Find Your Balance: Why it is so important as part of our work out regime
Avoid injury by getting your right and left sides in sync.
Many athletes today are using balance training as an integral part of their overall training programmes, both for injury prevention and performance enhancement.
Balance is needed by runners when negotiating woodland, by tennis players when reaching for a drop shot and by footballers taking the ball on the volley from slightly behind themselves. Each of these situations requires the exercise of just the right amount of flexibility and agility at the right time and from the right areas of the body in order for us to execute the desired task, recover and then be able to repeat the same or similar tasks without injury. With balance training, as with most training, the idea is to recreate and manipulate in a controlled environment what we do in an event or game situation.
Your body uses two strategies to balance on one foot. First, it tweaks ankle and foot muscles. The second is a “hip strategy”—you twist your torso to steady yourself. But when you run, you’re not using the ankle strategy at all, putting the strain of compensating for your weaker side entirely in the hips. “Leg dominance won’t cause injury,” he says, “but strengthening the hip and working on balance will help you avoid it.”
Taking Sides
So are you left-side or right-side dominant? Try:
THE BALANCE TEST
Stand on one leg, eyes closed. Time how long you can hold without toppling or putting down your foot. Switch legs. If both sides are close (30 seconds on each side, or 30 on one and 25 on the other), you’ve got good equilibrium. But if the difference is wide—five or 10 seconds on one leg, up to 30 on the other—you’re out of balance, and may have hip-muscle issues.
Get Even
Perform these two exercises daily for three weeks, after a run. (Doing them before might tire key core muscles.) Then repeat the balance test; you should be closer to equilibrium. Thereafter, do these moves twice a week for maintenance.
CORE STABILIZER
HOW: Stand with your weak leg on a pillow. Balance for 30 seconds (you can use a light touch on a wall). Repeat three times. Tip: When you can balance relatively easily for 30 seconds, increase the intensity by closing your eyes, which makes it harder to balance.
WHY: Supporting yourself on your weaker leg while standing on an unstable surface forces you to employ an ankle and a hip strategy to balance, and helps your weak leg catch up to your strong one.
We don’t have to ‘switch the core on’ to provide balance and stability; the design of the body is such that if it’s not switched on there is a bio-mechanical explanation. And if your balance on one leg is worse than on the other, it could mean something as simple as a tight calf or a stiff heel.
Balance is something we need for life. As we get older we need to train a lot smarter in all departments, and balance is no exception.
Reference:
Denise Schipani for Runners World, July 2011
