one leg to the other (i.e. running,
lunging, farmer ’s walks, etc.)
These exercises are examples of
locomotive movements for which
the goal is going from point
A to B. To be efficient, an athlete should perform this movement in a straight line. Think of
traveling: You want to take the
shortest direction to get to your
destination. Taking the scenic
route usually costs more in gas
and time. Running is no different. If our joints aren’t aligned,
we waste energy. An athlete who
overpronates pulls their knee
closer to the their midline. This
means they must constantly
compensate with other muscles
to prevent their knee from collapsing inward. The end result
is likely pain and definitely a
waste of calories and increased
fatigue from using muscle improperly.
A person who overpronates will
often complain of plantar fasciitis, Achilles tendinitis, and hip
bursitis.
Ankle
At the ankle, if we find a talus
bone that has shifted laterally,
then this is an indication we are
carrying more of our weight toward the midline of our body. The
ankle accommodates this shift in
weight distribution by turning
the feet outward. In doing so,
the Achilles tendon gets twisted
around a bit and movement becomes compensated. Dorsiflexion (the turning of the toes up
and bending the foot back toward the ankle) is lost and our
brain will ask other muscles to
pick up the slack, thus creating
a compensation pattern.
Most functional exercises involve bending at the ankle, knee
and hip to absorb impact from
bel ow (running, jumping, etc.) or
control forces from above (barbell squats, cleans, etc.). When
the ankle doesn’t bend well, the
knee and hip will try to make up
the difference. A restriction at
the ankle joint will force the knee
6
METCON | June 2016
to travel forward and ask the
quadriceps to carry the burden
of slowing the knee down. This
puts the glutes in a poor position
to load up and limits the amount
of force that can be produced.
For an athlete who is exploding
out of the hole during a barbell
squat, this is detrimental to force
production. Our ability to create
power from our gluteus maximus
hinges largely on our ability to
extend our hips backward as we
descend into a squat. Lacking
dorsiflexion pulls our knees and
drags our hips with it.
An athlete who suffers from a
lack of dorsiflexion will often
complain of shin splints, knee
pain, and low back pain.
Hip
A lot of people don’t understand
the pelvis isn’t just one piece. Although, at first glance it may appear as one cylinder, it really is
made up of four pieces: a right
and left innominate (hip), the
sacrum and the pubis symphysis. With that being said, one hip
should be able to flex while the
other extends. One of the most
common postural deviations that
occur is an anterior pelvic tilt.
This is when one or both innominate bones tilts forward. This
position will lock the back of the
pelvis in place and prevent it
from extending the hip.
Without the proper ability to flex
and extend at the hip, an athlete will be forced to compensate their movements when doing things like running. The hip
is very dynamic and can perform
many different movements. Flexion of the hip comes with external rotation, while extension of
the hip is coupled with internal
rotation. A person who lacks the
ability to extend to an anterior
pelvic tilt will also lack the ability to internally rotate well. This
will drive the brain to compensate by moving the leg forward,
which usually means the leg
must be swung forward from the
side. As a result, the athlete will