Is Foam Rolling Doing What You Think It Is?

I used to foam roll all the time. Every day, sometimes twice a day. I had a whole routine for my lower back on down, and in my head I thought I was helping myself. I was told that foam rolling would break up fascial adhesions, releasing tight muscles and allowing me to recover faster. In fact, in one of my most highly praised articles on EliteFTS.com I made claims about how foam rolling after a training session would help remove the metabolic by-products of training, thereby allowing you to come back the next day feeling stronger and ready to go. Now I don't foam roll at all.

I am no longer convinced that foam rolling is doing what I once said it does. In fact, based on my current MAT studies, I now believe that if you roll out your IT-band, for example, you are only smashing your vastus lateralis into your femur. Are you pressing on the fascia as well? Yup, but tell me how that piece of foam is able to only target your fascia and not your muscle fibers. It itsn't, and therefore we are back to the same argument I wrote about in my post and article "Stretching to Improve ROM and Speed Recovery: Fact or Fiction?" because now you are applying force into the muscle tissue but have no idea what it's doing.

Classic

You can use the massage argument if you want, but ask your massage therapist if you can train right after they work on you next and see what they say. Pressing on the belly of the muscle may feel really good, but it's probably not helping you as much as or in the ways that you think it is. And regarding breaking up fascial adhesions, please, fascia is adhesed to begin with! You aren't breaking up those adhesions any more than you are stretching your IT-band, which doesn't have the ability to stretch, by the way.

As far as removing the metabolic by-products of training, eh, it may be possible, but it's not the best way to go about it. In my opinion, the best way to ensure that you recover as fast as possible from your training is to make sure your muscle fibers are firing properly. The amount of force that is generated by the muscle fibers to move your body through space and time is SO much greater than you could EVER put into it with your fingers or a piece of foam or PVC pipe. If there is something that is able to move out of those muscle fibers through force, it will be moved out when they start contracting properly.

After I train, I no longer stretch and I no longer roll out. Instead, I check my range of motion in the relevant body area and perform low-intensity isometrics into any limits I find in my ranges of motion, as taught to me by Muscle Activation Techniques. I'm not sore or achy and my knees feel significantly better than they did in college. In fact, the only days they bother me are when I wear shoes too much. But alas, this subject is for another post.

Get big or die tryin'.

Charlie Cates, CSCS

Self Made®, Owner

Charlie Cates is a strength and conditioning specialist and the owner of Self Made® (http://selfmadefitness.com/) in Chicago, IL. He has worked with competitive and everyday athletes of all ages and ability levels, from 9-year-old kids to NFL MVP’s. He can be reached via e-mail at charlie@selfmadefitness.com.

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