Barefoot training

How to Properly Transition to Barefoot Training

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As we stated in our last article the transition to barefoot shoes should be gradual! Many people have movement pattern issues that need to be addressed prior to making the transition. This will reduce the risk of injury and keep you moving toward your goals!

Barefoot training

Common Movement Pattern Issues

Tight Ankles

This is one of the most common movement issues we see. Tightness in your ankles is typically from over-active calves and an under-active anterior tibialis (shin muscle). This will greatly reduce your dorsiflexion (your ankle bending forward).

Weak Hips

Weakness in your hips typically leads to your knees collapsing in and aids in your arches collapsing as well. This will come from weakness in your hip abductors and over-activity in the adductors.

 

Flat/Weak Arches

Almost everyone nowadays has flat feet. No matter if you’re born with it or have developed them over the years they can be strengthened! Just like any other dysfunction in the body it is a muscle imbalance of tight muscles and weak muscles. The right exercises can help bring balance back to your arch.

 

Tight Big Toe

When your range of motion (especially extension) in your big toe is reduced it will kill your balance and reduce your power when pushing off your foot. This is usually caused by your shoes squishing all your toes together. This not only causes bunions but will also greatly reduce the function of your big toe.

 

 

How To Improve Ankle Mobility

How To Improve Hip Stability

How To Improve Arch Stability

How To Improve Big Toe Extension

These exercises are a great start to increasing your mobility and stability. Once these exercises have been mastered, next you can transition to barefoot shoes in your daily activities. Start with walking, then progress to light jogging and eventually running. The transition should be slow!! Depending on the person this could take up to 6 months for a full and strong transition. Unsure if you’re ready for the transition? A movement specialist can assess you and ensure a proper program is established!

 

Written By:

Robert Jost

NSCA-CPT, ACE-CPT

 

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Shoes and Performance

Could Your Shoes Be The Cause of Foot Dysfunction and Decreased Performance?

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Foot Health and Your Performance

Typically the feet are a forgotten body part when it comes to training but the health of your foot can be one of the most crucial aspects in how well you perform on the field or ice.  Also the type of shoe you wear while training can play a huge role.

Types of Shoes

Shoes and PerformanceThere are a ton of different types of shoes out there nowadays. You have running shoes, walking shoes, training shoes, basketball shoes, hiking boots, casual shoes, dress shoes and the list goes on. Why is there a different shoe for every little thing I do in life? For the most part the shoe companies are just trying to make money so they will “create” a shoe for every possible task in life. But aren’t our feet supposed to naturally do all of these tasks anyway? Yup…and BAREFOOT at that!

Foot Anatomy

 

 

Our feet are amazingly strong (or at least supposed to be) and they have one of the highest sensory outputs in the entire body! They contain 33 joints and over 100 muscles, tendons and ligaments per foot!! So why in the world would we drown them and cover them with big bulky shoes that weaken our feet and reduce their sense of touch?

 

How The Feet Function

The feet have so many functions that can affect performance. The big toe is vital in how well you push off your foot. During activities such as sprinting this can make or break your explosiveness. The mobility of the ankle joint has a huge effect on your performance as well. Efficient dorsiflexion can help improve your speed and explosiveness by allowing your foot to act like a spring. Every time you hit the ground, your foot will propel you forward instead of pounding straight into the ground. This will limit the pressure on your joints and increase your body’s energy efficiency.

How Your Shoe Can Hinder Foot Function

Many shoes now have a raised heel so you’re walking around on this thick platform reducing your feel of the ground. The front of the shoe which is called the toe box is typically very narrow leading to the toes getting squished together. These two popular designs in shoes cause huge problems for your foot health and ultimately your performance. As stated above big toe push off and ankle mobility are vital to optimal foot performance. The raised heel can change your posture, how you stand, walk and run. This can lead to a heel striking running pattern.  Increasing your risk for hip, knee and foot pain as well as decreased performance. Squishing your toes into narrower toe boxes will lead to lack of mobility and dysfunction of your big toe reducing power and explosiveness.

