In this episode 37 protocols
▶ 24:48 Get Proper Back Pain Assessment Behaviors “First of all, if you have back pain, you need a proper assessment and diagnosis. It's really impossible for me in this format to try and diagnose your back pain or for you to try and diagnose your back pain.” ▷ 30:25 Build Musculature Around the Spine Behaviors “One of the things that somebody with a thin spine should do, according to Dr. Stu McGill, and I'll reiterate this several times today, is build up the musculature around the spine so that they can stabilize that otherwise bendy spine along both the vertical and side to side axis so they don't injure it.” ▷ 34:13 Improve Spine Mobility if You Have a Thick Spine Behaviors “People who have a thicker spine... perhaps want to do more work aimed at generating more flexibility in these planes of motion from side to side and at different angles relative to the vertical axis.” ▷ 37:59 Avoid Sit-Ups and Crunches Behaviors “Turns out that if you have back pain, and even if you don't, that is probably the least efficient and perhaps even the worst thing that you can do for your back pain. If you are crunching, you can imagine that's essentially bringing the vertebrae together in the front of that sandwich that is vertebrae, disc, vertebrae.” ▷ 39:08 Curl Up Behaviors “The curl up is an excellent exercise for people who have back pain and who don't have back pain to strengthen the abdominal wall. And it's done as follows.” ▷ 46:15 Side Plank Behaviors “So the way to really start doing side planks, and if you think you can already do side planks to assess whether or not you're doing them properly is to start with knees slightly bent.” ▷ 53:48 Bird Dog Behaviors “And now the third, which is the bird dog. The bird dog, as some of you may know, is where you get into all fours on the ground. You extend one arm forward, and you extend the opposite one leg backward.” ▷ 57:52 Do McGill Big Three Weekly or More Often Behaviors “Again, right now I'm striving to do all of Stu McGill's big three at least once a week, maybe twice a week. I know many of you will say, oh, that's pretty wimpy.” ▷ 58:31 Avoid Any Exercise That Exacerbates Back Pain Behaviors “If any of these movements exacerbate your back pain, then you should definitely avoid doing them.” ▷ 1:07:38 Pull-Up Bar Tools “If you can find a bar or something that you can hang from... the idea here is to get your arms overhead onto a bar, you're holding onto the bar and your legs are going to drape down and your toes are going to be in contact with the floor.” ▷ 1:08:07 Supported Hanging for Back Pain Relief Behaviors “What you're doing here is you're going to hold onto the bar. You're in more or less a hang, except that your toes are supporting you or your feet, or sometimes your heels are supporting you... You're going to do that for anywhere from 10 to 30 seconds.” ▷ 1:09:07 Inversion Table Tools “It's also the kind of logic behind inversion tables... I did used to have an inversion table that I had out on my deck in the morning and I like to lock my ankles in and invert on that thing.” ▷ 1:09:42 Avoid Inversion if You Have Glaucoma Risk Behaviors “If you have glaucoma or you're predisposed to glaucoma, you're going to increase ocular pressure if you're inverted in that way or any way. So keep that in mind. You would want to avoid that in those cases.” ▷ 1:14:12 Cobra Push-Up Behaviors “He suggested that I do essentially the opposite of a sit-up. Basically that I lie down on the floor with toes extended, legs together, and then do essentially a pushup while keeping my hips in contact with the floor.” ▷ 1:16:56 Wall Hip-to-Wall Extension for Severe Back Pain Behaviors “Some people have so much back pain that they can't even do the cobra type pushup. They need to just go to a wall and actually just put their hands on the wall, standing about six inches or so away from the wall, and then just push their hips towards the wall.” ▷ 1:27:53 Strengthen the Front of the Neck Behaviors “The simplest way to do this without any equipment is to simply put your fists underneath your, not your chin, but on the two sides of your jaw... and then with your tongue on the roof of your mouth and breathing through your nose, you're just going to do a 10 second static contraction.” ▷ 1:30:15 Wide Toe Box Shoes Tools “Some people opt to get very wide toe box shoes... I do have a slightly wider toe box shoe for running and I've really benefited from that.” ▷ 1:30:15 Toe