Unilateral Training: Why It's Beneficial for Your Training

What Is Unilateral Training? Unilateral means one limb or one side of the body. Why it’s important? Help Correct Imbalances It’s extremely rare to have a perfect symmetry. When we exercise in a traditional sense, bilaterally (both legs, both arms), we tend to overcompensate to one side, which in time can lead to injuries and stagnant strength gains. Improves midline stabilization Your midline (core) has to work harder to keep upright and balanced. Improves balance Not only does your core get over worked, but so does your overall stability of the working limb, depending on upper or lower body movement. With improved ability to stabilize limb by limb comes stronger muscles, tendons and joints. Decreasing the risk of injury, and longer term stability.

Try These Unilateral Movements: Alternating Dumbbell Chest Press Grab a pair of dumbbells. Lie on your back on a bench, and hold the dumbbells a few inches above your chest. Press one dumbbell upward until your arm is fully extended. Pause and slowly retract extended arm to start position. Then complete the same motion on the opposite side. Continue in an alternating manner.

Bird Dog Row Rest your left hand and knee on a bench, with your right leg on the floor for support. Lift and extend your left leg straight out and use your right hand to pick up a dumbbell. Row the dumbbell straight up until your upper arm is parallel with the bench. Slowly return to the starting position. Repeat on the opposite side.

Bulgarian Split Squats  Stand lunge-length in front of a bench. Hold a dumbbell in each hand and rest the top of your left foot on the bench behind you. Lower your body until your rear knee nearly touches the floor and your front thigh is parallel to the floor.

Try a full body workout! Alternating Dumbbell Chest Press x 10 reps per arm Rest 30 sec  Bird dog Row x 10 reps per arm Rest 30 sec  Bulgarian Split Squats x 10 per leg Rest 2 minutes  Complete 3-4 rounds (using a medium to light weight)  Written by Alex Manson Strength and Conditioning Specialist

Grip Strength: Why It Matters For Your Shoulder The shoulder is a complex joint that involves many different structures and motions. It is the connection between the upper limb and torso and is highly involved in many sports/activities. This also means that it is an area that is often injured within athletic populations, including those participating in regular resistance training. It has been estimated that up to 36% of resistance training related injuries involve the shoulder complex (1). These injuries have a broad range with regards to the specific structures being affected, the type of injury, and the specific mechanisms causing the injury. These cannot only impact your performance in activities/gym, but also in your daily life.   So why does grip strength matter?  Grip strength has been shown to correlate with overall function of the shoulder. A study by Antony et al found an increase in shoulder muscle activity (increased shoulder stabilizer activation, decreased activation of compensatory muscles – anterior/middle deltoid) occurred when the amount of force used to grip increased (2). This basically means that if you squeeze your hand harder, there will be increased muscle activity in muscles that help stabilize the shoulder. Another study by Horsley et al, looked at the connection between grip strength and rotator cuff strength in healthy individuals. They found there was increased strength the rotator cuff in individuals that had higher grip strength (3). Try this!   Place your right arm at your side and your left hand on your right shoulder. You can hold onto an object, or just make a fist with your right hand.  Start to squeeze the right hand, slowly ramping up the strength till a max contraction.  You will notice that as you start to increase the strength of the contraction, the muscle activation starts to increase in the shoulder (you should feel the muscles in the arm/shoulder fire).  There have been several proposed reasons for this relationship. One involves the concept of irradiation, which entails the transmission of neural impulses from a contracting muscle to the surrounding muscles. This will not only increase the activation of the surrounding muscles, but also increase their strength output (if they are involved in the action). Another theory is that the tension/forces are transmitted via myofascial/myotendinous expansions running up the arm, providing a network for this transmission (4).   What makes up grip strength?  Most people believe that overall grip strength is purely produced by the flexors of the forearm (muscles responsible for closing the hand). But it is actually also involves the extensors of the wrist/hand (muscles that open the hand). These will act as an opposing force to the flexors to help create functional stability of the joint (4). How can this help me? Try incorporating exercises that involve the use of grip strength (carry variations, Kettle Bell “bottoms-up” presses, 1-arm hangs, etc.) into your routine. It can be beneficial to not only build muscle, but also increase grip strength.   Suitcase Carry Kettle Bell "Bottoms Up" Press Grip strength alone is not the cure for all shoulder injuries! There are many different factors to consider for each individual case and injury; this is just a small piece of a much bigger puzzle. This post is meant to shed light on an often overlooked area when it comes to shoulder health and function. If you are experiencing any shoulder pain or would like to work on preventing future shoulder issues, feel free to contact me and we can go over some options for you.    Written by Dr. Jon Perry Chiropractor 1. Kolber, M. J., Beekhuizen, K. S., Cheng, M. S. S., & Hellman, M. A. (2010). Shoulder injuries attributed to resistance training: a brief review. The Journal of Strength & Conditioning Research, 24(6), 1696-1704. 2. Antony, N. T., & Keir, P. J. (2010). Effects of posture, movement and hand load on shoulder muscle activity. Journal of Electromyography and Kinesiology, 20(2), 191-198. 3. Horsley, I., Herrington, L., Hoyle, R., Prescott, E., & Bellamy, N. (2016). Do changes in hand grip strength correlate with shoulder rotator cuff function?. Shoulder & elbow, 8(2), 124-129. 4. Robb, A., Weinberg, B. Athletic Movement Assessment Manual (Taken June 24-25, 2017).

