Girlwithnoname – Fitness at Home

Since I’m on holiday this week, I’ve left things in the capable hands of my good friend Jon Coulson.

When it comes to training and fitness, Jon’s got a huge treasure-trove of valuable stuff in his head to share. So I know you’ll get a lot out of these important tips.

Thanks Jon.

Solve Your Office Aches and Pains

Let’s face it, working in an office sucks right? From non-stop emails to over demanding bosses (well, not my boss, my boss is awesome in case they are reading).

The main gripe I have with working in an office is that our bodies were not designed to sit in chairs for at least 7 – 8 hours a day. Sure, you might get up and move around a bit but for the majority of the time you’re sat in a chair and this, over time, leads to a number of issues.

Here is a summary of some issues that can happen from sitting for hours and hours at your desk

1)      Tight upper back

8)      Low back ache

Pretty much everyone who works in an office suffers from one or more of these issues to some degree.

The good news is that there are plenty of stretches and exercises to help reverse these problems. It is possible to write pages and pages of exercises and stretches to do. For the sake of sanity and carpel tunnel syndrome I’ll focus on some of the more back-for-you-buck exercises.

1)      Cat / Camel

The idea of this movement is to loosen up the spine. The trick is to make this a fluid up and down movement and not force the end of range motion.

Set yourself up so that you are on your hands and knees on the floor. Keep your hands and knees in the same spot, draw in your stomach and round your back, tucking your chin in. Then lower your back towards the floor creating a curve.

You shouldn’t need to use more than 8 – 10 reps for this

2)      Wall Slides

This movement is designed to improve posture by engaging muscles often ignored – middle and lower traps and the rhomboids. Usually these are overpowered by the upper traps muscles.

Stand against a wall with your feet 12-18” away from the wall. Press your upper back against the wall and hold your arms parallel in a “hands up” fashion. Keep your elbows and back of your hands pressed against the wall, slide your hands up as far as possible and return.

Aim for 8  – 10 reps

3)      Thoracic Mobility

This is one of my favourite exercises to loosen up my upper back when it feels tights.

Lay on the floor on a foam roller. If you do not have a foam roller, you can do this seated in a chair. Place the roller just beneath your shoulder blades, keep your butt on the floor and brace your abs. Placing your hands behind your head, arch your back over the roller and hold for 3 – 5 seconds. Repeat this 5 or 6 times

4)      Glute Bridges

Over time, a lot of sitting not only weakens the glute muscles it reduces their ability to fire correctly when exercising. This causes your lower back and hamstrings to pick up the slack leading to low back pain and overworked hamstrings. The glute bridge exercise will help to get the glute muscles firing again as well as strengthen the muscles.

Lay with your back and feet on the floor, knees bent and arms out by your side. Squeeze your butt muscles together and use them to lift your hips off the floor. Initially you might find that your hamstrings do most of the work but try to relax them and allow your glutes to do the work.

Aim to work up to 2 sets of 10. When you can easily do them, try it one legged!

5)      Lying Hip Internal Rotations

Another favourite movement of mine. I used this when my hips start to feel tight from too much sitting.

Lay on the floor with your feet flat on the floor and spread out wide. Try to touch your knees together and feel the stretch. Be careful when first doing this though as trying to stretch too hard too soon could cause the muscles to spasm.

6)      A More Intense Quad Stretch

A combination of weak glutes and tight quad muscles are a classic recipe for low back pain. A hard quad stretch can help relieve low back pain as well at improve overall posture.

Most people know how to stretch their quads – stand against a wall, bend your leg back and pull your foot towards your butt. This is a good stretch but sometimes, you just need more.

The first stage is to kneel on the floor with your legs at 90 degrees, shift your front foot forward and push your hips forward

Once this feels comfortable to stretch, set yourself up in the initial position, this time have a chair behind you and rest your back foot on the chair. This will create a more intense stretch in the quad.  Move your body back and forth to increase or decrease the intensity of the stretch. Hold for up to 30 seconds.

If you’ve been suffering from aches and pains as a result of being sat in a chair all day long then the exercises and stretches here will go a long way towards improving your posture and reducing those tight niggling feelings.

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Wow, that was super-informative and very helpful indeed, especially for all you office workers, I bet!!

Thanks again to Jon for covering me while I’m away. Feel free to get in touch with Jon on Twitter where he tweets as @JonCoulson.

Have a fit, fun and fantastic day.
Girlwithnoname

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