Mobility: Its not that people aren’t doing it, there’s just too much out there

I am really enjoying having my own site where I can express my views and opinions, not get edited and told I shouldn’t really say certain things. But I am aware that I may come across accidentally very egotistical and a “bit of a dick”. That is not my intention, but it is needed for my writing style. Everything I write is purely opinion based on where I am now with training and coaching, just as anyone else’s, any accidental fun I poke is entirely meant as fun. I have many friends and coaches that share different opinions to myself and we all love chatting about different methods and always arrive at the same results through different paths which is what is most important. So no one path is better than the other: it’s all about getting to know your client.

…I’m just saying that my paths are better. (JK, ROFL, LMFAO)

So, that being said, I am constantly reading about people doing mobility work, or shouting about others missing mobility work, la la la. Ultimately for me, I never want to have to do mobility work again, and that’s why I do it… Say again Tom?

Doing mobility is BORING! I want to lift stuff! My goal is to move so efficiently that I don’t need to use certain stretches and movements.

If done wrong, you may as well watch the fantastic four remake whilst doing it.

To me, having to roll around on a roller or lacrosse ball is a step too late. You’re already in pain. Something isn’t doing it’s fair share so you’re having to blindly rub and roll, hurting yourself a little bit more than the hurt that you already feel so that your current hurt goes away so you can do the same shit that hurt you in the first place.

That’s madness.

I am not saying it doesn’t have its place and that you shouldn’t learn rolling/self myofascial release, in fact it is a fantastic tool for teaching yourself how much muscles move when you move a joint. But should it routinely make appearances in your warm ups? No.

Another nice one is the couch stretch, if done correctly it can be a fantastic hip opener and really help you improve your ability to extend at the hip. If done wrong, you may as well watch the fantastic four remake whilst doing it. My question is, why do you need it? Why are your hip flexors always tight? Can we really blame sitting that much? What about moving? If you learn how to use your hip flexors correctly in everyday movement, surely that would fix them? Maybe walking is creating your tightness?

I can comfortably sit into a couch stretch any time of the day now and be aware of it but not be overly impressed by the nature of the stretch. I now know that my years of tightness was actually caused by the way I moved with EVERYTHING, not just sitting. Now that I move more efficiently I don’t have the need for that stretch AS OFTEN, not altogether. It is the same with my shoulders, I always used to get tremendously tight beautiful traps, but when I broke down my own training history I discovered I seriously neglected exercises that promote good shoulder extension, the solution? ADD in more training exercises, not rest! And boom, traps still as beautiful, but not tight anymore! We always miss something, no matter how good we think we are or how perfect we think our programming is. Now I can pretty much do shoulders every day and never suffer from any tightness unless I really push past the norm. Again though, no need to roll my lats, dig stuff into my traps or stick a band around my tits and wave hi to an imaginary gremlin.

It’s not that people are skipping on mobility work, they just don’t know how to progress from the famous floppy spotted cat book (see what I did there?). It is misunderstood in so many ways and turns people into biomechanical engineering experts after a single read. With your own mobility, you should treat it as a journey, your daily routine should include a self assessment of what your body is up to. It is up to you to listen to your body and track what you’re doing all the time, use the things that make you feel good but also see what happens when you take them away. Are they making you feel good or has it just become a time consuming habit? Do you even need what you’re doing at all?

Everyone has the ability to be a scientist with their own body, no true survey has 100% correct answers. What if you were the one exception to the rule that sticking a lacrosse ball up your rectum actually did release your piriformis muscle? We’ll never know if you don’t try, but just a recommendation, try a lunge first.

Tom