Stretching

"I don't excercise. If God had wanted me to bend over, he would have put diamonds on the floor." - Joan Rivers

For Cub Scouts tonight I'll need to discuss stretching exercises. It's been ages since I've done any stretching (to my body's dismay) so I did some research. Here's what I found.

Year's ago my wife & I attended a fun class called the Way of the Peaceful Warrior by Dan Millman. He recommends A Complete Four-Minute Fitness Routine every morning to get one revved up for the day. One part I remember fondly is a full body shakedown with random wiggling to loosen joints and muscles.

The site Corporate Yoga has pictures of stretches you can do in your cubicle and at your computer.

Fairview Health has pictures of classic stretches for the major muscles. I have unusually tight calf muscles and should be doing the hamstring and calf stretch more often. Standing on my toes is no problem but pulling my toes up, or leg lifts, not so easy.

Bottom Line

When should you stretch? As a child I was taught to stretch or pull the muscles (like Fairview above) before exercising. Modern medicine says this can tear "cold" muscle and cause injury and worsen athletic performance. Instead perform dynamic warmup like Arm circles and Trunk rotations to "warm" up muscles and increase the blood flow and oxygenation. Exercise. Then do "static" pulling stretches afterwards to prevent cramping.

A SportsInjury site allows for cold stretching but start slow, NO BOUNCING, 30 seconds max per stretch, and build up gently to harder muscle pulls.

Resources

http://www.myfit.ca/exercisedatabase/stretches.asp?exercises=flexibility

http://www.sportsinjuryclinic.net/cybertherapist/stretching/allstretches.php

http://physicaltherapy.about.com/od/flexibilityexercises/Stretching_Exercises.htm

http://www.thestretchinghandbook.com/

Push Ups for Abs!

“Exercise is done against one's wishes and maintained only because the alternative is worse” - George Sheehan, American physician

As someone with back trouble and an aversion to exercise, I read with interest a study that the traditional curl-ups or sit-ups are bad for the back: Stop Doing Sit-Ups: Why Crunches Don't Work. According to the Texas Back Institute the “full flex” movement, the “crunch” part of crunches, puts an unhealthy strain on your back when it’s at its weakest point. Professor Stuart M. McGill, of the University of Waterloo, says “There are only so many bends or a ‘fatigue life’,” in your spinal disks … if you keep flexing your spine and bending the disk over and over again, that nucleus slowly breaches the layers and causes a disk bulge, or a disk herniation.”

That is what happened to me – a disk herniation, twice! Though not from sit-ups; more likely from bad posture sitting before a computer for long hours. It started as lower back pain and I was very happy when one day it stopped. Then soon after I started feeling shooting pain down my left leg (Sciatica). It turns out the back pain stopped when the cushioning disk between two vertebrae popped (relieving the pressure). As the disk oozed out from the spine it started pressing on the spinal column, in particular pressing on nerves that led to the legs. Given time the pressure could have led to permanent nerve damage and paralysis of the body below that herniation point.

When I finally visited a doctor I was in such pain that it was easier for me to lie on the office floor than to sit in a chair. He took an x-ray, recommended aspirin and rest, and sent me home. Two days later I get an urgent call, please come to the office for a diagnosis. The doctor sure looked pale and worried (malpractice fears?) when he told me I had a major disk hernia. I was sent to a neurologist for examination and scheduled for surgery a few days later. The micro-discectomy cut away the protruding disk with just a small incision through the back muscles. The recovery was six weeks and during the duration we joked that my spouse was “pack-wife”. She carried anything heavy.

Bottom Line

So does this new studies say I can abandon any thoughts of washboard abs? No. Professor McGill in the article recommends push ups. This is a full body exercise that will not stress the spine if done properly (i.e. don’t stick your butt high the air when pushing up).

Exercise is important to preparedness. I read one amusing site that noted fitness was more than lifting weights. Consider the following: Two men stop you. One pulls a knife and asks for your wallet.

Scenario 1. You swing a punch that has little effect and run for your life. After one block you’re winded and they catch you.

Scenario 2.You swing a punch properly with your whole body and knock one guy flat. The other chases you but after a few blocks you’re still going strong and the bad guy is out of breath and gives up.

Which Scenario is more likely for you?

Preparing your Feet for Disasters

“A radical is a person with both feet firmly planted in the air.” - anon

Today I recommend the article Preparing Your Feet for TEOTWAWKI, by The Surgeon. It has too many excellent details about foot care to summarize here so go read it (you’ll have to scroll down past the annoying ad that fills the screen).

Bottom Line
We take our feet and ankles for granted until they fail us. While it’s possible to put an arm in a sling and let it heal, it is MUCH harder to heal a leg injury in the knee, ankle or foot. Even with a crutch you’ll find yourself putting weight on the injury and slowing the healing process.
When 9-11 hit NYC many people walked out of the city to friends or to home; a distance of many miles. I was working on 50th street at the time and when our company closed for the day and everyone told to go home (evacuate), I was amazed as I walked south to Grand Central Station to catch a train. I felt like a salmon going upstream as 5th Ave and Madison Ave were filled with thousands of people all walking north. I learned afterwards that the mayor had ordered a complete evacuation of lower Manhattan. With subways closed or overwhelmed, that left walking.
The lesson I learned from this was to keep a pair of sneakers in my desk drawer at work just in case. I once walked a few miles in dress shoes and got terrible blisters.

P.S. TEOTWAWKI = The End of The World As We Know It.