Did you know stretching might be the worst thing you could do for a ‘short’ muscle?

(Another past article for those who missed it and those who have asked for it!)

Ever heard of sub-clinical muscle spasm?

No me neither until I became a Biomechanics Coach™ and now I see 95% of my client base has sub-clinical spasm as oppose to what I previously would have assumed were 'tight' muscles - how do I know? Ok bear with me I will get to that bit but first lets talk about what sub-clinical spasm is..

Lifestyle compensations

We have come from a lifestyle of being hunter gatherers but over the last 50 yrs we have seen the most dramatic evolution in our lifestyles to date with the advancements in technology

Our bodies are trying to adapt to our changing lifestyles by putting muscles into different states to compensate for the fact we aren’t using them in the way we are have done in the past.

Evidence suggest that our muscles are gradually going through different states of compensation prior to them actually becoming what we know as ‘tight’.

What is it?

Sub-clinical spasm is the first state that more often than not we are completely unaware of. This state is a protective mechanism trying to look after a vulnerable joint, for any amount of reasons, and is easily addressed by performing an anti spasm exercise.

If unaddressed the muscle starts to become fibrotic and (research tells us about 40% of the muscle can become fibrotic) this can potentially also be addressed by using an anti spasm exercise.

if still un-addressed the muscle will finally start to become ‘tight’ which is like a more ligamentous state and requires a more aggressive exercise like stretching or sports massage. The stretching debate is something I am reading around at the moment so when I have more to report I will write about that.

So you want to know what this anti-spasm exercise is now don’t you? Let me tell you its gold dust and a badly kept secret amongst all Biomechanics Coaches™, iMoveFreely® Instructor and their clients

Less is more..?

If you consider that tightness requires more aggressive exercises like stretching or sports massage then it might be obvious that using a low grade 20% contraction just wont change it.

So all we need to do is identify which state the muscle is in to be able to safely address the compensation.

The problem with this is that this is virtually impossible even with EMG equipment, let alone without it.

How do I know..?

The most effective method would be to do a biomechanical assessment, perform the safest option of exercise (anti-spasm) then re-test. If there is a change you can safely assume the muscle is in spasm and so continue using this exercise. If after a couple of weeks of using the anti spasm nothing has changed then we can probably assume it needs a more aggressive technique to release it.

It is so simple anyone can do it!! It takes just 20% effort - (when do we ever do something with 20% eh?). Imagine a muscle in sub-clinical spasm is like a rope with knot in it and to stretch it could make it worse as it tries to hold on protecting the joint.

Click here to see previous blog for a screen that you could use to pick this up

How to do it..?

What does an anti-spasm look/feel like? It is a muscle contraction held at 20% effort for 20 seconds and evidence tells us if we do 4 repetitions, 4 x daily for a period of up to 6 weeks this can give the muscle the ability to fully contract and relax again.

Of course this needs to be combined with addressing the reasons for being in this state as well (lifestyle) and some conditioning exercises (strength work) but its effect can work like magic on muscles you may have been stretching for weeks or even months and experiencing no change.

Where did it come from..?

The anti-spasm has been tried and tested in a study by Ribot-Ciscar et al to understand its effect on muscle spindles and releasing a muscle (Ribot-Ciscar, 1991) and Jiri Dvorak, Director of FIFA Medical Centre of Excellence (HQ Zurick) reported to have replicated the research and got corresponding results.

Reference:

Ribot-Ciscar, 1991, Post-contraction changes in human muscle spindle resting discharge and stretch sensitivity

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/1836997

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