 

The Culprits

These are many of the most popular shoes “designed” for running, training and hiking. But wait….aren’t my feet already designed to do all of these things? Why do I need a specially designed shoe with extra support to help? All that extra support is like a cast for your foot, although it’ll feel better in the short term limiting any pain you have from your feet or hips being weak. In the long term you are actually just making the problem worse by reducing the movement of the hundreds of joints, muscles, tendons and ligaments in your feet. This will atrophy the muscles and stiffen the joints leading to more pain, dysfunction and potential injury.

 

“Barefoot” Options

Some may say the barefoot options are silly looking or not fashionable.  Walking around dysfunctionally (which is visibly noticeable) and knowingly creating weak and painful feet sounds a lot more silly and unfashionable to me 😉 These shoes can wake up the sensory processors of the feet leading to huge changes in posture, function, performance and pain relief!

 

The transition to barefoot shoes must be gradual! Proper ankle mobility, arch strength, and hip stability are all musts before adding in barefoot wear to your workouts and outdoor adventures! Stay tuned, next week we’ll break down the most common movement pattern issues and how to get yourself strong enough to start transitioning to your new “barefoot” lifestyle!

 

Written By:

Robert Jost

NSCA-CPT, ACE-CPT

 

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Peanut butter banana smoothie

Peanut Butter Banana Post Workout Smoothie

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Peanut Butter Banana Post Workout Smoothie

Peanut butter banana smoothie

 

Here a simple yet tasty high protein smoothie that is perfect after a tough workout.

Ingredients:

  • 1 large banana
  • 1 heaping tbsp. of peanut butter
  • 1/4 cup greek yogurt
  • 1/2 cup almond milk
  • 1 scoop your choice of protein powder (vanilla or chocolate)
  • 1 cup ice cubes

Mix the ingredients in a blender, blend and enjoy!

 

Written By:

Robert Jost

NSCA-CPT, ACE-CPT

 

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ankle pain

Is Your Lower Leg Mobility Plan As Effective As It Could Be?

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ankle painThere are many muscles in the lower leg (knee down) but we’re going to focus on two specific muscles in this article. The Gastrocnemius (upper calf muscle) and the soleus (lower calf muscle). The gastrocnemius is the calf muscle that everyone sees and aspires to have a defined shape. The soleus is a little less know muscle and isn’t as well seen or defined. So how do you know which one could be causing mobility issues? We have a couple quick tests that will reveal which one could be causing the problem and mobility protocols to ensure you’re getting the most out of your mobility routine.

Lower Leg Anatomy

Here is a picture to give you a better idea of where each muscle is.

Lower Leg Function

Both the gastroc and the soleus have similar functions. They both plantar flex the foot (when you go up on your toes) while walking, running and jumping. The main difference between the two is when they activate. The gastrocnemius activates when the leg is fully extended at the knee and the soleus primarily activates when the knee is bent.

How This Affects Your Mobility Plan

Since these muscles activate in different body positions you will also have to stretch and mobilize these muscles differently as well. The gastroc will best be stretched and mobilized with a straight knee position and the soleus will get the best stretch in a bent knee position. But how do you know which one to focus in on to improve mobility?

Test Your Lower Leg Mobility

There are two different tests you can do to decipher which part of the lower leg is the issue. The bent knee lower leg and the straight leg lower leg mobility tests can show you which part of the calf is more of an issue based off of the dorsiflexion range of motion at the ankle. Optimal range of motion is around 40 degrees.

Straight Leg Ankle Dorsiflexion Mobility test – The focus of this test is to see how much range of motion you can get from the back ankle while in the straight leg position . Keep the toes pointed forward, heel down and back leg straight.

 

Bent Knee Ankle Dorsiflexion Mobility Test – The goal here is to assess ankle mobility in the front ankle while bending at the knee. You want to keep the toes pointed forward, knee bent, and heel on the ground.

 

 

Protocol to Improve Ankle Mobility

After we have discovered which position has limited range of motion then we can asign the more appropriate ankle mobility and performance protocol.

