BID A FAREWELL TO ANKLE SPRAINS

If you have suffered from a lot of ankle sprains from soccer / gaa / rugby etc. and you're sick of them, I know it can be really frustrating, with training time missed and even having to take time off work for a really bad one. I know what it feels like and it's one of the most painful minor injuries in sport.

Like an auld gone-off orange

You've got inflammation, swelling, bruising, pain, time off sport, no gagnam-style dancing for the next few friday nights, and a high risk with up to a 70% chance of the injury re-occurring if you don't do your rehab and injury prevention work properly.

After a few supersplits...

I used to be plagued with them as a teenager until I went and did something about it, researched all of the information out there and most importantly followed through on it and went and got some proper coaching. Having done that, I haven't had an ankle sprain since 1998. And I have done a fairly wide spectrum of activities, from judo to obstacle courses to cross country running to hiking to running up and down mountains carrying heavy things through mud getting shouted at by men in army uniforms.

The truth is, ankle sprains shouldn't really be happening to you. And injuries aren't just down to bad luck, like a lightning strike.

"Why Me!?"

I hear people sometimes describing their injury history in consultations with me, and it tends to go like this;

"Ya I've had four ankle sprains on each ankle in the last year, and I cant understand it, I'm just so unluckly...Like, I go to the gym three times a week and I have training twice a week with the team and  a match most weekends and I've had lots of physio...etc..etc.."

And I generally stop them there, and say, "Look, all of that is great. But injuries don't just happen out of the blue, and they certainly aren't down to bad luck." My no-nonsense point of view is that every injury has a defined number of risk factors. Lets say that there are 5 main risk factors in ankle injury, with 3 of these being modifiable, as in you have control over them. Unless you have fully addressed each and every risk factor that you can, your injury will be your own fault, and not anybody elses. As the genius Eric Cressey says, injury prevention and pre-season work is like putting savings in the bank for a rainy day(high forces during games, turning at speed, uneven surfaces etc.). If you haven't saved enough, chances are that next season you're going to go into overdraft (injuries).

Tough advice, and tough to hear, but true I'm afraid. You might take this as a bit of an insult, but then you will also realise that you can, and do, have a large amount of control over your health and what happens to you in terms of injury, strength gain, weight gain, fat loss etc. So it's up to you to do something about it, and go and seek out the information and the expertise to solve the problem, e.g. by finding an experienced coach to carry out a proper injury history, assessment, and then follow through with a properly tailored and specific programme for you. A general run of the mill, one-fits-all programme just won't do I'm afraid, and you deserve better. Sometimes you need to go and find an expert and make an investment in your health. I've been at this line of work for 10 years, and I still go to an expert and get physio, reflexology, coaching courses etc all the time, just as I get a plumber in to do the plumbing and an electrician in to wire the house, instead of half-assing it myself.

The most common type of ankle sprain is the inversion sprain, seen here, where the ankle collapses laterally, that is, to the outside, seen here:

If that sounds like you, you need to do something about it. It won't just get better on its own. Physio is great and necessary in some cases, but physio alone won't sort it out. You need to complete all of the rehab that your physio gives you, but it doesn't stop there. You need to then drive on and address some of the specific risk factors, such as;

1. Lost foot awareness, proprioception and balance
2. Incorrect footwear
3. Poor peroneal strength and/or peroneal nerve function 
4. Quite often problems elsewhere, like poor function at the glutes
5. Really poor ankle stability
6. Incorrect movement patterns in running, and especially landing and turning 
7. Poor tissue quality and a buildup of muscle adhesions and scar tissue
8. Poor ankle mobility
9. Over-reliance on ankle supports or taping
10. A lack of any kind of system of training (assessment, periodisation, programming)

If you fit into any or these categories, you really need to come and see a professional strength coach with a lot of experience in preventing or rehabbing this type of injury. I promise you that the common ankle inversion sprain is one of the most preventable and unneccessary injuries in sport. You still have time to come and book a free consultation and assessment on 0863126918 or at vaughan.barry@gmail.com in time to get 4-6 solid weeks of injury prevention in preparation for your team training starting up again in the new year. Thats between 8-18 strength and conditioning sessions that your closest competition probably won't be investing in. Seeing as most common injuries (ankle, hamstring, ACL) tend to happen early in the season, with hard ground and after the christmas layoff, now's your last chance to get yourself ready, or you might as well programme the A&E departments GPS into your I-phone and stick your physio's number on speed dial.

