Stability of Your Feet

Image courtesy of detroitfootpain.com

The other day I had a really interesting conversation with someone as we were noticing how another individual was walking.  The person I was with commented that they believed the reason the other person was walking how they were is because their body was unstable and as such their motion throughout their gait was locked up to protect them.

Weak Ankles

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When I was 14 I rolled both of my ankles within a couple weeks of each other during 8th grade basketball.  "You must have weak ankles," is what my coach told me.  The solution?  Bilateral ankle braces.

Axes of the Foot: TC and ST

Image courtesy of http://moon.ouhsc.edu

In conjunction with our study group at Precision Human Performance diving into the axes of the foot yesterday, I thought I'd post a brief re-view of part of what we discussed.

Orthotics and Your Joints

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Last week I discussed how the use of orthotics can limit the motion of the joints of the feet, putting those joints' health at risk. Now I want to discuss what may be happening at the joints throughout the rest of your body when you use orthotics.

Once again, let me state what this post is and is not intended to do:

1) This post is not saying orthotics are bad. There may be a specific reason why you or somebody else has no other choice but to wear them.

2) This post is not telling you to immediately get rid of your orthotics. That could cause a lot of discomfort if your body is not ready for it.

3) This post is not telling you to completely disregard everything that the person who put you in orthotics has told you.

What this post is trying to do is to present some information that you may not be aware of regarding what may be happening to the rest of your body by wearing orthotics.

Okay, now on to the info.

Image courtesy of blogs.windsorstar.com

So I guess the easiest way in my head for me to see and comprehend this is if I think about a time I sprained an ankle. So if you can, imagine when you have sprained an ankle or known of somebody who has sprained an ankle. The ankle and possibly foot get all swollen up and it might hurt like heck to walk on, but what is usually a given in those scenarios is that it is now hard for the ankle to move. It is difficult to plantarflex and dorsiflex around the talocrual axis and as such part of your rehab or recovery work is traditionally exercises that are trying to reinstate this motion.

Without this normal motion of the ankle, you see people compensating and walking with a limp. A lot of times this is related to the current discomfort of putting weight on that injured foot, but even as the pain dissipates people can still be seen walking with this limp. So yes, while this blatant compensation may initially be due to avoiding discomfort, it may also be in part due to, among other things, the inability of the individual to have proper motion around their ankle, leading to them finding other ways to walk from point A to point B.

So what do you see with these individuals? Usually they are picking up motion at possibly the hip, knee, and various spinal levels in order to make up for the lack of motion available to them through their ankle. In other words, because their ankle motion is limited, they now have to move more than they normally would through their hip and/or other joints in order to compensate and walk as efficiently as they can.

Now, this compensation isn't a bad thing. In fact, it is surely better than the alternative of not being able to walk at all. But at the same time, if you are moving around one or more joints more than is required for unaltered efficient gait (walking) in order to potentially make up for a lack of motion at another joint, those joints that now have the increased motion may start to be worn down faster because they are being used in a manner that is inefficient for both their design and the completion of the desired task.

Imagine you could only raise your arm up to shoulder height, so in order to reach up onto a shelf or something you had to bend backwards until your arm was more up towards the ceiling. Eventually, your back would probably start to feel not so great. The same concept holds true for when you are trying to compensate around an injured ankle that lacks motion. You begin to pick up motion elsewhere in order to still walk, which, over time may lead to issues at these other joints.

Image courtesy of doczeke.com

And, to the subject of this post, the same concept holds true for when you use orthotics.

As I have stated in the past, there are 28 bones that make up the joints of the ankle and foot accumulating to 55 articulations between those bones*. If you consider each of those articulations as a place where possible motion can occur, you can see how implementing something such as an orthotic, which may effectively limit motion at all of those articulations, may cause the motion that is not happening around these joints during gait or other activities to be picked up elsewhere throughout the body. Furthermore, you can now see how having this increased motion at other joints as a means to make up for the restricted motion imposed by the orthotics, while useful in the short term, may over time lead to issues at the joints where greater motion is being required, IN ADDITION to the increased risk of the health of the joints whose motion is now limited (as discussed the previous two weeks).

So, what does all this mean? Well, like I said, I'm not saying orthotics are bad or you get rid of your orthotics. However, while their use may make you feel really good right here in the moment, there may be long-term consequences that aren't necessarily ideal and that should be thought through before implementing into your daily life. Furthermore, other options may want to be explored as well, such as Muscle Activation Techniques™, which can provide the opportunity to achieve the desired mobility of the joints by first and foremost increasing the stability of those or other joints.

Finally, just to clarify, this post is not a suggestion to inappropriately mobilize joints. In the example given with the injured ankle, there is a very good reason why it is not moving. That example was merely used to highlight a scenario that many of us have experienced in which we have limited motion around one axis and subsequently compensate by increasing or altering the motion around other axes.

Do you wear orthotics? How much information were you given in regards to what they may be doing to the rest of your body before you began using them?

Inter­ested in find­ing out more? Check out the “Mus­cle Acti­va­tion Tech­niques™” page.