Gastrocnemius (upper calf) Mobility Performance Protocol – If your range of motion is more limited in the straight leg position than we need to reduce tightness in the gastroc through active releases, stretches, and mobilizations. Then strengthen the soleus to bring balance back to the lower leg muscles.

 

Soleus (lower calf) Mobility Performance Protocol – If your range of motion was worse in the bent leg position then we need to reduce tightness in the soleus through active releases, stretches and mobilizations. Then get the gastroc activating to bring balance back to the lower leg muscles.

 

 

Written By:

Robert Jost

NSCA-CPT, ACE-CPT

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warmup

7 Techniques To Think About When Creating Your Warmup

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What’s your warmup look like? Typical warmups seen in the gym include the treadmill, static stretching, light sets on machines and a host of other modalities. So what’s the best way to warmup? First and foremost it depends on the type of workout you’ll be doing that day as well as your abilities and goal set.  Here’s a list of 7 things to think about when designing the best warmup for you!

warmup

1. Increase Synovial Fluid

Getting your joints moving through full ranges of motion is so important. This allows for synovial fluid to flow through the joints efficiently, reducing friction and improving the glide of the joints. This can also reduce stiffness and pain within the joints prior to working out.

 

2. Muscle Activation

Your muscles can look great, but are they fully activating during your workout? Many times big time muscles like the glutes aren’t actually activating when they should be. This makes other muscles over-activate creating muscle imbalances. To decrease the likelihood of muscle imbalances and improve performance incorporate specific muscle activations to wake up your sleepy muscles prior to your workout.

 

3. Joint Mobility

Full joint mobility through all joints is a must before getting into an intense workout. Just doing some running typical wont do the full job. You need to get every joint up the chain moving effectively. This includes feet, ankles, knees, hips, core/upper back rotation, shoulders, neck, elbows, and wrists!

 

4. Blood Flow

Blood flow is so important for so many different reasons. Increasing blood flow will help increase oxygen delivery to your muscles and improve nutrient delivery better fueling your workouts and holding off fatigue longer. This will also help prep the muscles to contract and perform better during workouts.

 

5. Heart Rate

Increasing your heart rate before exercise helps your heart and lungs start to adapt to performing at an increased level. It will also help to increase blood flow even further providing all the benefits stated in number 4!

 

6. Full Movement Integration

Integrating full body movements into your warmup prep will help increase the neurological connection between your brain and your muscles. This helps the muscles work in unison to help increase power output and overall performance.

 

7. Mental Prep

It’s so important to get your mind right before heading into a workout. Leave all the distractions at the door. Don’t let your mind wander, only focus in on your workout. Think about what you want to get out of todays workout and go out there and crush it!

 

There are many different ways to warmup but these are some techniques to think about and add into the mix when creating an optimal warmup!

 

Written By:

Robert Jost

NSCA-CPT, ACE-CPT

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Competing to be the best or unleashing your true potential

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Personal training with Training aaspects best personal trainers near youWho do you compete against?

“If you aren’t first you are last” … “compete not with others but with your last best performance.” … two very different definitions. Compete and be motivated by others or have the intrinsic motivation to win. Is one better than the other?

If you are at the top of your sport, career, business etc. do you continually look to improve and innovate or you are glad to be at the top and you assume you’ll stay there. There is a difference between great and legendary. We have talked a good amount about the difference of being great and legendary in pat articles. When looking at an all star team. The players are all great, in their own regard. They made the “all star” team, so they must be the top of the top, however, of every great group there are the elite few. Their hunger, drive, sacrifice, ( insert -> all the words that you usually hear of the  elite), supersede all the others efforts. If you listen to what they say, not the words,  they don’t do it for anyone but themselves. Terrible! Selfish.. but think of the other side, competing to beat someone else or competing to prove something to another individual. What do you do when you finally beat that person or  you’ve finally proven whatever it was you were looking to prove to that person.  All that work and now… ?!

