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DNS – The Foundations of Human Movement – Part 3

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This is part 3 of a 3 part series on DNS…for Part 1, click here, for Part 2, click here.

Part I covered the history and background assumptions of DNS, and went into reasons for its use.

Part II I’ll covered some of the process that I learned at the seminar.

Here in Part III I’m hosting a “philosophical” discussion about movement in the light of DNS and will include some observations of my own around assumptions we make regarding movement in our culture.

Corollaries
I think the second biggest thing that happened for me during the DNS seminar (the first being learning an approach to movement and motor organization that suddenly MADE SENSE) was the experience of multiple coincidences between DNS and other movement methods I’ve learned or been exposed to.

For instance, DNS is similar in ways to the developing field of Functional Neurology, which seeks to address and influence neurological (read: brain) structures through muscular and sensory stimulation.

Somatics
When you’re doing these “developmental” patterns, you can’t help but think of Feldenkrais, Alexander Technique, or the work of Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen or Annie Brook. Why? Because they based their work off an observation that these types of movement patterns are the ones we start with, and are ones that make us feel better.

If we were taking the stance that DNS is accurate we’d say that the principles all of these creators were recognizing were the reflex locomotor ontogenesis of the human animal.

The Big Difference, I think, is that DNS is organizing this approach under a very clear physiological (and developmental) framework, where most somatic disciplines I’ve been exposed to approach their work only from the felt-sense of the body.

Nothing wrong with that, and at the same time, DNS to me has the benefit of having a clear theoretical framework, that can be tested against across individuals. But don’t throw out feeling!

FMS/SFMA
Speaking of “somatics” and movement-based work, what about Gray Cook’s FMS/SFMA (Functional Movement Scree/Selective Functional Movement Assessment) and DNS?

Note – I do not have a certification in either the FMS or SFMA methods. Please correct me if I’m speaking out of turn here.

My take on FMS/SFMA is that they’re useful tools to standardize the assessment process of patients/clients. I’ve seen a good amount of video on these methods, and been taught the FMS assessment by a certified FMS’er.

The real value I see for these methods is that because they’re highly standardized they offer a good way to pass information along to other practitioners or to assess large numbers of people (e.g., teams or squadrons) at once.

Beyond that, though, I don’t see any difference between FMS/SFMA and any other assessment method. The practitioner still has to be skilled in identifying movement patterns and movement pattern dysfunction in order to do any type of quality work with the patient/client based on that assessment.

DNS helps the practitioner, I think, in offering a deeper perspective on what’s happening in the body.

For instance – one of the attendees is a certified FMS assessor. He has always had trouble with the shoulder mobility test, with one shoulder being much less mobile than the other in this test. In the DNS course, we had him put his scapulae into an optimal neutral position, and then perform abdominal coactivation the DNS way, and…voila…totally equal results from side to side on the shoulder mobility test.

How does this help? To me it showed that his “shoulder problem” was more about a lack of global stabilization. Working on good positioning for stabilization and proper “core” activation, and progressing those methods through movements, will likely “cure” this patient.

RKC/Primal Movement Patterns
Gray Cook has another series of videos out that are more RKC (Russian Kettlebell Certification) based that deal with “primal patterns.”

From what I’ve seen, now that I’ve been to the DNS course, Gray and Lee have borrowed DNS material and put it into various movements they feel are appropriate for RKC folks.

That’s fine, but what I’ve seen on the DVD’s doesn’t replace what you get at a DNS course, and doesn’t provide the full spectrum of information you need to (help other to) perform proper core coactivation through the use of the diaphragm, breathe well, or move through “primal movement patterns” effectively while maintaining core coactivation and breathing.

Martial Arts
Of course there are huge martial arts implications in DNS as well. After all, martial arts are usually ways of understanding the most effective (and often efficient) way to move your body when confronting another (or multiple others) in conflict.

I’ve always practiced internal martial arts (IMA’s), which rely on the manipulation of advantages of potential and kinetic energy in conflicts, rather than the direct use of potential and kinetic energy. Most IMA’s have some form of standing practice, and many do “Zhan Zhuang” (standing like a post).

