Hello and welcome to this week’s blog, all about injury rehab, and this is part three. Do take a moment to go back and read the first two instalments. This week I am looking at Prehab.
Prehab
Prehab is a buzzword that has come to the fore more recently, and in fact is a valuable way to look at rehab in general. It means that you prepare and train your body to avoid injury from over training or a weak link in the chain that is your body. By being careful and training in such a way to make you less susceptible to injury is probably the most important element of injury rehab.
Which sounds crazy, right?
Who has the time to embark on ‘prehab’, why not just address an injury as and when it happens?
Take a moment to think about what would happen if you just continued to not train, or not look at your weaknesses in a critical manner to work on them?
You could sustain a small injury which might be a nuisance for a little while, a quick massage or stretch could sort it out. However, what if you suffer a bigger injury or muscular dysfunction that takes several weeks, or months, to properly heal? It could take the intervention of a doctor, or a surgical procedure, or many massages and visits to a physiotherapist before you reach a resolution and can continue your life without that pain.
Wouldn’t it be better to avoid all that?
In that case, practise Prehab.
What Should I Do To Prehab?
In case you’re sitting there scratching your head, wondering what on earth prehab is, then I will enlighten you.
The notion of mobility workouts only being for the older generations is slowly coming to an end, and this is where you need to start when it comes to prehab.
Mobility workouts can help you maintain a healthy joint range of motion, as well as the natural length and actions of the muscles controlling each joint.
Personally I follow the workouts by Ryan Hurst of www.gmb.io because these cover all the important bases in a controlled format.
If you do not want to commit to a set workout like that, think about introducing a mobility warm-up before each workout you do. This would involve in moving each joint in a controlled and slow manner, through its full range of motion.
For example, shoulder circles, hip circles, wrist rotations, foot circles. Practise those forwards and backwards for about 5-10 repetitions.
Also practise body weight exercises, like those found in yoga as well Pilates, martial arts, calisthenics, and capoeira.
Don’t currently follow a workout regimen?
If you don’t currently follow a workout regimen, then start with a five-minute yoga or Pilates workout, easily found on YouTube, and see what you like and what feels good. If something feels too restricted to begin anything, or you’ve started and something is not allowing you to move with freedom, then do please pay me a visit to see how I can help.
If you have many different physical interests, or time doesn’t allow, then try to include a dedicated session of mobility, yoga or Pilates, once a week or fortnight. The other thing to include in your prehab routine, is a regular week of rest, once every six to eight weeks. When I say rest, it does not mean do nothing, but rather spend a week doing completely different activities to those you normally do, in order to allow your entire body and mind to rest and recover from its usual routine.
Thank you for stopping by and taking time to read my blogs, I hope that you have found something useful here to help you, and of course if you would like any further information or need any help, please do get in touch or head over to my bookings page to make an appointment.
Chloe