To get you started, heres a brilliant video from Dick Hartzell, inventor of the famous Jump Stretch Bands, and a very knowledgeable guy on preventing ankle injuries. You need to do a lot more than just this, but this will get you started. Remember to book your free consultation and assessment for next week on 0863126918 or at vaughan.barry@gmail.com to get a full 4-6 weeks done before the new season. You can also get a gift voucher as a christmas present of 3 sessions for €100 if you have someone close to you that struggles with injuries. Best of luck and talk to ye soon, 

Barry Vaughan BSc CSCS IAWLA

BACK REHAB TESTIMONIAL

LIMERICK UNDERAGE HURLING TESTIMONIAL

CORK U21 FOOTBALL TESTIMONIAL

BEACH BODY CHALLENGE

Hi Lads,

I'm starting a new small group training fat loss programme at Source Health & Fitness,

This is a targeted fat loss programme to tone up, get strong, and lose up to a stone of bodyfat over 6 weeks.

There is a full nutritional fat loss plan and weekly weigh in and body composition each week.

If you're looking to get in shape this summer and need a big push this will work for you, results guaranteed!

THOMAS FAHERTY IDFPA NATIONALS 2012

BOX JUMPS FOR EXPLOSIVE POWER

FUN WITH MY FIRST ATLAS STONE

THE SKINNY ON SLEEP - PART 2

Hi folks I meant to get this post out on monday but had a busy week so here it is! I've heard back from some of you that have said Part 1 really helped you so lets put the nail in the coffin and try to put your insomnia....to bed for good. In part 1 I covered some of the nutritional changes that you can make to boost sleep quality without resorting to booze or sleeping pills. If you haven't yet, I highly recommend giving the pre-bed meal a go each night for a week. 90% of you will find that you drift off more easily, have deeper restful sleep and wake feeling refreshed, alert, bright eyed and bushy tailed.

For those of you that are still having trouble sleeping, I have a few more tricks up my sleeve.

1) Psychological Methods

The psychology that leads to deep restful sleep could be an area you need to work on. You may need to work at developing healthier habits that let your body and mind get into a normal healthy rhythm. Firstly, try to set a certain time that you go to sleep each night, e.g. 10.30pm. Honestly, is that extra episode of crap telly really worth sacrificing your health and happiness by depriving yourself of the healthy sleep your body needs? You probably have is Sky +'d anyway so go to bed. 

Sleep Hygiene

Try to get the room as dark as possible (we have dark purple curtains and dark purple blinds). Try to turn off all electrical equipment and artificial light sources (ipod dock, phone charger etc.) Avoid using laptop/kindle/messing with iphone etc while in bed or getting ready for bed.

Calm Racing Thoughts

If while falling asleep or early into your sleep your mind is racing with thoughts about the jobs you must do tomorrow, a problem you had at work etc. then there are a few tricks you can try. Keep an A4 pad and pen by the bed. If you wake in a panic wondering about your schedule for the following day etc. then jot down a few bullet points of a to-do list, in order for the next day. Keep it brief, one sentence per point. When this is done, put the A4 pad safely away by the side of the bed, set your alarm, and head off to sleep more relaxed and contented.

Progressive Muscular Relaxation

PMR is a technique for reducing anxiety by alternately tensing and relaxing the muscles. It was developed by an american physician named Edmund Jacobson in the 1920s. It is widely practiced by those that suffer from anxiety and also by sports people looking to control their psychological arousal, e.g. pre-competition nerves or before their mental imagery training. It worked a treat for me in college during exam times when I had spent 12 hours studying physics or biomechanics and my brain was swirling with numbers and equations and worried about exams. The basic premise of PMR is that a person cannot achieve mental relaxation while muscular tension exists in the body. The technique teaches you to notice the difference between muscular tension and relaxation. I would normally used a guided practice myself and with my clients by performing this with an audio file on an ipod and headphones while lying on a bed or sofa. This is a very effective method with initial practice sessions taking around 30 minutes. As your skill progresses you can learn to do this in shorter and shorter sessions, with or without the audio file, lying or sitting. Learning to relax is a life skill that everyone should learn. A pity they don't teach this well-researched, highly effective stuff in schools.

2) Restorative Methods

If you've done everything I've suggested so far, and you still can't sleep, which I very much doubt,

you could try a few more methods of physical relaxation. 

Massage

                                      

Invest in some restorative and relaxing massage with a good bodyworker. A lot of people I meet in the gym seem to be gluttons for punishment when it comes to massage. "It was agony, I was screaming in pain, I can barely walk today, jeez it was GREAT!" Look, unless you really require deep tissue massage to treat an injury or serious muscular imbalance, do yourself a favour and opt for the relaxing, restorative form of massage every once in a while. Most other cultures seem to appreciate the benefits of relaxation, whereas I think here in Ireland we think that something has to be horrible to be good for us! If you can't afford to get a professional massage, ask a partner or loved one to give you a nice basic, relaxing massage. Use lavender oil and get them to focus on areas where we commonly hold tension, e.g. upper back, neck, traps, calves, forearms etc.

