Rolling patterns for health and performance

So how do you roll? I don't mean this in terms of your style but more as to how you move.

  [caption id="attachment_3979" align="alignleft" width="300"] This is not how we roll 

  For most of the adult population the day consists of sitting on the commute to work, sitting at a desk, sitting on the drive home, sitting to eat dinner followed by sitting down to watch the latest episode of Suits.

[caption id="attachment_3980" align="alignleft" width="238"] You might want to sit down for this one

While the obvious pattern above is too much sitting we make this worse by not only not moving enough but moving in only the sagittal plane (think forward and back). We are ignoring movements in the frontal and transverse plane.

Recently we have seen in increase in multi-planar movements and function from people like Dewey Nielsen, the folks at Primal Move and any else that trains with varied movement and challenge.

So why the interest in rolling and 3D movement? Well part of this traces back to how we learned to move as infants. We learned head control, then as we explored with our heads to get to whatever it was that caught our attention we would bring our opposite arm or leg over to flip over.

And while we learned this rolling pattern as infants it has been lost as we become more sedentary, become injured and age.

However as we address our ability to roll we can see improvements in our ability to perform in rotational sports such as hockey, tennis, golf as well day to day movements such as squats and hip hinges.

Check out the video below to see Charlie Weingroff, who spoke at the 1st Okanagan Strength & Conditioning Conference, talking about rolling.

http://youtu.be/gmQuG2mnkWw Here are a few takeaways from the video and rolling patterns in general:

* all rolling involves a rotational component

* rolling from supine (on your back) to prone (on your front) involves a flexion component as well

* rolling from prone to supine involves an extension component as well

* all rolling stems from the direction and focus of the eyes, head and as Charlie pointed out even from the influence of the tongue position

So what is rolling? Is it an assessment? Is it a training drill? Is it something else?

Yes, to all of the above.

Initially you may use rolling to identify limits in your mobility and or stability in the transverse (rotational) plane. Once these limits have been identified you can now plug in some rolling drills into your program to improve your mobility, stability and sports performance.

If you are wondering if your ability to roll is affecting your health and sports performance make sure to contact us. We can put you through a screen to identify where your weak links are rotationally and how to improve them.

Chris