Here’s Chen Taiji master Chen Xiaowang doing three variants of the Zhan Zhuang posture:

Here’s a baby exhibiting the posture that DNS calls Supine Sagittal Stabilization:

Connection not clear? Try this one:

Well that’s funny! If we look at the Zhan Zhuang posture from the side…it looks…well…

Now have a look at this image of a Skylab astronaut in weightless posture:

All so strangely similar, no?

Perhaps the similarities aren’t so strange after all. They all represent a foundational or primary postural “set-point” in the human animal. It is the posture from which we stabilize and begin to learn to interact with the forces of gravity.

The posture is determined by our ontogenetic (species-genetic) structure, which also determines the reflex neuromotor patterns in our central nervous system, and the ways in which our muscles are organized.

Chen Xiaowang is replicating a sagittal stabiliation posture (and doing proper breathing) in an upright position.

The astronaut is exhibiting a primary posture of structural stabilization while asleep in a weightless environment. You’ll notice that the astronaut’s head position isn’t “ideal.” I don’t know how long he was in space at the point the picture was taken, but eventually the flexor system begins to dominate in weightless environments, since the extensor system doesn’t have anything (gravity) to oppose.

Just as importantly, RELAXATION is emphasized in all of these iterations of this posture.

My friend and extremely experienced internal martial artist Scott Phillips and I had a chat once about the predominance of thoracic kyphosis (rounded upper back) in many older Tai Chi practitioners. Why were they developing that postural abnormality.

Scott said that it was due to a misunderstanding of the “sunken chest” prescription in Tai Chi postural cues. The goal is not to collapse the chest by rounding it in, but rather, to let the sternum “fall” or relax, while the shoulders stay broad and the upper back stays erect (as in Chen Xiaowang’s demonstration above). The head stays on top of an erect spinal cord.

This is precisely the type of relaxed posture we seek in DNS SSS. Laying on your back, allow your ribcage to relax down into the floor. Many people have a concept of good posture as the classic “military” posture – chest up, shoulders pinched back, etc. But this throws us completely out of whack and is a terrible posture for any kind of movement.

When you can attain this relaxed posture while maintaining coactivation of the “core” musculature and breathing well in a circular fashion (i.e., allowing your chest and abdomen to expand to the sides and back as much as to the front), you can start to add mobility.

Adding movement one step at a time reeducates the body regarding effective, efficient, and stable movement. That also equals powerful movement, since the expression of power depends on all of those things as prerequisites.

Going from one side to another can reeducate the body regarding bilateral deficiencies or compensations (which may have underlying sources in scar-tissue or unresolved tissue trauma…which should be treated).

Moving this posture into standing creates the “Grand Ultimate Fist” of Taijiquan.

Well…that wraps it up for now. If you have questions about DNS or anything else here, feel free to leave a comment below.

Thanks for reading!

DNS – The Foundations of Human Movement – Part 2

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This is part 2 of a 3 part series on DNS…for Part 1, click here.

Part I covered the history and background assumptions of DNS, and went into reasons for its use.

Here in Part II I’ll cover some of the process that I learned at the seminar with reflections on similar movement patterns in other disciplines.

Part III will be a “philosophical” discussion about movement in the light of DNS and will include some observations of my own around assumptions we make regarding movement in our culture.

So let’s get going!

As discussed in Part I, the main observations to make at the beginning of DNS are whether or not the joint is functional – that is, centrated and capable of full ROM. If not, why not?

Karel Lewit notes that it’s important to remove any restricting lesions before beginning any other work. A “lesion” here means any neuromuscular block to normal movement. Lewit often refers to these as “scars” and has a definite method for releasing scars.

Once you’ve removed lesions or blockages to restoring mobility or centration, get to work.

But first thing’s first. Numero uno – check your breath!

This resonated with me very deeply since I’d just finished a Wilderness First Responder course a week prior to the DNS seminar. In first-responder scenarios after considering basic scene safety and triage, the first things to assess in a patient are the “A, B, C’s.” That is – What is the quality of their Airway, Breathing, and Circulation.