Competition isn’t nice. Someone always loses, it just depends on how high the stakes. In 3rd grade gym class, losing in a volleyball game you didn’t care about may not have high stakes compared to the wild, where, a lion either catches and kills another animal or his pride starves. Eat or be eaten. Intense! That’s competition. A lion competes to survive not to be better, being better is an important variable of surviving.

 

There is always someone younger, looking to knock out the champ. Think of teams, the best player on the team eventually gets older and is at some point challenged by a talented young gun who wants to take over. No matter how great the veteran player was, what memories were created or how great they were in the community, age hits all of us and at some point it’s what is in the best interest of the team.

Competition can suck! … it all depends on your mindset. Compete with yourself, continue to strive to get better, innovate, find ways to develop your craft. Feel like you’ve achieved everything you possibly can… there is no higher level? The legendary, the elite always find a way top themselves. Michael Jordan won 6 titles! If you ask anyone else there is nothing else for him to do.. He has plenty of money, connections, time. When he retired, he went on to be the  first player to own a basketball team. Compete for yourself, achieve your true potential, block out the noise and stop worrying about the risk and possible “failure”… we all lose. Losing allows for true growth and reaching your maximal potential allows you to reach legendary status.

 

Kirill Vaks
BA,CSCS,ACSM-cpt

 

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Training Aspects’  personal trainers and sports performance coaches want you to accomplish your goals. You, as the personal training client, are a reflection of our personal training and group training methods! We are here to help you accomplish all of your personal training goals!  Our main training focus are people looking to increase performance, lose weight , lose body fat and increase lean muscle. Whether you live in Cherry Hill, Haddonfield,Marlton, or any of the other surrounding areas we are here to help you Move, Look and feel as you’ve always desired…

Ankle Mobility

Top 5 Movement Restrictions Holding Back Your Hockey Performance

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Top 5 Movements To Finally Unleash Your True Potential

One of the most common issues we see with great athletes is their movement. Some of the most talented guys are not actually moving their bodies as efficiently as they could be. It’s important to be strong but to use your strength properly to be able to move fluidly and transfer your weight effectively. If you have joint movement restrictions throughout your body you will likely plateau and never unleash your true potential!

1. Lack of Ankle Mobility

One of the main reasons for this is your foot is locked into a boot reducing how much movement you can actually get from your ankle. Over time this will lead to reduced range of motion as well as muscle imbalances in the lower leg. This is a huge problem in hockey because coaches are always telling you to get low when you skate but if your ankle mobility is lacking you will bend over with your back to get low instead of sitting into your legs. This will greatly reduce your stride power, overall speed and hitting potential.

 

2. Not Fully Extending The Hips

This is typically caused by too much sitting, over activating the hip flexors/quads and a lack of the glute muscles firing. This creates an imbalance leading to an anterior pelvic tilt also know as “hockey butt.” Without full hip extension you wont be able to get a full stride leading to reduced stride length, stride speed and overall power production.

 

3. Lack of Thoracic (upper back) Rotation

This one is huge, especially when it comes to how powerful and quick your shot is. This can be caused by a lot of sitting, as well as a muscle imbalance limiting your rotation to one side. This imbalance can be very common in hockey players considering you shoot to one side almost 90% of the time, this can lead to an overdevelopment of those muscles and create excessive tightness. If your rotation is limited on your shot side your shot power and even accuracy can decrease.

 

4. Tight Shoulder Mobility

Typically with a lack of shoulder mobility you will see rounded shoulders and a rounded back. This is usually caused by an unbalanced workout program leading to a muscle imbalance. Other causes can be excessive sitting, phone use and computer use. This creates a problem when you’re trying to get low on the ice because you will be prone to rounding over instead of keeping your back straight, leading to reduced hitting power and potential injury.

 

5. Poor Wrist Movement

Lack of wrist mobility can typically be caused by overuse of the forearm muscles while weight training or excessive computer work. It is so important to have efficient wrist movement. Increasing your wrist mobility can greatly improve the fluidity of your movements leading to better stick handling skills and shot accuracy.

