Category Archives: Avoiding Injury

Extension exercise for the spine

This post is prepared by West 4th Physio associate Marj Belot Extension Exercises for Low Back Pain: When, why, how? Are you having low back pain? Have you heard that backward bending (extension) exercises are a good thing to do? Have you been told that backward bending and laying face down are bad for your back? It’s possible that you have read or heard both things and now you’re confused as to what exercises you should be doing? What is the purpose? To start, it’s important to consider the purpose … Read the rest of this post »

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Working from home…

With the current physical distancing requirements you may have been working from home. You might even be spending a lot more time at the computer! Here are some suggestions to help with posture and computer related back ache. 1) Think about your work position. Get yourself seated well back into a chair that has good support. (A rolled towel in the small of the back makes a great back support). For those on the shorter side, use a footrest. Dangly feet will pull you forward over time, away from the … Read the rest of this post »

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Clinical Pilates at West 4th Physio

This post is prepared by West 4th Physiotherapy associate Jenny Lehmann What is “Clinical Pilates”? Traditionally, “Pilates” was stigmatized as a yoga-like exercise for women, emphasizing core stability. Current research supports its utility in conjunction with conventional physiotherapy to treat various injuries. “Clinical Pilates” is the delivery of classic pilates by a pilates-trained Physiotherapist in the context of rehabilitation. Using their clinical background, your physio can individualize exercises and provide tactile feedback to correct pain provoking movement patterns at the root of your injury. In attempt to further explain the … Read the rest of this post »

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Injury Prevention Through Workload Monitoring – Part 3

This post is prepared by West 4th Physiotherapy associate Peter Francis How about a practical workload monitoring example? Let’s take a real life example and help apply it by using an elderly person in our general population who simply wants to stay mobile.  Some older adults might keep a walking log, so here’s how we can take a brisk walk to the next level!  There are only two columns that the individual needs to fill in (1) distance of blocks walked at a brisk pace and (2) session’s rating of … Read the rest of this post »

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Injury Prevention Through Workload Monitoring – Part 2

This post is prepared by West 4th Physiotherapy associate Peter Francis How do we manage load? Once you understand that any stressor on the body is a training load you can start to manage it.  This means introducing the right amount of stress to elicit an adaptation to the tissues you are intending to train.  The first thing you need is a metric, or variable, to measure and monitor.  In baseball, for example, the number of high velocity throws is a good starting point to monitor a pitcher’s workload.  Tim … Read the rest of this post »

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Squats exercises

  Runner’s, triathletes and cyclists will often develop an asymmetry in their hip stability resulting in symptoms around the knee, hip or low back. Their chosen activity involves thousands of repetitions of the same motion so small differences in form can become cumulative and over time develop into an injury. Squats exercises and their variations are favourites and a valid part of most balanced training routines. They are frequently recommended as baseline strengthening for the lower limbs and with just a little attention to form  are also a great core strength … Read the rest of this post »

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Sitting on a ball

Many of our clients are office workers and find sitting to be a significant requirement of their work. Continuous sitting has been widely reported over the past few years to be negative for a wide variety of health metrics. As a result we get frequent questions in the clinic as to whether there might be benefit in sitting on an exercise ball instead of a regular chair. Most people are familiar with the ball in a gym setting where it is regularly used as a vehicle for enhancing core stability (more on this in … Read the rest of this post »

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Effects of throwing…

This post is prepared by West 4th Physiotherapy associate Peter Francis. Performing any activity repetitively can produce a pattern of tightness and weakness based on the direction of movements and muscles that are active at the joints being moved. Simply put, if you do any activity repetitively and long enough without maintenance you are bound to develop predictable joint ranges of motion. Having a full joint range of motion is important in sport and activity because we need adequate movement to produce force through muscles and then decelerate (slow down) the moving body segment. … Read the rest of this post »

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Tapering for a half marathon

  This post is prepared by West 4th Physiotherapy associate and runner Suzanne Foster Tapering Tips – Half Marathon Distance 1) Your last long run should be two weeks from race day. This allows the body to fully RECOVER from all those hard earned miles and to reap the physiological benefits of the increased mileage. This run is a great time to practice your fuel/hydration/warm up strategy for the race, what you are going to wear, what are you going to eat the night before the race as well as … Read the rest of this post »

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Downhill running tips for success

 This post is prepared by West 4th Physiotherapy associate and runner Suzanne Foster Don’t Put On The Brakes: Keys to Conquering Running Downhill! If your quadriceps muscles are sore after hilly running, it is probably from the downhill portion.  This is because downhill running requires our thigh and lower leg muscles, to contract “eccentrically” or lengthen as we move down the hill. This can actually cause microtearing within the muscle as eccentric loading uses more force than on uphill or flat terrain. This is more costly from an energy and recovery perspective possibly leading to injuries (IT Band … Read the rest of this post »

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Hip flexor issues in cyclists

Hips are the domino joint for cyclists. Get them balanced and you’ll be mostly happy. Ignore them and the constancy of the cycling motion can lead to a cascade of back, hip and knee discomfort. The repetitive motion of cycling is predominantly done within a flexed inner hip range and is all in a straight line. The hip never reaches a position of neutral such as found in regular standing, let alone into actual extension where the long thigh extends out behind the body. It only goes sideways when you … Read the rest of this post »

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Patellofemoral arthritis

From West 4th Physiotherapy associate Gretchen Mclennan… Now that we know it is in fact healthy for our knees to keep running (provided we are doing that correctly!), http://www.west4thphysio.com/archives/2784  here is some info about an often “forgotten joint” that will hopefully keep us all running and cycling painfree for a long time! Osteoarthritis in the knee is something most of us are either familiar with, or at least we’ve heard about it in some respect. But most of us think of OA happening at the main knee joint. This is … Read the rest of this post »

Posted in Avoiding Injury, Cycling, Cycling injuries and prevention, Knee, Running injuries and Prevention, Sports | 1 Comment