Life won’t continue long without any of those three. And life is certainly diminished when any of those are diminished. Consider the relative quality of life of any person suffering from airway, breathing, or circulatory disorders.

Adequate and efficient intake and distribution of oxygen is primary to the function of the body.

Check your breathing by doing the following – place your hands on the fleshy bits between your hip bones and your lower ribs, with your thumbs toward the back by your kidneys, and your fingers pointing forward toward your navel. If you can’t get into this position without restricting your shoulder movement (hunching forward) DO SOME SHOULDER/THORACIC MOBILIZATION FIRST (here, or here).

Now that you’ve got a grip on yourself, push out against your hands.

How? By using your diaphragm, of course. When your diaphragm pushes down, it presses against your guts, which have to squeeze out somewhere. When they push down and out, they should automatically trigger a “myotatic stretch reflex” in the abdominal and pelvic floor (and gluteal/deep hip) musculature.

This move is different from just pushing your belly out…or “belly breathing” as they like to call it. Instead, think in terms of breathing circularly. The entire hoop around your midsection should expand and slightly contract as you breathe.

Practice keeping that tension while breathing.

One key here is to RELAX. Let your shoulders relax, let your arms relax, let your brain relax. Relax all over. If your shoulders are hiking up when you breathe (or even if your clavicles or sternum are moving upward toward your head) you’re using accessory muscles to breathe rather than the diaphragm. RELAX.

Now put your hands up on your lower ribs, making sure they’re expanding and contracting laterally (out to the sides) with each breath. When you’ve got that (while keeping your core coactivation) move up to the upper ribs.

Once you’ve got your breathing functioning well again, it’s time to integrate that into some movement.

The 13:00 mark on this video shows clear application of the method in a supine sagittal stabilization (SSS) phase. Once you’ve got yourself stabilized, start adding slow limb movement.

If you get the limb movement down well, move on to transitioning from SSS through developmental patterns, starting with the ipsalateral/homolateral support pattern. Again, watch the video for the different patterns.

Remember throughout your exploration to maintain abdominal coactivation, “circular” breathing, RELAXATION, and focused awareness.

DNS – The Foundations of Human Movement – Part 1

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Ever have the experience that you’re peering into the very foundation of existence?

Come one, you can admit it to me. Even if you were totally “altered,” it counts. Ever experience that?

Ever have that feeling that you were seeing something so simple, yet so immense, it was completely within your grasp and yet completely beyond your understanding?

If not, stop reading now and go get that experience.

If so, you can relate to what I experienced today at the DNS Sport seminar here in Seattle.

It’s funny, because I think as is true with most “profound” things, many people who attend a DNS course may feel only confusion, or disgust, or the feeling that the thing they’re seeing is so obvious that it’s meaningless…that they’ve already thought that or they already do that.

All great feelings, that need to be checked immediately as potential reflex responses to things that challenge your (perhaps limited) worldview.

This is going to be a three-part series on DNS, because I’ve got some ground to cover.

Part I will cover the history and background assumptions of DNS, and also go into its applications and use.

Part II will cover the process that I learned at the seminar with reflections on similar movement patterns in other disciplines.

Part III will be a “philosophical” discussion about movement in the light of DNS and will include some observations of my own around assumptions we make regarding movement in our culture.

So what the heck is DNS, and why should you care?

DNS stands for Dynamic Muscular Stabilization. It’s a therapeutic method developed by Czech physiotherpist Pavel Kolar and his colleagues at the Prague School of Rehabilitation.

On this page you can see/watch a ton of information on DNS.

DNS is based on what’s called Developmental Kinesiology (DK) – the study of the development of movement from conception through maturation of movement. Most DK work focuses on the organization of movement from the first day of life up through about one year of age, when walking begins.

DK rests on a few key developmental landmarks.

