Hi! Keith Scott from BackToFormFitness.
Today, I’m going to talk about low back pain and we will give you some exercises and tips to help you deal with your low back pain. I get a lot of people that come in and see me because their lower back hurts so they have stiffness. And, there are a couple of things that I do with these clients to help them really eliminate a lot of the stiffness and the pain that they feel in their lower back. I am going to show you a couple of exercise that you can put into your daily routine that should help you eliminate a lot of the stiffness and pain that you are suffering.
So, watch the video, check out the exercise, try them, and let me know what you think.
The first thing that I am going to show you is how to use the foam roller on your lower back. A lot of people don’t like to roll their lower back because they do not have a lot of meat down there and it can hurt their spine and may cause some bruising. I am going to show you a tip that I use with my clients that can eliminate any of that bruising or pain on their spine and still dig around that area where you back feels tight and help eliminate some of those problems.
What you are going to do is just take the foam roller against the wall. And what you are going to do is just slowly roll. Make sure that you position the foam roller right on the spots and you are just going to slowly roll. And as you do, you are going to put a little more pressure. We basically do it on a small squat and you are going to do a little bit of pressure on your back as you are leaning back. And, what I like to tell people to do is just kind to lean to the right side first and you’ll fell it right on the side of your spine, you have some muscles, some tightness. And just dig in, put a little pressure on there. I am not putting any weight on my spine itself. It is to the side of the muscle groups. I am going to spend some time on the right side, and then over here, I am going to spend some time on the left side. Rolling each side individually, putting pressure on those spots where I could feel some tension and really pressing in if I feel good, a good knock there. Again, to the right and then back along the whole back.
It’s just like you in this little technique. You are going to help loosen up those knots and hopefully, the knots will start to go away if we would increase motion and a lot of the pain will go away too.
The next exercise that I am going to show you—actually two exercises are stretches to the hip area that could really affect the lower back which would help loosen up any kind of problems back there. And more cases than not, we are going to feel better and looser after we do these stretches. They are simple to do. Combined with the foam roller, you can really start to see some relief.
So, the first one that I am going to do is what we call the hip rotator stretcher or Piriformis test stretch. But basically, you are going to lay in your back, cross your leg over, and we are just going to slowly pull back on our lower leg. Now, don’t jerk this movement. You are just going to slowly pull back and you should feel a really good stretch in your butt area and we are just going to hold it there. Now, if you cannot get your knee up that far because you don’t have a good range of motion, don’t worry. Just pull your leg up as far as you can and just rotate it slightly. Rotate your foot slightly to the inside you will still get the same effect down to that stretch. For those of you who do have a good range of motion, you want to pull in as far as you can and hold the stretch. Usually, when I hold a stretch, it’s anywhere from 20 to 25 seconds to get a full effect of it. You are going to do both sides, hold straight in and continue to feel the stretch.
The second stretch that I would want to show you is another good one for loosening up the gluts and the hip area and can really make a big, big difference for our stiffness down there. Basically, what we are going to do is cross our leg over our body, and this stretch is some of the same muscles that the other one did. You want to make sure that you keep your back flat. You don’t want to twist your back. Keep it flat and we are just going to pull down on our knee and you should feel a nice stretch along here in the glut area, on the side of your lower leg and maybe a little one on your lower back.
Again, we are going to hold this stretch for 20 to 45 seconds, do the other side and stretch those areas. Finally, to finish up this progression, you are going to take the foam roller back, back on the wall, roll those sides of your back again. The combination of the rolling and the stretching and then again with the rolling really has a dramatic effect on stiffness and low back problems. I’ve used this countless times with clients and athletes and it really does make a big difference. So, give it a try, see how it feels, let me know what you think about the video and how it has worked for you.
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