Running and Strength Training go Together Like Peanut Butter and Jam!
We GET you.
You’re a runner, not a bodybuilder.
You love the stress relief and way your body and mind feel during and after a great run. The freedom that comes with the simplicity of lacing up your shoes and that’s all you need to get a good workout in. The satisfaction of seeing your run times improve and new distances unlocked.
Plus, you’re already busy enough and adding in strength training is probably the last thing you want to do - BUT. What if we were able to show you that adding strength training is the secret to enhancing your running experience EVEN more.
There’s roadblocks that maybe you have or you’ve heard other people say that could be unnecessarily holding you back from adding that sauce. They’re holding you back from taking your peanut butter (running) and accompanying it with some jam (strength training), taking those two great things and making it a better thing. That’s what we’re aiming to do with this blog…we’ll address a few common roadblocks around strength training and running and hopefully convince you to take that next step towards the perfect health sandwich.
Ready, set…
Your MRI is Not Your Story
MRI’s Are Amazing!
Don’t get us wrong, MRI’s help us identify serious problems and can be life saving when used to diagnose and guide surgical interventions. For example, MRI’s help us with…
Neurological Disorders: MRI is highly effective in imaging the brain and spinal cord, making it invaluable for diagnosing conditions such as brain tumours, multiple sclerosis, strokes, and various neurological disorders.
Cardiovascular Conditions: Cardiac MRI can provide detailed images of the heart, helping to diagnose heart problems, such as heart muscle damage, congenital heart defects, and vascular diseases.
It’s a tool, and a very good one. However, oftentimes this is mistaken for being able to do everything and solve every problem. Like any tool, if it’s used in the wrong way it can cause harm. Therefore, the purpose of our blog is to highlight some of the issues that can occur with musculoskeletal (MSK) pain and MRI’s and how your MRI is not always your story, particularly when it comes to MSK pain.
All About our Partnership with StayAbove Nutrition.
When it comes to your overall health most of us are well aware of the importance of nutrition. We know that certain foods offer a higher quality source of nutrition than others and that it is important to be selective of what we put in our bodies. We’ve realized the importance of helping people with their nutrition and this is why Dee our dietician, is focused on educating and guiding people through nutritional plans to allow for you to take control of your health.
Get Ready for Neck Day - How to Train Your Neck
Let’s face it. No one walks into the gym thinking “I’m pumped for neck day today.” It’s not something we often work on or see people working on in the gym. No one wants to be that person getting looks from everyone because of the weird exercises you’re doing. But just like any other part of the body can be trained, so can the neck. Now we aren’t talking about adding a neck day into your exercise split, but rather adding in some accessories to your upper body loading day. You don’t need to turn into a Formula 1 driver with your neck strength but it can benefit your upper extremity lifts especially in an overhead position.
What is Pelvic Health Physiotherapy?
Did you even know that there is such a thing? Or maybe you know it exists but aren’t sure what it really means or involves? OR, maybe you’ve done it before but didn’t realize we did pelvic physio at The Movement.
Well now we do, so that’s why I wanted to talk about it with you. My name is Jess, I’m one of the physiotherapists at The Movement and I just became certified in pelvic health physiotherapy.
Let’s talk about it…
Why We Eat What We Eat
We all know that healthy eating is important. It's also no surprise when I say that for most of us, we know what we shouldn't do, or at least what we should do less of. I think before starting any nutrition journey or changing any type of habit we need to explore the “why” behind any behavior. The ‘why’ lets us get to the root cause of why we are doing something so we can
fix it, or
At least gain a better understanding of our own behaviour.
How We Approach Sciatica
‘Sciatica’ is a term that gets thrown around quite often but the reality is that sciatica is a catch all term for symptoms that go down your leg. Without getting into the weeds too much, we’d just like to point out that symptoms like that could usually benefit from seeing a professional such as a physiotherapist, who can make individual recommendations for you. However, in this blog post, we’ll give you an idea of how we approach sciatica at The Movement and teach you about how to move the nerve with exercises called neuromobility exercises. We have also included a free download of 5 exercises to improve sciatic nerve tension!