All of them are based on ontogenetic (species-wide) developmental patterns that are reflexive – they happen automatically according to a relatively fixed maturational schedule, and are triggered by external stimuli (like any “genetic” factor). The main ones are all based on human upright posture. Specifically, the following elements of movement:

Spinal straightening
Extension
Abduction and external rotation

The first organizational level is Sagittal Stabilization. This represents the child’s ability to organize movement around the midline, linked to optical orientation. The child learns to maintain an erect spine and develops control over limb abduction and external rotation.

The other is “phasic movement” which comprises stepping forward and stabilization/support.

The homolateral or ipsa-lateral movement (movement of the same-side limbs) aspect of stepping-forward and support happens first. When a baby rolls onto its side, the lower limbs become support limbs. The rest of the body moves over the supporting joints (i.e., the proximal joint facets move over the fixed distal/limb joints, or the fixed segment). This is usually called “closed-chain” movement – the distal end is fixed, and the body ends up moving on that fixed base.

The contralateral (opposite-side movement) pattern happens second developmentally, with opposite-side limbs acting as supports. In this type of movement, the distal portion is usually the free-end, and the distal part of the joint is moving on the fixed/stable proximal segment. This is usually referred to as “open-chain” movement, since the distal end is “open,” able to move whatever resistance it’s encountering. The body is the fixed base of support.

Rotation and creeping are the main stereotypes that cover postural development. They are the main patterns that organize the development of all skeletal muscle.

So what?

First off, what DNS is saying here is that all human movement develops from the basis of these reflex patterns. And because of those patterns and the way muscles attach to bone, all human movement evolves in a very particular way.

Think you might want to know about that?

Also, since these are developmental reflexes (embedded in the fabric of the nervous system), they can be reawakened at any time in healthy neurology. That is, if you have some sort of movement dysfunction, you can potentially “cure” that problem by returning to these fundamental patterns.

Why?

Because the patterns create optimal movement in a baby. That is, these are the patterns create healthy movement in a healthy human animal. Get out of these patterns, and things start going bad.

Breathing
Breathing and healthy diaphragmatic action is a key to postural stabilization. The diaphragm is not just the bellows of your lungs, but it’s also the most central “organizationally powerful” stabilizer of the spine.

Ideally, the abdomen is a solid cylinder. When the diaphragm pushes down on the abdominal contents, it creates what’s know as “Intra-Abdominal Pressure” (IAP). IAP creates reflex-co-contraction throughout the muscles of the abdominal cavity – all of the “normal” abdominal muscles, as well as the pelvic floor and even the gluteals!

DNS extends well beyond breathing, but always utilizes the central principles of IAP and reflex locomotor patterning, using positioning and manual contact to elicit response.

Joint Centration and Movement Organization
To be optimally functioning, the joint (cavity and head) must be centered. The forces on either side must be balanced.

Why does any of this matter?
This is how the body is organized. This is “functional” movement – that is, movement that is ideal in the organization of the body (and external object) with regard to gravity. “Mechanics” are optimal. Stress and shear are minimal (or “optimal”). Dysfunction is negligible.

This is how to move well.

It should be obvious that getting these patterns in good working order is literally the baseline state for good healthy movement!

So how do you do it?! Stay tuned!

Happy New Year!

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Happy New Year everyone!

LIFT is growing and changing in exciting ways this year!

The main focus of my efforts with LIFT this year will be to expand on the outline in my book “Physical Culture, Personal Evolution.” I’ll be doing that a few ways:

1. Through meaningful training with an ever-expanding my client base here in Seattle and throughout the world.

2. Through cooperative work with an ever-expanding professional network here in Seattle and throughout the world.

and,

3. Through various media outlets (writing, video, etc.)…

In addition, I’ve been given the role of Exuberant Animal Jam Animal! Very exciting and I’m looking forward to leading a TON of Exuberant Animal Jams this year! If you aren’t familiar with Exuberant Animal, it’s a movement focused on making our lives and movement more Primal, Practical, and Playful. If you want info about Jams, contact me!

On a personal note, I will post some of my own fitness goals for 2012 shortly, and share my programming with everyone so you know what’s what!

Here’s to the best year yet!

