Understanding the importance of mobility is something I feel that everyone only ever works out the hard way, once an injury has occurred. Time and time again I will hear excuses as to why stretching is too hard, there is no time, it isn’t as important as being strong and so on, but for the purpose of this blog I am going to help you realise how incorrect that is.
Time and time again we are told that we need to be stronger, fitter, lose weight, have a certain body composition, undertake X amount of minutes of exercise a day and the demands just keep going. I get that, but what I don’t get is why everybody wants to look a certain way, or lift a certain weight, yet won’t put the work in to be a more mobile and functional body at the same time? I can guarantee you that most of the musculoskeletal issues that I treat clients for regularly, are a product of poor movement patterns and a lack of education as to why stretching can be the answer. There are certainly more people than not, who are simply not strong enough, I believe that whole heartedly. The rest though, and even the weak people all seem to have terrible functional ability and I think it comes down to a few things:
1) A lack of education as to the value of stretching.
2) No accountability to the issue, and excuse after excuse as to why it’s too hard.
3) Strength training without a program, and without a proper dynamic warm up.
It doesn’t take long to find somebody who will tell you that they have a sore back, yet when asking them to bend forward with straight legs, it’s obvious that they have no calf, hamstring and lower back flexibility. The same can be said for somebody with shoulder issues who can’t reach their arms overhead without a massive arch in their back. These bodies are full of compensations and restrictions and it’s somehow a mystery why there is pain presenting itself from top to bottom? It’s such an easy fix, but it might hurt, it might take admitting that you have dysfunctions and it might take some consistency in your approach to the problem.
I propose the following 3 movements as absolute necessities in order to clear somebody for heavy strength training:
1) Can touch their toes with no or minimal knee bend in a forward lean.
2) Can squat below parallel without the heels lifting off the ground.
3) Can reach above head, passed 180 degrees at the shoulder without an arch in the back.
Rarely can somebody do all 3 initially, but can hopefully go close. If not, we need to realise the implications of loading with obvious movement restrictions. I am not suggesting no strength training, more so the opposite, strength training with a mobility and functional focus performed as often as possible. As all movements can be regressed, the technique of certain exercises should take precedence over loading, whilst mobility is corrected along the way with the appropriate interventions. This is where the education comes in. Somebody who is looking after your best interests should be all over the idea of function and form over loading. Appropriate progression is important to ensure that progress is being made and the individual is therefore aware of the path they are taking, and what the end of the road will look like.
I can’t emphasise this enough, embracing compensations and overlooking mobility issues will always lead to pain and discomfort long term, choose which pain hurts worse. You can either stretch your calves and hamstrings to prevent a disc injury under load, or go through the pain of the disc injury and wish you did something sooner. As somebody who has had the disc injury, I’d choose the former over the latter.