Coaching | Wild Geese Fitness Training

Causes of Knee Valgus

14 01 2013

Well I was in the middle of writing a post on the methods I employ to speed recovery between training sets and also increase general endurance.
Half way through I realised I don’t have the video footage I needed and my camera is in the gym. My bad, I’m stoopid.

So I guess you’ll just have to check in later in the week for that one!

This did lead to a small issue though….

What the hell do I write about for this morning?

And then I come across THIS from one of the biggest brains in the Strength & Conditioning industry, Mr Bret Contreras.
Whatever Brett writes is worth a read. He takes the science research, goes through it with a fine toothcomb and then presents it to us mere luddites in a manner we can almost understand!

The article I’m referring to today is from his Strength & Conditioning Research journal, which is an excellent resource for all coaches.
This particular one talks about a thing called Knee Valgus.
Click this image to go to the article:

What is knee valgus?

It’s where your knees pull together, giving that knock kneed look.
It’s very common when people squat, even more common in the female population.

So what’s wrong with knee valgus?

It can put an excessive amount of stress on the Anterior Cruciate Ligament (ACL). Which obviously aint good.

So how about do we go about fixing it?

That depends on the cause.
As Brets post states, some potential causes (which are also the ones I always look for)

decreased gluteal activation or strength, increased hip-adductor activation and decreased ankle-dorsiflexion range of motion (ROM)

Makes sense. For the knee to move into a valgus position the hip must rotate internally, in orther words our external rotators aren’t working right and our internal rotators (Adductors, Hip Flexors) are doing overtime. It may also be that the arch of the foot has started to collapse leading to the ankle tracking poorly.
It all follows the alternating joint theory nice and neatly, where the ankle should be mobile, the knee stable and the hips mobile. An problem at one joint means another must take up the slack by becoming more/less mobile/stable.

I don’t think any one symptom occurs independently but they have a cascade effect, either from the top down or the bottom up.

The study in Brets post talks about the Gastocnemius (the fat part of the calf) is mentioned as being over active and causing problems for the Anterior Tibialis on the front of the shin. Something I’d never considered.
Could this also help explain shin splints?
Maybe.

Needless to say I’m going to start paying more attention to peoples gastroc flexibility and have them work more ankle mobilisation as soon as I see any valgus during squat movements.
I use two ankle mobilisations already with the guys, the primary drill being the Wall Ankle Mobilisation (catchy title, eh?)

Here’s top coach Eric Cressy explaining how it works:

It’s one of the drills I teach during the Squatting section in my Bodyweight Workshop.
The next workshop is coming up on February 23rd at Galway Kettlebells.
This is filling fast, so if you want to learn:

- Joint mobilisation for the whole body
- In depth examination of the Push Up and Squat movements, with progressions for more advanced practitioners.
- Martial Arts & Animal movements for strength, conditioning and mobility
- More, in fact as much as we can fit in!

Drop me an email to book your spot.

Regards

Dave
http://www.wg-fit.com

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Tags: ACL Injury, Ankle Mobility, Bret Contreras, Coaching, Knee Valgus
Categories : Bodyweight training, Strength and Conditioning

The Risk:Reward Ratio of Exercise Selection

11 01 2013

A few days ago I was inspired to write this post in response to a fellow coach informing me that a team he trained were leaving him so they go to a training camp based around a particular piece of equipment.
Needles to say I thought this was nonsense and say as much in the post.

It has however got me thinking some, and while I’ve made my point about equipment, what about exercise selection?

How do we choose what exercises an athlete should do?

I commonly read other peoples blogs espousing the awesomeness of their favourite exercises, but what happens when that exercise doesn’t fit the athlete?

A fine example is the Barbell Front Squat.
I love it. I love to have my guys do it. I believe that it is a safer and potentially more effective method of squatting than the back squat.
However I have a number of people that the lift is simply not suitable for.
The most common problem preventing the front squat is the strength or mobility of the upper back.
For others the needs of their sport simply means the back squat is more appropriate for them.
Is the squat even appropriate if their glutes aren’t firing right? Maybe, but only under close supervision with the right activation and mobilisation work to ensure safety and progression.
I also love single leg training. Yet one or two my guys simply can’t tolerate it and must stick to bilateral lower body lifts.

It all comes down to what I call the Risk:Reward ratio.
How much do the rewards outweigh the risks of any given exercise?

Do I take the guy with horrendously internally rotated shoulders and make him do overhead work simply because I advocate kettlebell lifting and that what you do with kettles?

No f@*king way! He does floor pressing or push ups. Why? Because of the Risk:Reward ratio for that individual.
The risks for him on the overhead press without first correcting his posture far outweigh the potential benefits of that exercise. So we substitute it with a more appropriate drill.

This is the job of the coach, hell it’s why we have a job in the first place.
While yes, we all have our preferences, we must put the needs of our athletes ahead of them.

Regards

Dave
http://www.WG-Fit.com

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Tags: Coaching, exercise selection
Categories : Strength and Conditioning

The Importance of Coaching vs Instructing

18 04 2012

erm.....

An interesting conversation took place here the other day with one of my lads.

He’d just finished his training and we were chatting about the progress he’d made. He commented that it was down to simply following a program.

And to a large degree he’s correct, good programming is vital to success in any athletic endeavour. But in his particular case and in many other people’s case, it’s not the whole truth.

When he joined me he was already following a training program set out by an online coach and simply asked if he could use my facility to train out of, things hadn’t worked out well at the last place he was using.
I agreed and pretty much left him to it. He followed his program religiously and made great progress. But it could have been better.

Since then he’s switched to training directly under me. No, in his chosen sport my programming skills are probably not as good as the specialists he was consulting online, but there is one major difference.

I am there, watching.

Not only that but I can judge what days to push forwards and what days to back off. I can adjust the training on the fly as needed.
And I can converse with him between sets and work out what adjustments need to be made in order to best advance him as an individual. These could be technique issues or weak/imbalanced areas specific to him.

In other words, he receives “coaching”, where as previously he only received “training”
The difference is crucial.

A coach is there, always there.
A good coach knows his athletes as well as or often better than they know themselves.
A good coach knows as soon as his athlete steps onto the floor where he is mentally and physically, before anything more than “hello” has been said.
A good coach can pick out an athletes weak points and eliminate them.

A “trainer” can’t do this. Nor can the vast majority of fitness instructors.

If you are training for something, be it athleticism, physique or sport, ensure you search out a coach, someone who doesn’t just hand you a workout, no matter if it’s the perfect program or not. But find someone who can get in your head, someone who can work out what makes you tick and can manipulate you to tick more efficiently.

If you are a fitness instructor/trainer whatever. Endeavour to learn how your athletes think. Always be assessing.

There’s a lot of internet chatter about assessments, especially since the whole FMS thing exploded onto the scene. But in Wild Geese I am assessing you from the minute you enter the building to the minute you leave.
Each and every movement, each facial expression, the intonation and construction of your sentences when you speak, the way you stand, walk, the look in your eye. All these tell a story.
These are all things a coach should be looking for, should be reading and taking note of.
Each tiny element helps build a story. A coach can read the story and workout how best to steer it.

The difference in an athlete’s success/failure isn’t always the programming. The best program in the world is no use if the athlete can’t implement it on those occasions where life gets in the way.

Regards

Dave
www.wg-fit.com