Epsom Salt Baths

This is one of the most powerful ways of ensuring deep sleep and also boosting muscle recovery, relaxing tired, sore muscles and flushing toxins out of the body. A good hot bath with a big cup of epsom salts thrown in will relax the muscles, lower the blood pressure a bit (our old friend the sleep-boosting magnesium again) and prepare to hit the hay like Rip Van Winkle!

THE SKINNY ON SLEEP-PART ONE

Healthy sleeping patterns are crucial to your health and fitness. Poor sleeping patterns and poor sleep quality can have a disastrous effect on your recovery from training and you’re ability to cope with physical and mental stress. While insomnia can have a range of medical causes which you may have to go and see your G.P. about, this post will describe some tried and tested nutritional, psychological, and restorative methods that healthy, active people can use to make sure they get their zzzzzzs and wake up feeling fresh and alert and ready to take on the new day. Some of these tips are backed up with existing and emerging scientific literature, and some have been tried and tested by myself, my family, my personal training clients, and the sports teams I have worked with. If you are struggling with your sleep I hope that a few of these tips will help you to get the quality of sleep you need and deserve, maybe without having to resort to alcohol or sleeping tablets, neither of which are a long term solution. To avoid overloading you with one very long post, I’ll break these methods up into a 3-Step approach which I’ll post today, tomorrow, and then the third on monday.

Step 1: Nutrition

Avoid eating a lot of sugary or starchy carbohydrates (crips, cereals, sweets, sugar, bread etc.) late at night. These will cause your blood sugar levels to rise quickly, with the inevitable drop in blood sugar later in the night that could interrupt your sleep and leave you awake, hungry and cranky. Minimise your caffeine intake (coffee, tea, coke, energy drinks) or simply cut them out. At least limit these to before 3pm. And for the clincher, there are actually certain foods that may contain the natural cure for your sleepless nights. You ideally want a mix of protein and good fats in this last meal, as you want a slow and steady release of energy throughout the night to avoid blood sugar crashes and encourage muscle growth and repair. To sleep at 10pm, try an evening meal at 7pm with;

A grilled turkey breast (containing sleep-boosting tryptophan);

A few cherries (containing melatonin, the sleep hormone);

A handful of raw almonds and raw spinach (containing magnesium, a natural relaxant)

Some of these chemical compounds and minerals are being researched and sold as sleep-enhancing drugs in their own right. I’d prefer to have a bash off using natural (and cheap) methods before forking out your hard-earned dough for a new drug that may or may not work on it’s own. An hour or two after this meal you will struggle to keep your eyes open. I find this combination to work a treat for me and my clients. I would also recommend trying a supplement called ZMA, containing zinc and magnesium, and a 5 g teaspoon of L-glutamine(an amino acid used to prevent overtraining and promote digestive and immune health) mixed in a little water. I find on a ZMA+glutamine combination that 8 hours of sleep feels like 12 hours of deep, restful sleep. This may be due to the relaxing effects of magnesium or the hormone-balancing effects of ZMA. Try this meal out for the next few evenings and see how it affects your sleep quality. Stay tuned for the next post on psychological methods. Happy snoozing!

THE ULTIMATE PROS AND CONS OF THE WARMUP

PROS

The perfect warmup prepares both the body and mind for the workout to come. You arrive at the gym, fire up your AC/DC on the ipod, and start your dynamic warmup;

1. Your heart rate, blood pressure, and muscle temperature begin to rise, you feel a light sweat and start sucking in air.

2. Your mind-body connection is strengthened as you practice fresh, crisp movement patterns.

3. Your mind becomes clear, focused and ready for the hard work to come.

4. Your brain sends messages down along your spine and nerves through the neuromuscular junction and tells the right muscles to start firing in the right sequence. The main muscle groups and stabilisers are primed and ready for high forces and heavy lifting.

5. Your joints become well lubricated and your ankles, thoracic spine and hips become more mobile.

CONS

1. I train myself and my clients for REAL WORLD STRENGTH AND FITNESS. Improved sporting performance and a better physique should merely be a bonus, the side-effects of hard, functional training and solid, healthy nutrition. Do you ever get a chance to warm-up in real life? Does a lioness stop to stretch her hamstrings before chasing down a gazelle?

2. God forbid the worst should happen; your toddler takes off downhill on his tricycle towards a busy crossroads. You stumble downstairs for a glass of water in the middle of the night and meet a startled burglar helping himself to your HD TV. Your life and the lives of your family are on the line. Do you think you’ll get the chance to stop and do a few jumping jacks first?

3. The longer the bout of exercise lasts, and the lower the muscular forces and flexibility demand involved, the less important the warmup, in my opinion.