Shoes Tools “Some people will even run in those shoes where the individual toes look like they're in a glove.” ▷ 1:30:30 Toe Mobility and Strength Practice Behaviors “Basically what anyone can do... is to try and see if you can spread your toes out from one another so that none of them are touching on both feet.” ▷ 1:31:17 Toe Spreaders Tools “Some people find that they can't spread their toes out and they need a little bit of help from toe spreaders. Yes, there are commercially available toe spreaders that take the form of these kind of stalks that you can put between your toes.” ▷ 1:34:39 Brace the Torso During Resistance Training Behaviors “When doing resistance training, that bracing the body by essentially not doing a big belly breath, but filling the body with air so that you essentially create a firmness within the abdominal walls and the spinal erectors and the obliques... That's beneficial during resistance exercise.” ▷ 1:35:35 Belly Breathing at Rest Behaviors “It turns out that when we're at rest, when we're just standing around, we actually want to do the opposite. We actually want to relax that musculature and belly breathe.” ▷ 1:35:55 Nasal Breathing at Rest Behaviors “You can do yourself a great favor by trying to remember that when you're at rest... that you're ideally nasal breathing, unless you're speaking or eating or something of that sort, and you are belly breathing.” ▷ 1:37:35 Staggered Stance During Resistance Work Behaviors “Rather than stand with feet parallel, standing with one foot in front of the other, making sure that they are wide enough apart in the lateral plane... and then making sure that your belly button is still facing directly forward.” ▷ 1:38:50 Mirror Tools “Sometimes it's helpful to do these in front of a mirror.” ▷ 1:44:21 Use a Rolled Towel for Lumbar Support While Sitting Behaviors “If you travel or drive or you're seated a lot for work, I and many others find it really beneficial. Just take a towel and just roll it up and put it so that you maintain the arch in your lower back. So you're not rounding in your seat.” ▷ 1:44:42 Maintain a Straight or Slightly Arched Lower Back Behaviors “You want to make sure that you're not rounding your lower back too much, keeping it straight or a little bit arched is going to be beneficial, not overly arched, but straight or a little bit arched.” ▷ 1:44:57 Activate the Medial Glute Behaviors “The protocol here is to essentially activate and de-spasm the medial glute... You're going to do that for maybe five to 10 repetitions. And then on the final repetition, you're going to hold it there in that raised position, not as long as you can, but probably anywhere from 10 to 20 seconds.” ▷ 1:49:04 Kettlebell Swings Behaviors “If you're somebody who is being conscientious and doing a lot of posterior chain work, such as kettlebell swings on a regular basis...” ▷ 1:49:13 Glute-Ham Raises Behaviors “You're doing glute ham raises, which I'm a huge fan of... such a big fan of Nordic curls, glute ham raises, et cetera, for all sorts of reasons, strengthening the back, strengthening the posterior chain.” ▷ 1:49:22 Glute-Ham Raise Machine Tools “Unfortunately, you need a specialized piece of equipment to do them.” ▷ 1:49:37 Nordic Curls Behaviors “I'll talk more about those in a future episode... such a big fan of Nordic curls, glute ham raises, et cetera, for all sorts of reasons, strengthening the back, strengthening the posterior chain.” ▷ 1:52:07 Psoas Stretch in Lunge With Overhead Reach Behaviors “Here's the protocol that I do believe everyone can benefit from... which is essentially to do what looks like a warrior two position in yoga. So you're essentially doing a lunge... and then you're going to take the hand on the same side as the leg that's extended behind you, reach that toward the ceiling.” ▷ 1:59:41 Balance Pulling and Pushing Exercises Behaviors “Are you doing enough pulling exercises to balance out all the pushing exercises you might be doing like pushups and shoulder presses and bench presses? Make sure you're balancing the back musculature and the shoulder and chest musculature.” ▷ 2:02:46 Yoga Behaviors “wonderful evidence for any and all of those different practices what i've tried to focus” ▷ 2:02:46 Pilates Behaviors “wonderful evidence for any and all of those different practices what i've tried to focus” ▷ 2:02:46 Walking Behaviors “wonderful evidence for any and all of those different practices what i've tried to focus”