Josh

Kstar and the MWOD, why aren’t you doing these?

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Hi there.

If you haven’t heard of Kelly Starrett, or the Mobility Workout of the Day (MWOD), you’re missing something.

Kelly is a physical therapist and the owner of San Francisco Crossfit.

As much as I’m bored by Crossfit, Kelly offers a unique spin – TISSUE QUALITY TIPS AND TRICKS.

He uses some traditional physical therapy concepts and puts them into a format that ANYONE, ANYWHERE, can use to help to fix their tissues before, between, after, or during workouts.

Subscribe to his blog. Watch the video posts. Do the MWODs.

When you do those things you will begin to
Move better
Feel better
Recover faster
and maybe most importantly of all
Learn something about your body…

DO IT NOW.

Play, long-term athletic development, and how to become a superhuman fitness model

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My friend Aaron Schwenzfeier posted a great post earlier this week about Long Term Athletic Development Models and pain/inury-free competition. Click on the link to read his post.

Aaron’s main point was that even Long Term Athletic Development models (which are currently only found in Australia and Canada, to my knowledge), suffer because they don’t embrace PLAY throughout the lifespan.

My response was to his post was this:

YES!!!

That was my experience as well…organized sports supplemented my PLAY activity…not vice versa.

And today, the same is true.

My problem with the “LTAD” models out there is that they posit some “goal state” that isn’t in the present moment.

How about “Present-Term Athletic Development?” PTAD

Wherever you are, that’s where you need to focus your efforts and abilities.

Getting to some “goal-state” might happen, but that should be an intention more than a rigid and forced outcome.

What’s the goal right now, always?

For me, and for any athlete or other person I’ve ever met, THE CURRENT GOAL HAS ALWAYS BEEN THIS:

+ to improve strength power and endurance (the %’s may vary)
+ to improve range of motion
+ to improve agility and reactivity
+ to improve tissue quality, and recover-ability…
and
+ TO HAVE MORE FUN

I’ve never met ANY client – athlete, non-athlete, bodybuilder, etc., who wouldn’t agree that they want to do those things.

“Physique” goals are important for bodybuilders, but even that goal takes a backseat to those above for most of the bodybuilders I’ve ever met.

Want to do that? CONTACT LIFT NOW.

Want to know how? Sign up for my newsletter and prepare thyself for the book I’m currently writing.

Sour grapes, Crossfit, tabatas, and an exercise program that really helps you

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I posted some articles on Facebook recently dealing with Crossfit (in particular this one, this one, and this one), and just yesterday posted an article asking “What the #$%^ is MetCon?!”

Met-Con is a term frequently used by Crossfit and people who do Crossfit to describe the Crossfit-style workout. It’s also occasionally used as a blanket term for what could better be described as “General Physical Preparedness” – a program that achieves a general level of aerobic endurance, muscular strength, and some muscular power.

As mentioned in the post above, the term is actually useless, since literally anything and everything a person does qualifies as “metabolic conditioning.” That’s the definition of metabolism. “Met-Con” sounds cool, but doesn’t help anyone to understand what is being described or promoted.

I also recently re-posted this article by a fitness guru about Tabata training. He doesn’t go into much depth, so let me explain.

Tabata (named after Japanese researcher Izumi Tabata) intervals consist of 20 seconds of maximal effort work followed by 10 seconds of rest, repeated for 7-10 total sets. Tabata developed this working on highly trained athletes, who would get close to total failure in that 20 second period.

The results are amazing. Over time the Tabata athletes’ VO2max (max oxygen volume/uptake) increased to levels beyond those achieved through any other recorded training protocol.

Crossfit began using Tabata intervals, and then a lot of other trainers jumped on board. Here’s the problem – Tabata intervals demand 7+ rounds of 20-second effort to exhaustion.

Most trainees do not have the capacity to exert an all-out effort period, let alone for multiple rounds of 20-second stints. This is not a knock against the average trainee, it’s simply a fact. New trainees don’t have the neuromuscular coordination or power-endurance to perform this protocol in any meaningful way, let alone to adequately control complex movements (like Olympic lifts) in this fatigued state.