Inter­ested in set­ting up an assess­ment time or dis­cussing this sub­ject fur­ther? E-mail Char­lie at charlie@selfmadefitness.com.

Your body. Your training.

Want to use this arti­cle in your blog, newslet­ter, or other plat­form? You may, but be sure to include all of the bio­graph­i­cal infor­ma­tion found in the yellow box below!

*Roskopf, Greg. Advanced Foot Function. Muscle Activation Techniques™ Mastery course. p 5. February 2013.

MAT™ and Healthy Feet: Orthotics

Image courtesy of thephiladelphiapodiatrist.com

Last week I described how participating in the Muscle Activation Techniques™ process can provide the opportunity for the muscles of your lower legs and feet to contract better, potentially allowing for more motion to occur around the different joints of your feet and more force to be appropriately applied through these joints.  I then discussed how these joints in fact need a certain amount of motion and force through them to be healthy.  This means that if the muscles are not contracting efficiently and motion and appropriate force application is subsequently limited around and through these joints, the health of these joints is at risk.  The irony of all of this is much of today's society is doing something to intentionally limit the motion of the joints of their feet:  wearing orthotics.

Let me first start by saying what this post is not doing:

1) This post is not saying orthotics are bad.  There may be a specific reason why you or somebody else has no other choice but to wear them.

2) This post is not telling you to immediately get rid of your orthotics.  That could cause a lot of discomfort if your body is not ready for it.

3) This post is not telling you to completely disregard everything that the person who put you in orthotics has told you.

What this post is trying to do is to present some information that you may not be aware of regarding what may be happening to your feet by wearing orthotics.

So why do people commonly wear orthotics?  One of the biggest reasons I hear of people wearing orthotics is because of plantar fasciitis.  Plantar fasciitis may develop when pronation continually occurs during the propulsive phase of gait, causing the plantar fascia to become inflamed.  When you wear orthotics, the amount your foot is able to pronate is typically limited, which prevents those tissues from getting beat up any further.  Subsequently, relief may be felt.

Here are a couple of the issues:  First, while the orthotics provide the stability that is needed by the foot so as to not pronate during the propulsive phase of gait, they are not addressing why the foot was pronating during that phase of gait in the first place.  They are metaphorically solving the issue of repeatedly breaking your arm by permanently casting it instead of teaching you how to not run into walls (or parked cars, street light posts, or barn doors, depending who/where you are).  A permanent casting may work just fine, unless it limits your ability to perform a motion how you would normally perform it.  This would cause you to figure out other, possibly less efficient, ways to move, which may begin to have their own negative consequences.

Second, and what is relevant to the topic of this post, is by limiting the ability of the foot to pronate at all--not just during the propulsive phase of gait--the motion that is supposed to occur at specific joints is no longer occurring.  Consider this akin to the muscles of your feet not contracting as well and thereby limiting the motion at specific joints in your feet.

And then we are back at last week's post.

Instead of introducing this "all pronation limiting" device, Muscle Activation Techniques™ can potentially improve how the muscles of the lower leg and feet contract, allowing the joints of your feet to be controlled better.  This means that your feet could pronate when they are supposed to and not pronate when they are not supposed to, which may allow for both appropriate motion and force to be involved with the joints of your feet.

Specific joints need specific amounts of motion in order to stay healthy.  Specific joints need specific amounts of force through them in order to stay healthy.  Limiting either in any way limits the health of the joints.

Have you experienced how Muscle Activation Techniques™ can help you reinstate the health of your feet?

Inter­ested in find­ing out more? Check out the “Mus­cle Acti­va­tion Tech­niques™” page.

Inter­ested in set­ting up an assess­ment time or dis­cussing this sub­ject fur­ther? E-mail Char­lie at charlie@selfmadefitness.com.

Your body. Your training.

Want to use this arti­cle in your blog, newslet­ter, or other plat­form? You may, but be sure to include all of the bio­graph­i­cal infor­ma­tion found in the yellow box below!

MAT™ and Healthy Feet

Image courtesy of devonfeet.com

Your feet are comprised of 26 bones each (28 if you count the tibia and fibula due to their articulation with the talus)*, which create eight groupings of joints in each respective foot**.  The majority of these joints are considered to be synovial joints** and as such have certain requirements regarding motion and force that need to be met in order to remain healthy.

As I have written many times before, Muscle Activation Techniques™ is an assessment process to analyze what muscles are not contracting efficiently and a means by which to give those muscles the opportunity to contract better.  At the most basic level of understanding, a muscle does one thing:  generate tension in order to control the distance between its two endpoints of where it attaches into bone.  Subsequently, controlling the distance between these points also means muscles control how bones move on each other and, more specifically, how the contact surfaces of the bones articulate.