A 100m sprint requires huge forces to be produced in take off and absorbed in landing. A huge range of motion is involved and the mind must be primed for a short, 10 seconds of explosive effort.

An ironman triathlon, on the other hand, can have a cut-off time of 17 hours.

How important can a ten-minute warmup be for this event. In my opinion, for a long-distance event, it is more important to make sure that the right work has been put in before race day, that the athlete has muscular balance, a strong core, strong tendons, healthy joints, efficient movement patterns etc. Once this groundwork has been done, a very brief active warmup and slow starting pace should be more than enough to get you on your way.

4. You were custom-made to perform in extreme situations.

Your fight or flight reflex is designed to make you immediately ready to fight off a predator or run for your life. Your body is supplied with a large adrenaline dump, your heart rate and blood pressure spike, blood is shunted towards the main muscle groups and away from non-essential processes like digestion. If you take 15 minutes to perform a set routine warm-up at a nice easy pace every single time you train, you are not training for life.

SO WHAT NOW?

I’m not suggesting you ditch the warmup altogether. I don’t want 50 people reading this article and promptly nutting themselves the next time they go for a max deadlift after walking in off the street.

For safety, those new to training should always carry out a full and thorough warmup before any strenuous exercise. Sport-specific warm-ups before your chosen sport are an absolute must. When doing your heavy lifting, warm up progressively to avoid doing serious damage.

My point is that all too often, I see people squandering their precious time by just half-heartedly going through the motions with their warmup without any clearly defined goals. A warmup should be focused, tailored to your individual needs, and brief enough not to detract from the main training session.

What I am suggesting is that you take the fluff out of your warmup and minimise it to get the most bang for your buck. Fifteen minutes jogging on a treadmill or sitting on a bike is not an efficient or effective warmup in my book. Everything in your warmup should be there for a reason, eg:

• Fundamental movement skills for sport (jumping, landing, sprinting etc.)
• Client-specific mobility drills to address each clients’ restrictions
• Myofascial release on areas of muscle adhesion, e.g. iliotibial band
• Learning new movement patterns, e.g. the turkish getup/single leg RDL

An athlete that is well trained and injury-proofed should be capable of performing at or near their bests at random. They should be capable of lifting awkward, heavy objects and covering any type of terrain in real life. All of my clients report that training with me has made them better equipped to handle the physical and mental stresses of daily life, be it the paramedic carrying a patient down three flights of stairs on a stretcher, or a retired accountant capable of heavy gardening work and hill-walking every weekend with his teenage son.

Know your limits and have an idea of what you’d be able to do off the bat with no prior warning. I know I’d be able to knock out about 80% of my max on most lifts without a warmup during a normal active working day. I know I could run a surprise 30 metre one or two seconds slower than my best.

Develop the ability to move explosively and act on instinct in the real world.

A karate instructor friend once told me, “A black belt is like car insurance. You never want to use it, but you have to have it.” Take that approach when developing your real world strength and fitness. Train to develop the confidence that if and when you ever need it, it’s there.

If you would like to start training but don’t know where to start, come and meet with me for a free consultation by emailing vaughan.barry@gmail.com, or calling me on 0863126918. I have a new special offer on personal training starting soon, stay tuned to the facebook page for details, get out and get active and make the most of the beautiful weather!

Regards,

Barry Vaughan BSc CSCS

GYMNASTICS PROGRAMME

I have always wanted to have crack at gymnastics, you see these amazing athletes with superhuman functional strength, flexibility, awesome power, and great physiques and you can't help but be awed by the fact that most of them have never picked up a dumbell or a barbell or bothered with tedious bodybuilding programmes their whole lives. And whats more than that, they make it look effortless and seem the epitome of health and grace. Have a look at these to see what I mean;

So after putting on about 18kg (almost 3 stone) over the past year (and about 3% bodyfat),

I am finding bodyweight exercises fairly challenging again (you try strapping on a 20kg plate and doing chinups!) so I decided to finally give gymnastics training a go and found a great book on the subject, by USA Juniors Gymnastic Coach Christopher Somner, available here;

http://www.gymnasticbodies.com/store/homepage/building-the-gymnastic-body.html

This book is written with over 30 years of gymnastic coaching experience at national level and contains a lot of progressions for each of the key gymnastic skills, from easy(ish) to advanced.

Heres how my first days' testing went, humbling I have to say! Some of these are brutal. So no free weights for me, just gymnastics (and a few kettlebell swings) for the next 12 weeks, should be fun and a welcome change! Can't wait to get some of these skills nailed. You get a great feeling from acquiring a new skill that you don't necessarily get from getting stronger in the gym. Its' less about ego and more about the confidence and sense of accomplishment that you get from skill mastery. I look forward to working on these and seeing where it takes me!