Category: Education

Did you just start running?

Well in this blog post, I’m going to share with you some simple core exercises that you can do at home to help improve your running skills

Strength and conditioning outside running is one of the most common things that is overlooked by many runners. To help you improve your speed and endurance, as well as the longevity of the sports that you like.

I cannot emphasize enough how important strength training is for running. Adding strength and conditioning exercise to your routine, even one or two times per week, can actually be very beneficial to your training—it can help prevent injuries and help to build up the efficiency of your running.

I’m going to share with you some of the exercises that I normally start off with for most runners that come into my clinic. Doing these exercises, you will be able to significantly improve the efficiency of your running.

Keeping in mind, these tips and advice are of general nature and do not take your injuries/history into considerations. If you are experiencing any pain or would like an individualised tailored program to help improve your running, I highly recommend you speak to any one of your physiotherapists to guide you through your running journey.

Here at Capital Physiotherapy, our physiotherapists are the experts in helping you to fix your issues as well as all the discomfort that comes with it!

We can help you lead a healthier and pain free lifestyle.

Our physiotherapist will be able to give a full assessment on you and come out with individualised advice/ treatment plan that is tailored for your particular needs.

At Capital Physiotherapy, your initial appointment is 40-60minutes long. This allows our physios to be thorough in their assessment, as well as giving them enough time to give you treatment on the same consultation!

For any physiotherapy related concerns drop us an email info@capitalphysiotherapy.com.au or make an appointment through our booking system!  

Today in this blog, I am going to show you some core stability exercises that are absolutely vital for any sports performance or back and hip injury rehab that no one has shown you before!

I’ll be starting a new series of videos on stabilizing exercises for every major joint in our body in the upcoming few weeks. These exercises will not only be beneficial for your overall fitness but will also help improve any sports performance, help with injury rehab as well as pain management.

I’ll try to make our very complex body anatomy as simple to understand as possible. Our body is made up of two groups of muscles type

The Postural Muscles and The Movement Muscles

Postural muscles are made up of mostly ‘slow twitch” muscle fibre, they are designed to create stability in the joints to help maintain our posture and to also help stabilise our moving joints.

I see a lot of people doing core strengthening exercises, and they do have very strong core but what they are lack if is a good core control and that’s what we call “proprioception training”

Proprioception is the awareness of the body in space. It is the use of joint position sense and joint motion sense to respond to stresses placed upon the body by alteration of posture and movement.

Proprioceptive exercises are exercises which challenge and develop proprioceptive receptors. Proprioception helps to stabilise a joint during static and dynamic functional tasks. Decreased proprioception can lead to an increased risk of injury.

Having a strong core without knowing how to control them is not going to help you translate it to normal functional activities or your sports. In order to improve your sports performance and improve the efficiency and fluidity of your movement, you need to learn how to control the core muscles as and when you need them to, and learning to turn on the precise amount needed for a particular movement.

These series of blogs that I’m starting to make are targeting these postural muscles groups and your proprioception of your core/lower back and hip.

To help improve your conditioning workout routine, rehab and to improve your stability of your joints while you continue to enjoy the sports that you love or just to enjoy a more pain free living.

Keeping in mind these exercises are of general nature and do not take your injuries/history into considerations. In order to fully rehab your discomfort you will still need to continue to progress to harder and more functional strengthening exercises that are specifically tailored for you,  in order to feel pain free while working.

Here at Capital Physiotherapy, our physiotherapists are the experts in helping you to fix your issues as well as all the discomfort that comes with it!

We can help you lead a healthier and pain free lifestyle.

Our physiotherapist will be able to give a full assessment on you and come out with individualised advice/ treatment plan that is tailored for your particular needs.

At Capital Physiotherapy, your initial appointment is 40-60minutes long. This allows our physios to be thorough in their assessment, as well as giving them enough time to give you treatment on the same consultation!

For any physiotherapy related concerns drop us an email info@capitalphysiotherapy.com.au or make an appointment through our booking system!  

