Home Newsletters Newsletter 161

Newsletter 161

Written on June 30, 2009 at 7:24 am, by Eric Cressey

I have the normal weekly newsletter posted below, but first a quick announcement: Mike Robertson, Bill Hartman, and I just filmed a new DVD set!  Those of you who have enjoyed all of our products individually can now see what happens when the three of us collaborate.  For more information, check out today’s blog post: A Sneak Peak at the New Project.



The Law of Repetitive Motion: Part 2

In last week’s newsletter, I talked about the first three component of the law of repetitive motion: “I” (injury/insult), “N” (number of repetitions), and “F” (the force of each repetition, expressed as a percentage of maximal strength).

lawofrepmotion

This week, I’ll discuss the “A” and the “R” of this equation.  To begin, amplitude, stated simply, is range of motion.  If we spend our entire lives in limited ranges of motion, we run into problems.

Obviously, this refers to those who sit too often and too long – particularly in poor postures.  I’m a big believer that the best posture is the one that is constantly changing, so I always encourage people to try to get up and move around every 20-30 minutes whenever possible.  If not, I love the idea of simply “shuffling” positions at your computer.  Complement this constant fluctuation of posture with some good training to open up the hips and thoracic spine, and strengthen the upper back and glutes, and you’ll find that being stuck in a job with a small amplitude is a “manageable” problem.

inside-out

Amplitude can also refer to only doing certain exercises in the gym, particularly those who exercise through a partial range of motion.  It might be people who simply press too often and pull too infrequently, or those who perform a lot of bilateral exercises, but nothing unilateral.  We aren’t just talking about ranges of motion at the joints; we are also talking about the muscles recruited and type of muscle action – concentric, eccentric, isometric – that takes place.

Lastly, working at a specific task for extended periods of time can be a huge issue for some.  Just ask musicians, factory line workers, and even baseball pitchers.  These issues can all impose huge asymmetries that must be addressed both directly (soft tissue work, flexibility training) and indirectly (training the contralateral side, or just exposing the individual to a broader excursion of movement outside this specific task).

So, all that in mind, improving amplitude is all about increasing range of motion in one’s daily life.  Of course, this must be specific range of motion.  You wouldn’t, for instance, want to increase lumbar spine range of motion in most back pain patients, but you would want to optimize hip and thoracic spine mobility.

Rest, the “R” in our equation, is pretty straight-forward: if a tissue is angry, you need to give it time to settle down.  However, just stopping all exercise isn’t always the best bet.

Often, it’s simply a matter of keeping the stress on the tissue below its capacity for loading.  As a great example, a lot of manual therapists with whom I’ve worked actually like people to go out and lightly load tissues that have just been worked in order to teach the tissue to “deform” properly.  For instance, I got a little “Graston Loving” on my biceps a while back, and spent the rest of the day lightly loading the tissues and doing some prolonged stretching sets.  It worked like a charm.

ec_graston1

Taking it a step further, though, much of the time, it’s about redistributing stress.  For instance, someone with anterior knee pain may not be able to do a more quad-dominant squat, but instructing that same lifter to sit back into the glutes and hamstrings more can markedly take down the stress on the anterior knee.  Sure, it changes the muscular recruitment of the exercise, but the lifter derives great benefit and keeps the loading on the affected tissues below capacity.  And, in this particular case, he’s strengthening the posterior chain muscles that almost always help to prevent anterior knee pain in the first place.

That wraps up our look at the law of repetitive motion.  It’s certainly not an exhaustive review, but my hope is that it got you thinking just enough to consider how this law applies to the issues you see on a daily basis, as well as those you want to prevent from ever reaching threshold.  For more information, check out the Building the Efficient Athlete DVD Set.

btea_set

New Blog Content

Random Friday Thoughts
The Who-What-When-Where-Why of Flexibility Training
In the Presence of Greatness

Have a great week!

EC

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5 Responses to “Newsletter 161”

  1. Smitty Says:

    You call that a bicep? 🙂

    Can’t wait to see the new product guys!

  2. Darian Says:

    Hey Eric,

    It seems as though most of the time you show a picture of you or someone else getting soft tissue work, there is considerable bruising that takes place. I have gotten some work done in the past but have never had this degree of bruising/ irritation. Should I find a new ART/Graston therapist or do some people just have more severe reactions?

  3. Michael Maxwell Says:

    Hi Darian,
    ART should in general not produce bruising. There are some people that bruise easily and some locations on the body that bruise more than others, but for the most part ART should not produce bruising. Graston on the other hand typically does produce bruising, but the bruising is neither necessary or pertinent to its results and is more a side effect of treatment. The bruising produced by Graston is from the subcutaneous tissue (under the skin) and not from the tendon, muscle, or ligament. Graston produces a fairly aggressive vibration through the superficial structures (skin, fascia, etc) under the treatment area. There are many small, fine and relatively fragile blood vessels in the sub-cutaneous tissue that are easily broken and are the reason Graston produces bruising in most patients and in most areas of the body (some areas more than others and some patients more than others – usually those with more sub-cutaneous tissue, i.e. fat, bruise more)

    In short, you do not need to find another practitioner because you are not bruising. Your decision on whether or not to seek another provider is based purely on the results you are getting and confidence you have in the person that is currently treating your condition.

    All the best, Michael

  4. Dev Chengkalath Says:

    Eric,

    Great review of the Law of Repetitive Motion!

    Michael, how are you keeping in Victoria?! Bringing any courses out to Toronto soon?

    Regards,
    Dev

  5. Mike T Nelson Says:

    Good review of the basic equation EC.

    I am sure you will cover this later, but nervous system re-education is key to long term change.

    As for tissue deformation, I am a big fan of alterning the nervous system to elicit the change vs very aggressive hands on work. Again, this does NOT mean I am against hands on work (quite the opposite really), but it does NOT need to be painful at all. Even if someone holds their breath, winces, rapid eye blink (signs of startle) is too much force.

    While painful soft tissue work can be effective in the short term with some athletes, I fear it may be burning in compensation patterns. You don’t need dynamite to blow the safe open, just need the right combination of inputs (proprioception, eye position, head position and then hands on if needed).

    It is always hard to sort out, as many times ANY novel therapy/movement can have a positive effect.

    Rock on
    Mike T Nelson
    PhD(c), CSCS, ZMT


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