A few years ago I was shocked to hear that during Operation Enduring, and Iraqi Freedom, the leading cause of evacuations were from non-combat related musculoskeletal injuries. Even outside of soldiers, police and firefighters have a 90% incurrence rate of experiencing pain which stops them from being able to work, with roughly 60% being chronic or recurring pain.
It becomes obvious that no matter what tactical career you are in, pain is a chronic issue that affects most people.
But what if I told you, you didn’t need to experience it.
Pain in the body can be caused by a variety of things, including joint stress, mobility limitations, altered length-tension relationships, lack of strength in key normally untrained muscles, disordered movement patterns, or a specific impingement further up or down the kinetic chain.
Although coaches know what causes these debilitating injuries, the fact is, many choose to omit them from training simply because they aren’t visible to their clients. You simply won’t see your low back develop six-pack abs, or your shin develop bicep like muscles.
But when you are stuck on the sidelines because you can’t run, laying on the floor in absolute agony, or can’t pick up your child. It becomes obvious that this needs to be something you should have worked on.
So whats the solution?
1 hour of stretching per day? 45 Minutes of recovery practices after each workout? 3 days a week of tantric yoga?
No its allot easier than that. Its just having an effective warm up (and I don’t mean those boring ones you had to do in elementary school). By having a ramping style of warm up you can both maximize your performance in your workout and stop chronic pain from ever happening.
The ramp style is pretty simple. It starts with functional inhibition of muscles that are overactive, then lengthening movements focused on the opposite muscles to restore balance, then activating those muscles so they are better primed for activity, then finally integration which primes the body even further for the upcoming workout.
Damn, even reading that sounds like a lot!! But that is where you are wrong. For most of my athletes, this protocol designed specifically for them, only takes 5-8 minutes. Think about that, 5-8 Minutes Per Workout For No More Chronic Pain. Seems to be too good to be true.
In part it is, while you have the formula for how to achieve Pain Free Performance chances are you won’t be able to effectively integrate it. Even with many coaches this system becomes a lost tool even after they learn how to apply it, because it’s a very technically demanding skill.
You need to know what muscles to stress, and which to relax, making it compact and enjoyable, as well as functional for each individual athlete. So most choose to go back to their old school warm ups, which take twice the time and are ineffective by comparison.
But in this chaos we can find order. By hiring qualified professionals, not only can you get more effective coaching, bringing you to your goals faster with higher efficacy, but you can also have it pain free. Here at Onyx Tactical Performance all of our coaches know how to most effectively deliver personalized warm up protocols to our clients, ensuring their maximal performance and longevity in their functionality.
If you are interested in getting some coaching, click here and book a call with one of our human performance specialists. Not only will you get a free personalized assessment to figure out what you can do to perform your best and achieve your goals, but we ill also throw in a great discount for your first month of coaching.