Going back to the feet, these synovial joints*** are comprised of many features, one of which is hyaline cartilage and another is synovial fluid.  Hyaline cartilage provides a low-friction, shock-absorbing surface for joints and survives by receiving its nutrients via a process called imbibition where the cartilage is squished, releasing its fluid, and then as it becomes "un-squished" it soaks up the nutrient-rich fluid around it.  Think of it kind of like a sponge.  Synovial fluid is released by the synovial membrane at the onset of joint motion, serving to keep the articulating joint surfaces lubricated.   The important take away from all of this is there are parts of your feet that need motion and force in order for the joints to remain healthy.

One way to help ensure that motion continues to occur in your feet and forces continue to be applied as they should is to make sure the muscles of your lower legs and feet are contracting as they should.  This is where MAT™ comes in.  By providing an opportunity for muscles to contract more efficiently, not only may you experience improved joint motion and force application in your feet and rest of your body as a result of the MAT™ process, but the health of those joints may also improve due to their need for motion and force in order to stay healthy.

By wearing shoes all day or doing activities where you are constantly on your feet (examples such as running and playing sports), the muscles of your feet may lose their contractile efficiency.  On the one hand with shoes, the requirements of your foot muscles may be very little, causing them to become deconditioned, similar to if you were to not exercise for an extended period of time.  On the other hand, asking the muscles of your feet to do too much based on their current set point may reduce their contractile efficiency, as well.  This is in part why it may be initially difficult for you to go from wearing shoes for years to not wearing shoes while you exercise--you haven't progressed to train the muscles of your feet to handle the forces of barefoot training but yet all of a sudden expect them to.

If this contractile efficiency is lost, the opportunity for efficient joint motion and force application to the joints may be lost as well, which will be detrimental to the health of those joints.

So, to recap and highlight the important parts:

1. Your feet are comprised of many bones and many joints.
2. These joints need motion and appropriate force application in order to be healthy.
3. Muscles create and control motion of the joints as well as apply forces to the bones which then get transferred through the joints.
4. If the muscles are not contracting efficiently, joint motion and appropriate force application may be limited.
5. Muscle Activation Techniques™ is a means by which to provide an opportunity for muscles to contract more efficiently.
6. Muscles contracting more efficiently = joints potentially moving better & forces potentially appropriately applied = healthier joints.

How well are the muscles of your feet contracting?  Schedule an MAT™ assessment to find out!

Inter­ested in find­ing out more? Check out the “Mus­cle Acti­va­tion Tech­niques™” page.

Inter­ested in set­ting up an assess­ment time or dis­cussing this sub­ject fur­ther? E-mail Char­lie at charlie@selfmadefitness.com.

Your body.  Your training.

Want to use this arti­cle in your blog, newslet­ter, or other plat­form? You may, but be sure to include all of the bio­graph­i­cal infor­ma­tion found in the yellow box below!

*Moore, Keith L.; Dalley, Arthur F.; Agur, Anne M.R..  Clinically Oriented Anatomy, Sixth Edition.  p 522.

**Moore, Keith L.; Dalley, Arthur F.; Agur, Anne M.R..  Clinically Oriented Anatomy, Sixth Edition.  p 652.

***While the information on synovial joints in this post can be found in many textbooks and online, it was first presented to me in the RTS™ courses.

Biceps Curls And Your Feet

Image courtesy of wikipedia.org

So I've talked about balance in a number of posts--how it is a skill of maintaining your COM over your BOS and how your brain will figure out how to use what you have available to order to perform this skill to the best of your ability.  I have also proposed the idea that just because you can physically perform something doesn't mean you are necessarily prepared to perform it in as much as you may have exceeded certain thresholds of the tissues, namely the ability of your muscles to contract efficiently and on demand.

Going back to the title, if you perform a standing exercise such as dumbbell biceps curls, as you move the dumbbells from by your sides to out in front of you to back closer towards you, the redistribution of your center of mass over your base of support as you perform the exercise, as well as the changing moment arms to many of your joints, will present a challenge to muscles other than your elbow flexors.  And, depending on the exact mechanics of the exercise as well as the speed with which the exercise is being performed, the demand to produce tension placed on the muscles of the feet may exceed their set point, which means your standing biceps curls may be detrimental to the ability of your feet to work efficiently.

And from there, mechanically inefficient feet may cause a myriad of problems at other joints and tissues in the body.

I'm not trying to say standing biceps curls are bad or you shouldn't do them.  I'm trying to highlight the point that there is a lot to take into consideration when creating and performing appropriate exercises for your body, and unless you have a means to analyze and assess how your exercise is affecting you, such as Muscle Activation Techniques™, an exercise that may appear completely focused to one area of the body can actually be causing massive issues in seemingly unrelated areas of the body.

Inter­ested in find­ing out more? Check out the “Mus­cle Acti­va­tion Tech­niques™” page.

Inter­ested in set­ting up an assess­ment time or dis­cussing this sub­ject fur­ther? E-mail Char­lie at charlie@selfmadefitness.com.

Is your exercise right for your body?

Your body.  Your training.

Want to use this arti­cle in your blog, newslet­ter, or other plat­form? You may, but be sure to include all of the bio­graph­i­cal infor­ma­tion found in the yellow box below!