As I mentioned in my last post, this season I’m looking into all the ways I can improve my triathlon performance that go beyond simply training more or harder. Most of thee have the added benefit of making you a healthier, happier person too, so that can’t be a bad thing, can it?
Having listened to Kelly Starrett on a couple of podcasts and started reading his book Becoming a supple leopard, I became convinced that mobility lay at the foundation of many of these ‘marginal gains’. And I decided to start, as is almost always best, at the very beginning. With the foundations.
My friend and fellow ATAC member Lorna Wilson is a Biomechanics Coach as well as a full time personal trainer. Last week, I headed to see Lorna at Sport371 in Amsterdam to begin a course in foundation biomechanics.
But at its root is one misunderstanding. More and harder might well be better – if you’re doing it correctly in the first place. And very few of us are. In most cases, we’re not moving in the way our bodies are meant to – or, more commonly, we can perform the action we want but we’re not doing it with the correct muscles and motion. Some muscles are overcompensating for other under-used or in-spasm muscles.
That’s where biomechanics coaching comes in. Lorna explains that everyone can benefit from biomechanics coaching, from the unfit or overweight learning to gain range of motion, to the average Joe whose posture and motion have been damaged by years at a desk or hunched over a laptop.
For athletes, there are probably two great benefits: firstly, injury prevention; secondly, increased movement efficiency. Both of which lead to better and faster performances.
So, what does a biomechanics session involve?
About an hour in length, it’s sort of like an MOT for your body (for non-Brits, the MOT is the annual test a car has to pass to prove it’s fit for the road). While there are a few small bits of movement here and there – dropping off a step, hopping in different directions – the vast majority is performed either lying down, stood still or sitting down. Lorna gives me an instruction and a demonstration, then observes as I make certain easy movements (some assisted), each of which tells my eagle-eyed biomechanics coach something about the way my body works (or doesn’t work…).
Based on this, Lorna devises a 4 exercise routine that will start to correct some of the bigger issues and we spend the rest of the time going through this, so I know exactly what I need to do when I get home. I’ll need to repeat these exercises 3-4 times per day for the next few weeks until my next session to see real gains, I’m told.
When I get home, I have an email from Lorna once again laying out my exercises, the number of reps required, with diagram demonstrations of how to do them. I’m excited to get started. I’ll keep you posted about how I get on…
If you’re interested in Biomechanics Coaching and based in the Netherlands, you can contact Lorna HERE or HERE.
Learn more about Biomechanics HERE.