 

Consistently working on and optimizing these movements will increase your speed, power, overall performance and truly take your game to an elite level!

 

Written By:

Robert Jost

NSCA-CPT, ACE-CPT

 

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Shoulder pian

Could Your Shoulder Also Be the Cause of Your Elbow Pain?

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Could Your Shoulder Also Be Causing Your Elbow Pain?

 

As we learned in the previous article about the wrist and elbow pain, going right to the source of pain isn’t always going to be the fix. We have to think outside the box and examine what else could be causing the problem. The elbow joint is sandwiched between the wrist and the shoulder so if one of those two joints aren’t moving correctly the elbow will likely try to compensate and take on a workload it is not meant to handle. If this happens repeatedly over time pain is inevitable. So how could the shoulder actually affect the elbow?

Shoulder pian

Anatomy of the Shoulder

 

The anatomy of the shoulder is very complex and has so many muscles that attach to it, to keep this article simple we will only be referring to specific muscles that typically affect shoulder movement the most.

The Muscles Around The Shoulder

We usually think of the main muscles of the shoulder being the deltoids (the muscles that give our shoulders that round boulder look), which they are, but usually aren’t always the culprits when it comes to shoulder issues. It’s the muscles that are near the shoulder that can cause the biggest problem though. Muscles like the pec minor/major (chest muscles) and the biceps muscles attach to the bones that connect the shoulder joint. These muscles are very often overused and create tightness in the shoulder leading to a rounded shoulder look and movement dysfunction.

The Rotator Cuff and Shoulder Stability

The rotator cuff consists of 4 small muscles that are often overlooked and almost always undertrained. These 4 muscles (supraspinatus, infraspinatus, teres minor, and subscapularis) are responsible for efficient movement of the scapula and stability of the shoulder joint. When these muscles underwork your shoulders will lack stability and look to other muscles to take over the workload, leading to muscle compensations and poor movement patterns.

How Does This Relate To My Elbow?

When the rotator cuff is weak/underworking the shoulder will lack stability. When a large joint like the shoulder lacks stability, the body will need to compensate and create stability somewhere else. The elbow is the lucky one next in line to take on the grunt work. The problem is the elbow is not designed to withstand that kind of work, especially over long periods of time. In combination with the chest/biceps muscles over working and creating poor movement patterns, there is a recipe for elbow pain and potential injury.

How to Restore Shoulder Function and Stability

We will be taking a similar approach as we did in the last article about increasing wrist mobility. We will start with myofascial release and static stretching of the tight muscles which include the pec minor (chest) and the biceps.

Chest Release

Bicep Release

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Chest Stretch

Bicep Stretch

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Now that we have created more range of motion we can start restoring proper movement back to the shoulders and scapula with mobility drills.

 

Then finally after we have restored proper movement and mobility we can effectively use strengthening exercises for the rotator cuff and surrounding muscles to increase stability and function of the scapula and shoulder joint.

 

 

Written By:

Robert Jost

NSCA-CPT, ACE-CPT

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Elbow pain

Is Your Elbow Pain Actually An Elbow Problem?

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Is Your Elbow Pain Actually An Elbow Problem?

Whenever someone has a pain somewhere they typically like to go right to the source of the pain and start trying to fix it. Depending on the situation it could work, but more times than not the pain is just a symptom of a problem somewhere else in the body. So what could possibly be causing pain in my elbow if the elbow isn’t the problem? Let’s explore a few possibilities.

Elbow Anatomy

As you can see the anatomy can be very complex around the elbow, but if you notice many of the muscles that attach to the elbow also attach to the wrist. Therefore the muscles that move the wrist will also have some affect on the elbow as well. So what does that actually mean?

How the Wrist Affects the Elbow

So now that we know many of the muscles that move the wrist also affect the elbow we can break down how these muscles influence the elbow. The wrist has two main functions, flexion and extension. Wrist extension is the position your hand would be in, in a pushup position. Flexion would be the movement your wrist makes when flicking your wrist after a throwing motion. If either of these wrist movements are limited, whether it be from the muscle being tight from overuse or a mobility/stability issue, it can cause havoc at the elbow. The tight muscles will pull on the tendons of the elbow potentially creating an overuse injury like tennis elbow (lateral elbow pain) or golfer/climbers elbow (medial elbow pain).