Will it exhaust you? Yes. Will it make you feel like you are experiencing “tabata death?” Yes. Will it improve your performance over time? Maybe. As long as you don’t fry your central nervous system, or experience some sort of acute or repetitive-strain injury. And as long as your body can adapt between “Tabata” workouts.

That said, the reason for this post is something slightly different.

One of the people who commented on my Facebook posting of the articles above said that it seemed like “sour grapes.”

She’s an amateur competitive runner. She’s invested in her health and fitness. And I’m sure she knows at least one person who does Crossfit.

So I understand her reaction.

And that reaction itself is the reason for this post.

As long as the lay-public has no way to discern the deeper aspects of physical conditioning – as long as health and fitness experts continue to post articles that simply praise or blame, but offer no true education – those types of articles and posts are just sour grapes.

It is up to the competent health and fitness professionals out there to begin to educate their public about the principles of physical health (as far as we can understand them) in concrete and useful terms, that rely on accepted standards of reproducibility and logic (“science”).

Our technology has advanced to the point where – now more than ever before – it is possible for anyone to understand and interact with the deepest structures and functions of their bodies in ways that allow for feedback and meaningful correction over time.

This is the method that I use in my training, and seek to refine, constantly, and I call for all of the other health and fitness professionals out there to use the same principles in their programming – to tailor their work to each individual based on the principles of life – and to become proper educators of their client base, rather than just fad-producers or -promoters, cool-name-slingers, and/or disconnected, herd-mentality “workout” generators.

I’ve hit my limit on this post. I’ll post the best workout for you in the next entry!

What the #$%^ is “met-con?”

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Met-Con – Metabolic Conditioning

Metabolic – having to do with metabolism, which is the sum-total of chemical actions that take place within the body at any given moment.

Conditioning – the state of something, or the process of changing that state.

Okay, so that’s it eh?

Well…yes, that IS it.

Sit on the couch and eat potato chips and watch TV/play video games/wait for the paleocalypse = MetCon.

Workout till you puke = MetCon.

Go on vacation and hike/bike/swim/have fun every day = MetCon.

So can I ask a favor of you folks out there in the reading-world?

Please stop calling your workout session or methodology MET-CON!

We know it’s MetCon.

EVERYTHING IS METCON.

If someone is selling you “Met-Con,” and they’re not telling you specifically what aspect of your MET their going to CON (other than you wall-met…eh…alright that’s bad, but you get my point), take your money elsewhere!

Breaking up scar tissue in your body – why is it important, and how can you do it?

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Andreo Spina has just come out with what I think is his best video yet. In it, he describes the way scar tissue adheres between layers of soft tissue in the body.

This information is critical to everyone who has a body. Soft tissue scarring is a fact of life. Everyone gets it. Knowing what to do about it and actually doing those things will improve your health, your movement, and your strength.

What are Soft Tissues?
The body has several layers of tissues.

There’s your skin, on the surface.

Under that, there’s the fascia, a contractile connective-tissue. Fascia is that white stuff you see on meat that you get in the supermarket.

Then there’s the muscle, which is attached to bone by tendons.

And the bones are attached to one another with ligaments.

Scar tissue, or “adhesions,” are areas where some part of the soft tissue gets damaged, and doesn’t actually heal. Instead it forms rigid connective-tissue bridges in order to stabilize the tissues and allow for movement.

Typically scar tissues remain when the body isn’t moved. But we’ll get to that in a second.

First, here’s Andreo’s video:

So you can see the importance of breaking up scar tissue. Imagine, as Andreo said, “stretching your leg up with a pair of skin-tight jeans on.”

You can’t do it.

That is, you can’t move well if your soft tissues are full of scar tissue that is preventing them from moving.

And if you can’t move well, your body can’t do several things:
1. It can’t pump blood back to your heart sufficiently. The contraction of muscle is what pumps blood back to your heart. If your muscles can’t (or aren’t made to…different issue) contract fully, your circulation sucks.
2. If that happens, metabolic waste builds up in your tissues…so, number two is You can’t clear metabolic waste produces efficiently. When those build up, disease happens.
3. You can’t feel the joy of movement. If you’re bound up by scar tissue, movement is probably painful. That’s no fun. And that doesn’t help you want to move.

