endurance all at once? Improve your posture. Just what your parents told you, stand up straight! Actually, it is not so simple. When you stand upright, with good posture, you are using the minimal muscle tension possible to maintain that position. If you stand as straight as you can, your muscles are less tense, when you use them you will have greater contractile force, and you will be able to use them more than if they were tight and tired (IE increased endurance).
In fact, many of the issues of tight muscles that people encounter when they attempt to stretch, are due to bad postural habits. For example, lets say you sit slouched at the computer, neck muscles tense to keep your face from hitting the screen. When you go to stretch your neck, it is going to be much much tighter than if you sat at your computer upright, and did not lean forward. As a rule of thumb, if I would look at you from the side, your ear lobe should be centered over your shoulder, which should be centered over your hip, which, if you are standing, should be centered over your knee, and the weight should fall into your feet with a line slightly ahead of your ankle. This is a plumb line from your ear lobe to the floor.
So, if you work on your posture, you will be astounded to see how much your stretch will improve as a result of that. Try this exercise: stand with your back to a wall, all parts of your back touching the wall (hips, low back, mid back, neck), and bend your knees slightly. Begin to feel what a flat back feels like. Now, if you have shortened neck muscles, you may not be able to do that part of the exercise, but just beginning to comprehend what a straight back is in a standing position will help you a lot. Of course, when you move, the curves in your back will return. But working on a straight back against the wall can stretch the ligament that runs down your spine and keeps you from being able to perform certain stretches that require full body flexion.
Check out my DVD if you wish to learn more about the muscles that hinder posture, with how to stretch them out!

A Quote from my Teacher

"Nothing in the world can take the place of persistance and determination, talent will not: nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not: unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not, the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistance and determination are omnipotent."
Dr. Robert C. Sohn

Food for thought. That's all for today.

A question from Cyberspace

Hi Mark,

I've been seeing your posts for years, and checked out your site
and blog. I'm looking for specific stretching and strengthening advice
for bicyclers, hoping you might point me in a helpful direction.

In brief, I'm 62 and for 20 years have had various lower extremity
issues: hip, knee, foot. Each dealt with separately. Seems likely,
from google searches and a dash of common sense, that they are
actually an inter-related system. My chiropractor says it looks like
I probably pronate, and the inner quad (medial) muscle is probably
weaker than the outer (lateral). He referred me to a personal trainer
and a bike fit guy. They both are entrenched in the 'high-tech
racer' mind set, and I suspect not a good match for me.

I also wonder why riding fixed gear over rolling terrain can actually
help my knee feel improved. Any thoughts will be most appreciated.

Best,
Larry F
Marblehead, MA

Larry, good question. Lets go backwards. Fixed gear riding places the work load more evenly amongst the four quads, the hamstrings, and gluteal muscles, for starters. And that's just in the upper leg. Additionally, fixed gear riding engages your lower leg muscles (gastrocnemius, which is the calf, tibialis anterior and posterior, which are the shin muscles) particularly when you are going downhill, and resisting a fast spin with your legs. So since you are basically sharing the resistance training with your muscles above the knee and below, from the front of your leg to the back, you will stabilize those muscles and help your knees. On a geared bike, we all can avoid this work of knee stabilization by coasting down hills.
Now, I have never met you in person, but I bet you your legs are damn strong. In 25 years of practice as a chiropractor, I have never met a cyclist who had a problem with strength. Now, muscle imbalance is another story. Just from reading your description, I would say your iliotibial muscles are VERY tight. Check out my page on those stretches, tell me if you can get into this stretch. All the way. Like this:




Bet you can't. If you can't, that is good, you have something to work on to fix your issues. Also, your medial quad and inner thigh muscles are often tight to offset the tension in your IT (iliotibial region). So there is a war going on between the inner leg and the outer leg, and your knee, and eventually your back, is the loser.

Check out page one and two of the IT stretches, and let me know how it goes. Good luck Larry, you can fix this!

What I learned from my accident

In recovering from my broken arm due to a motorcycle accident about two weeks ago, I have learned a few things. We as humans take for granted something called tendon glide. Tendons attach muscles to bones, and they glide in their sheaths as we move our joints. In the case of my tendons in my wrist, I can no longer do this:

Much less this:





In the case of this picture, when I relax my wrist, it barely bends at all right now.


Needless to say, I am hard at work to restore the tendons so I do not have long term issues with my hand. It is really good that I could do all the stretches I could before the accident. There is definitely some body memory. Funny, it will take longer for me to fix the soft tissue damage to my tendons than for the bone to heal.


PS, thanks for all the DVD orders. I am sure there is enough info on it to keep people stretching until the next DVD comes out. The next project will be an in depth class taught by me with many, many more details than on howtostretch. You can order your Posture DVD here.

New Guest Instructor, Kam Singh

I would like to let all of you know there is a new guest instructor on the howtostretch website. Kam Singh is an accomplished practitioner and teacher of yoga, and sheds some light on a difficult and important stretch.

Also, I apologize to those of you that have sent me questions, I will answer them! two weeks ago, I had an accident on my motorcycle on my way to work. I broke my right arm (I am typing this with my left hand!) and had to have surgery to fix it because the break was pretty bad. Thanks to my years of martial arts training, I know how to roll and fall correctly, and was not hurt worse. I was also wearing proper gear. My break came when my bike hit the ground and the force from the handlebar went into my arm. (just for your info: I was going slow on a side street, someone cut across me, then stopped right in front of me).
For those of you that have ordered my new CD, they have been sent, thanks for your orders. The CD is still available, you can order it here. I really appreciate your orders more than ever at this time, because with a broken right arm I will not be able to work as a chiropractor for a while.
BTW, I did stretch at least 20 mn a day for several days after the mishap on the 12th. Since the surgery on the 19th, I have not stretched, as every time I got on the floor to do so, I would find myself napping. the body needs its energy to heal itself.

THE NEW DVD IS AVAILABLE!

I have not had a lot of time to post lately, been busy with personal projects. One of those projects is my new DVD, "Correcting Posture Through Stretching".

This DVD is appx 36 minutes long and covers the essential stretches necessary to correct postural problems that haunt many people today. The introductory cost is $18 plus shipping, US sales only for now. Limited availability, check the website for details.

• where posture comes from,
• how postural defects unfold,
• what habits affect posture, and
• which stretches can help correct poor posture! The information is clear, direct, and easy to follow. Click here to find out more info.

Many of you have sent me some great questions, they will be answered in the blog because I think a lot of folks have the same issues and would like to learn more. I will only use initials for names to insure privacy.