I’ll be starting a new series of videos on stabilizing exercises for every major joint in our body in the upcoming few weeks. These exercises will not only be beneficial for your overall fitness but will also help improve any sports performance, help with injury rehab as well as pain management.

Body Anatomy

• I’ll try to make our very complex body anatomy as simple to understand as possible.
• Our body is made up of two groups of muscles type
• The Postural Muscles and The Movement Muscles

Postural muscles are made up of mostly ‘slow twitch” muscle fibre, they are designed to create stability in the joints to help maintain our posture and to also help stabilise our moving joints. To train these muscles we must perform the exercises slowly, holding it for a longer period and with higher repetition.

The movement muscles on the other hand are normally very strong, big fast twitch muscles that are designed to give our body an outburst of power, but normally for a much shorter duration of time. To train these muscles, we will need heavy loading and shorter repetition with much more frequent rest periods to ensure the muscles can properly recover before the next activation. Most people that I see come in injured are mostly due to this imbalance between the movement muscles and the postural muscles.

These series of videos that I’m starting to make are targeting these postural muscles groups.

To help improve your conditioning workout routine, rehab and to improve your stability of your joints while you continue to enjoy the sports that you love or just to enjoy a more pain free living.

Keeping in mind, these tips/advice are of general nature and do not take your injuries/history into considerations. If you are experiencing any pain or would like an individualised tailored program to help improve your symptoms, I highly recommend you speak to any one of your physiotherapists to guide you through your rehabilitation journey.

Here at Capital Physiotherapy, our physiotherapists are the experts in helping you to fix your issues as well as all the discomfort that comes with it!

We can help you lead a healthier and pain free lifestyle.

Our physiotherapist will be able to give a full assessment on you and come out with individualised advice/ treatment plan that is tailored for your particular needs.

At Capital Physiotherapy, your initial appointment is 40-60minutes long. This allows our physios to be thorough in their assessment, as well as giving them enough time to give you treatment on the same consultation!

For any physiotherapy related concerns drop us an email info@capitalphysiotherapy.com.au or make an appointment through our booking system!  

Over the past few weeks it’s been like deja vu one after another my client came into my clinic telling me they restrain from doing exercises as they are afraid it will make their already tight muscles tighter!

As weird as it may sound to you but i’m going tell you this is a myth. Strengthening your muscles does not make it “tight” or “stiff”

If done a certain way (eccentric strengthening-Eccentric training is when you contract the muscle while it is getting longer. ) it can actually help increase the stretch tolerance and flexibility of that muscles.

Just stretching and not strengthening your muscles will make those muscles prone to injuries.

A lot of our clients often report a sensation of tightness and pain in their muscles. As such we are frequently asked for stretches or whether massage or dry needling would help.

While stretching might give a short-term benefit, strong evidence have shown that that eccentric training can;

1. Increase the length of our muscle fibres and
2. Improve joint range of movement AND
3. Improve muscle strength AND
4. Reduce injury risk at the same time!

Soreness isn’t always an indicator that a muscle needs to be stretched. It can also be an indicator that the muscle itself isn’t strong enough.

A lot of times, chronically tight muscles are tight because they’re weak.

Weakness reduces efficiency of muscle activation which leads to over activating muscles fibre that is not required and constantly being overworked creating a “tightness” sensation.

By increasing the strength of the muscles, you increase the efficiency of the muscles and hence reduce unnecessary overloading of it which will help reduce that “ tight” / “stiff “ sensation.

Now, I’m not saying that stretching is useless, because if you are one of those people who never stretch in your entire life, you probably do very much need stretching, massaging, dry needling.

Our muscles work best in their mid range. However if you increase the flexibility of your muscles,your ideal/ optimal range would significantly increase as well.

So the ideal situation or training routine should have a combination of stretches and strengthening at the same time to maximise the benefit and reduce your sensation of “tightness” & “stiffness”