Foam Rollers

Foam rolling is becoming increasingly common amongst the gym, exercise enthusiasts, and even in a lot of injury/ rehabilitation clinics. It's a form of ‘Self Myofascial Release' (SMR) which is essentially a self-directed massage that you can conduct yourself. From a financial standpoint, they’re a worthy investment costing as little as ￡10+!? But how do they actually help you?

You can use them if you’re an athlete if you train a handful of times a week and even if you don’t train they’re a tool for everyone! The benefits will be different from person to person but the main benefits you got from SMR are:

• Reduce muscle pain - delayed onset muscles soreness (DOMS) is what you may feel after a heavy training session and studies have shown that just 20 minutes of foam rolling can significantly reduce the effect of DOMS
• Increase range of motion (ROM) - foam rolling has been shown to increase joint ROM and more so when used in combination with static stretches!
• Enhance performance - by doing the above muscular performance will naturally be greater meaning you can train for longer periods and perform better?
• Promotes blood flow - through mobilising the muscle and tissues in our body we increase blood flow to the targeted areas which can help and support muscle recovery and performance?
• Promotes lymphatic drainage - lymphatic drainage is our body's internal waste system, as we increase blood flow we also increase the demand for any waste products such as lymph, lactic acid, deoxygenated blood cells, etc to be removed from the body

Knowing the benefits is fantastic and part of the ongoing education of your body and understanding how you recover from work or training. But to really get the most out of using a foam roller you need to know how to do it, here are some of our key tips!

1. Avoid areas of pain/ discomfort - a bit of a catch-22 as you’ll be using your foam roller to help you recover but if you conduct SMR on areas of pain you could be doing more damage than good! You should always start away from areas of pain/ discomfort/ soreness and build up to it. If it is too uncomfortable don’t SMR that area or seek medical advice.?
2. Go slow - slow and controlled is the key here, your body needs time to adjust to the stimulus (foam roller) by allowing your body to relax you can reap the benefits. If you go too quick you will lose out on these benefits?
3. Relax - commonly when using a foam roller users have a tendency to hold their breath which naturally causes the body to tense up. In order to experience the benefits of foam rolling, you need to relax.

How often?

As often as you feel, once you have got used to it. If you have never used a foam roller before it can take time to adjust to it.? You should initially just get used to placing your body or the area you wish to work on, on top of the foam roller and build up from there. Start with 10 seconds and build up to 30, 45 seconds, and maybe even a few minutes! Once you have practiced and built yourself up to using the foam roller you should aim to do at least 30-40 seconds per area 2 times over so your session could be like this:

• 2 x 30 seconds on each hamstring
• 2 x 30 seconds on each calf
• 2 x 30 second on each quadricep
• 2 x 30 seconds on each glute
• 2 x 30 seconds on your back

That's a quick 9-minute session you can easily integrate into your routine!?