So, what can you do about it? Here are a few things:

1. Get high-quality bodywork.
What do I mean by this? I mean bodywork from someone who understands the video above, and who isn’t just giving you a “relaxation massage.” People who label themselves as offering “sports massage” often have a good understanding of the above. Self-massage works as well. Investigate some techniques and apply them (on YouTube you can search for things like “myofascial release” or “skin sliding” or “break up adhesions” or “self-massage” or any combination of the above).

2. Take hot baths.
Yes, a nice hot bath is relaxing. Throw in some Epsom Salts if you want. The bath can also help to “liquify” the very soft tissues in your body, allowing them to slide again. But that will only happen on one other condition…that you:

3. Stay well hydrated.
This means drinking plenty of high-quality H2O. Not going to go into a lot of detail here. Simply try the pee-test. If your pee is not clear, you’re dehydrated (with exceptions). Also, try to get well-water from reliable local sources rather than drinking chlorinated/treated water from the tap.

4. Move Well, Move Often!!!
This may be the single most important factor. Moving itself, as long as your body gets heated up to a nice sweaty level, will help to resolve soft tissue adhesions. Of course, it won’t usually do everything, but it will sure help. And once those adhesions have been (manually) broken up, there’s nothing better than full-range, hot movement to keep things from sticking together again. That’s one of the reasons Tai Chi is so good for you. Getting down into the pose above (snake creeps down, I think) demands a high level of balance and strength, AND – to the point of this post – it puts the soft tissues of the body in the deepest possible level of stretching and contraction…

Foam rolling can help, but as Andreo points out, it doesn’t really or necessarily slide one layer of soft tissue over the other.

But don’t just sit there reading this! Go do one of those three things (or all of them)! And put them into your regular practice!!!!

Bodyweight Training – why, what, when, where, and how?

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Local Parkour facility Parkour Visions posted this talk of Charlie Moreland discussing bodyweight training.

Great talk!

AND…

I agree with his early assertion – “We can do what you can do, but you can’t do what we can do.”

This is often true, because movement is a skill.

So, if you practice doing the bench press often (laying on your back), you get very good at that movement-skill.

If you practice the progressions Charlie recommends, your nervous system gets much more greatly enriched.

That said, weight training still has its place. I just prefer to limit it.

Weight training has become popular in the past few decades as a way to rapidly change physique.

It also matches up with a cultural tendency to isolate things – we do “isolation” exercises like biceps curls, triceps pushdowns, etc., in much the same way that we isolate ourselves in other ways…

Free weights offer an easy way to “progress.” And, being less demanding on supporting muscles than bodyweight only training can be, it’s often easier to “bulk up” on free-weight programs than on bodyweight programs.

So what’s the best?

For the average person, the best is – diversity of movement.

Yes, I know I’ve discussed the SAID principle at length in this blog. The fact is, that’s true. You get what you train for.

But the average person wants to train for LIFE itself. There’s no “competition” date…or rather, every day is a competition…to feel good, to stay exuberant, to be healthy, to have energy.

There are a zillion ways to approach this, but at this point in life, my favorite is this:

Pick one “classic” barbell exercise: Squat, Deadlift, Clean and Jerk, Snatch, Overhead Press
Pick a few full-range-of-motion bodyweight movements.
Pick one movement practice – dance, martial arts, walking or hiking, climbing, etc.

Do your classic lift twice a week. Day one work up to a 1-3 rep max. Back off and do 2 or 3 sets of 3-6. Wait 72 hours. Do that lift again but do 60% of your 1-rep max, and go for 4 sets of 3 explosive (or, preferably, ballistic) reps.

Do your bodyweight training every day. Mix it up if you want. Stop with gas in the tank.

Do your movement practice every day.

In other words, use weights for “strength training.”

Use your body to move better.