 

Below are pictures of wrist extension (left) and wrist flexion (right).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

How To Increase Wrist Flexibility

In order to increase your wrist flexibility you need to decrease the tightness of the muscles that are holding back your range of motion. There are going to be two main groups of muscles you want to aim for. The wrist flexor group and the wrist extensor group. Typically if your pain if felt on the outside of your elbow then you will want to focus on the flexor group. For pain felt on the inside, target your focus on the extensor group of muscles. A healthy dose of both can never hurt though 😉

 

Wrist Flexibility Protocol

The first plan of attack would be to decrease the tightness in the forearm muscles. Trigger point releasing and stretching will be your most effective tools for decreasing tightness and increasing length of the muscle leading to more flexibility. Start with releases of the forearms for 30 sec – 2 mins followed by stretches for 30 sec – 1 min. After decreasing the tightness we can effectively start implementing mobilization drills for 10-15 reps in each direction. These drills will help gain more range of motion at the wrist joint so you can start using your wrists to their full potential!

*Always consult a doctor first and get a diagnosis of the pain. Only then can you know how to effectively treat the pain. If it’s an overuse injury and not something more serious these protocols could be effective for you.

Wrist Extensors Release

Wrist Flexors Release

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wrist Flexors Stretch

Wrist Extensors Stretch

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wrist Mobilizations.

 

Your wrist flexibility is only one piece to the elbow pain puzzle, how your shoulder moves is a huge factor as well! Stay tuned for how your shoulder could be affecting your elbow and causing pain.

 

Written By:

Robert Jost

ACE-CPT, NSCA-CPT

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work hard hockey

Hatrick of mental toughness

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The Hat Trick Of Mental Toughness

Training Aspects, Sports Performance, Fitness, Fitness Coach, Personal Trainer, Personal Training, Training While Pregnant, Health and Fitness, Health Coach

Great athletes are usually known by the public during the time they play. Their greatness lasts as long as they are playing, once they retire another player steps in and takes over the title of “great player”. The synonyms that accompany a “legend”: myth, epic, fable, folklore and if a person is a legend their stories often become on par with myths and folklores. Only a few great athletes become legendary.  The intangibles are what boost the talented players to legends. When the game is on the line, make your coach rely on you, here are four ways to develop your ability to strengthen your mental toughness and attain legendary status.

Noise distractions:

You’re about to shoot, easy shot, you got this! All the sudden someone yells something that catches your attention. Instead of hitting the corner you miss by a couple inches, enough to not score. Our minds run, they are built to protect us, a great ability for survival is being able to catch important signals from the outside… but not while  you’re in the process of scoring the game winning goal. If your shooting pucks outside, in your garage, in the basement, once you’ve developed the technique needed, have someone call out corners and another person trying to make you laugh, anger you, upset you, whatever. Work on blocking out the noise.

Movement distractions

You’re about to shoot and all the sudden you’re being hooked!  You just lose the puck all together. Really? you lost focus that easy? Develop the technique and follow up with being hooked, slashed, lost edge and/or bodied up. Take the game situations into your own hands. create a mental road map of what to do if your name is called and its up to you to win it. They hook you, they slash you, it doesn’t matter. You will still make the play.

Thought distractions:

You got on the bench, coach yells at you for not making a play, now the rest of the game you can’t focus. Find your mental toughness, scratch the one bad shift or one bad play, reset and get back to dominating.

process of learning

Taking it to a legendary status there is a whole other level to achieve. Live every part of your life with mental toughness and it becomes an ability within you instead of an add on. Unconscious competence, means the habit has been formed. No longer a need to think about it, your mind just does it, AKA a habit. When distractions can no longer affect you, you become automatic.

 

Kirill Vaks
BA,CSCS,ACSM-cpt

 

 

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