Why Orthotics Aren’t the Solution to Your Plantar Fasciitis
What’s the first think people tell you to do when you get plantar fasciitis? Yup…more than likely they immediately say, “you should get orthotics!” This SEEMS like such an appealing answer, support the arch the way your foot is supposed to be and BAM your pain is gone and you’re good to go. In this blog post, we’re going to present the argument as to why this isn’t the direction you should go or at least why it isn’t the only thing you should do to truly solve your plantar fasciitis. We’ll present 3 problems and the solution to plantar fasciitis as well as at the bottom we’ve included a free download that has 3 exercises to prehab your plantar fascia.
3 Myth’s About Lifting Weights
Don’t believe everything you read or watch…especially around health and fitness!
There’s no shortage of information these days, ranging from fixes for your pain and training tips to nutrition tips. This is GREAT overall because you’re able to learn about most things you want to do. However, this can be really impactful on your health in a negative way as well if you’re seeing the wrong information.
A Story About a 72 Year Old Client.
Find out how our 72 year old client went from in pain, unable to walk more than 10 minutes, and never strength training to out of pain, walking for as long as she wants, and strength training 3 x a week!
You’re Missing Out on THIS Easy Way to Improve Your Running Performance…
When most people think of running muscles, they immediately think of the quads, hammies, and glutes. Although those muscles as well as all muscles in the lower extremity are important for running, the soleus muscle is truly the powerhouse. Understanding why it’s important might convince you to spend a little more time on training your soleus. This could be the thing that just unlocks the potential you need for your running performance…
Recover Like an Athlete.
Progressive overload through planned training stress is an essential aspect of improving performance over time. That said, equally important and more often overlooked is having a dialled in recovery plan. Although there are many tools out there that anecdotally help enhance recovery including foam rolling, BFR, Normatec, muscle stimulation devices, etc, the research is clear about the recovery superpowers of having appropriate nutrition, adequate sleep, stress management strategies and a structured training plan. In this blog, we’ll be covering your true recovery superpowers.
How We Actually Rehab Acute Injuries
In a recent blog post here, our RMT and Athletic Therapist Dan Marynowski discussed why ice isn’t necessarily the way to help acute injuries. Knowing what we now know about icing, acronyms guiding soft tissue management have evolved from the traditional ICE/RICE/PRICE and POLICE protocols. The way we now approach soft tissue management is taking all stages of healing into account rather than just the acute phase. That being said, the new acronym that encompasses the rehabilitation continuum from immediate care (PEACE) to subsequent management (LOVE) is PEACE & LOVE.
What is your core and how to train it.
When you hear the word core, I’d be willing to bet you start to think of the abdominals! I don’t blame you, as this is where most peoples heads go when they hear the word core. Most people don’t understand how their core helps them with their performance, what else is involved in the core, and how to train it in ways other than sit ups and planks. So my goal is to share our philosophy on the core, how you can think about its function and then share with you some ways that you can train it that you might not have expected.
Overcoming Fear of the Barbell
Over the last 4 months we’ve watched client after client in our group training sessions embrace this experience. The Barbell can be intimidating. But at the same time it can be empowering. In this blog we’re going give you 3 thoughts on how you can overcome the fear of the barbell.
The Benefits of Resistance Training
Resistance training or lifting weights is something that we preach all the time. Generally speaking, people understand the benefits of cardiovascular training for overall health but tend to underestimate the value or resistance training for overall health beyond getting more muscular. However…
Stop Stretching Your Hip Flexors!!!
Okay okay….I know….the title of this blog is a little extreme. It’s completely fine to stretch your hip flexors for the most part…but not always AND it may not always be the best usage of your time. I can’t tell you how many times clients come in to see us and say they’ve been dealing with hip flexor pain and/or tightness, they’ve tried stretching….stretching….and stretching some more but haven’t seen results. That’s why in this blog, I’m going to teach you about when you may want to avoid stretching your hip flexors and when you may want to consider a different approach.
Should you really be icing acute injuries?
It has always been customary to throw on an ice pack for any injury, especially acute injuries The question we’ll be posing is….should you? Or maybe the better question is…do you NEED to? Firstly, let’s address why people think they should ice.
The Best Way to Program Your Own Runs.
80% of runners get injured because they run at 80% intensity 80% of the time. This is what we’re aiming to help you avoid! To be frank, most people progress running too quickly. While you may be able to withstand the runs and recover aerobically, your tissues need time to recover and this takes more time (think tendons and bones). We like to think of run programming as stacking bricks slowly over time…it seems like you’re going slow, but done consistently over time you end up achieving your goals (see graphical depiction).