Bulletproofing for Runners

As the weather becomes warmer and we start to come out of our winter hibernation, the number of runners hitting the pavement is going to substantially increase. A new outdoor running season may mean breaking in some new gear, setting sights on new PBs and, most importantly, making sure you stay healthy throughout the season. 

This article is for the novice, amateur and experienced runner, so sit back and dive in to learn how to keep yourselves strong and resilient throughout the running season!

Injury Mechanisms

According to the literature, the largest predictor of an injury is a rapid increase in loading over a short period of time.The literature also proposes that 60-80% of injuries are a result of training error, meaning that training load is responsible for causing injury. Interestingly, there is a lack of conclusive evidence in the literature linking running mechanics to injury. Many alterations in mechanics may actually be due to an injury itself, and it’s hard to conclude what came first; the injury or the change in mechanics. Classic chicken and the egg scenario. Wait…am I saying that the way you train actually can influence your risk of injury? You would think this would be a very common thought, but it is often forgotten that training is a stress on the body that needs to be carefully monitored. Stress is needed to create change but we need an optimal amount to do so; not too little and not too much. We need to find the sweet spot and continue to discover where that sweet spot is as we get bigger, stronger and faster. We will take a closer look at using training variables to mitigate injury risk later on in this article Load vs. Capacity Tissue capacity is dependant on multiple factors, including tissue strength, movement control (i.e., body awareness), mobility (active control of your range of motion) and history of previous injury. It is also influenced by some lesser known factors, including:  Non-musculoskeletal intrinsic risk profile Diet, age, BMI, genetics, medications (corticosteroids, anticonvulsants), hormonal changes (around menopause), and metabolic issues Brain and central nervous system changes Central sensitization and response to exercise Psychosocial factors (the perception of pain) Stress, mood, fears, beliefs, motivation, and rehab behaviours Training load can be broken down into 3 main subcategories that we can alter: Volume: How much (i.e., number of kilometres/miles in a given week) Frequency: How often (i.e., how many times a week you are running) Intensity: How hard (i.e., amount of effort of each run) These are not the only training variables, but these are the ones that we can most easily record and modify to help avoid increasing the risk of injury throughout the running season. Once a tissue has become injured, it inherently has a decreased ability to handle load, altering the capacity of the tissue. This means that there needs to be a gradual re-introduction of load to the tissue during the rehab process.  Have you ever taken a week or two off of training due to an injury and then gone back at the same training load only to find that the nagging pain or discomfort came back relatively quickly? That’s because the tissue didn’t have a chance to adapt with an appropriate loading strategy. “Zero to one hundred real quick” is only okay as a lyric in a Drake song, not when it comes to rehab and training.  Injury Prevention  Injury prevention during a busy running season can be done by managing training load, while at the same time working to increase the tissue’s ability to manage load with strength training. The literature has recently proposed that one of the best ways to manage training load is to compare acute workload to chronic workload.  Acute/chronic workload is a measurable indicator that compares the training load over the previous 4 weeks to the current week. By using rate of perceived exertion (RPE) of each run and multiplying it by the duration of each run, we are able to create an arbitrary unit that can be used to measure workload ratios. Rate of perceived exertion is a number out of 10 that is personally associated with the difficulty of that specific training bout. Calculating training load for a single run would be as follows:  8.0 RPE x 20 minutes = 160 arbitrary units (this is your training load)

Calculating the acute to chronic workload ratio would be as follows:

160 (average of the previous weeks training load) / 150 (average training load over previous 4 weeks)
= 1.07 (acute:chronic workload ratio)

An increased risk of injury is associated with an acute:chonic workload of greater than 1.25 (with a significant increase in risk of injury when the ratio is greater than 1.5). The proposed “sweet spot” for training is between 0.8 to 1.25.

Strength Training

Strength training has been shown to improve running economy and decrease the risk of injury. There is strong evidence that strength training is the only way to expose tissues to the stress that is necessary for positive adaptation - which in this case is an increased capacity of the tissues. A high intensity approach of using 70% of 1RM (1 rep max) is more effective than a low intensity approach, however there need to be a gradual increase to that amount of weight. The main focus of strength training for runners should be on lower body muscular strength and muscular endurance, upper body posterior chain muscular endurance, and core muscular endurance.

Points to Remember:

•  Load > tissue capacity = tissue injury •  Most common cause of injury in runners is due to training error (rapid increase in load over a short period of time) •  Modifiable training factors are volume (how much), frequency (how often), and intensity (how hard) •  Once a tissue is injured, it inherently has less ability to handle load •  To avoid injury in runners, care should be taken to monitor load management and to participate in strength training •  Use the acute:chronic workload ratio to avoid overtraining If you have any questions about running training and how to make sure you are mitigating injury, come on in to Catalyst Health and one of our knowledgeable practitioners would be happy to help! Written By: Dr. Dhanbir (Danny) Dulay, D.C., B.Sc. (Kin), CSCS Medical Acupuncture Practitioner  Functional Range Release Practitioner Strength and Conditioning Specialist Instagram: @dulaydc Available for appointments at our Richmond location Monday - Friday