Self Massage

The BEST Foam Roller Stretch!

So for most of 2018 I’ve been making YouTube videos but falling behind on making the corresponding blog posts or updating old blog posts to match the YouTube videos… and enough is enough! So here goes…!

As you probably know by now, I love foam rollers as a self massage tool and even have a guide on which one you should buy.

But other than self-massage, the foam roller is incredibly useful for increasing your thoracic extension (the ability to bend your upper back backwards) and stretching your lats, shoulders and chest. Here’s one of my favorite stretches!

This will feel quite good if you haven’t tried it before and make your shoulders a lot more “open” to have a nicer handstand or bridge, to boot! I used to do this daily for years before I exhausted the stretch. On the other hand, people who have impeccable thoracic extension won’t feel a thing. If you’re curious which roller is used above, it’s the TriggerPoint Therapy roller which is one of my favorite basic ones.

BONUS VIDEO + TIP!

Use the weight of your pupper (or anything, really) to increase the pressure of the roller against your upper back!

Hope that helps!

How to use a Lacrosse Ball for Self Massage

The lacrosse ball is a hard, dense ball that makes for a GREAT self-massage tool for MANY different parts of your body. When someone gives you a deep tissue massage, they use their palms/fingers/elbows to apply pressure to help relax tight muscles. The lacrosse ball helps mimic this deep release with your own bodyweight. The best part is that you could go to town on your glutes and hamstrings in a way that not even many massage-therapists will because of how intimate that area is. (When was the last time someone FIRMLY massaged your ASS? See?) So thats why I have one, to get free ass massages, haha. (No but seriously, it’s great for the whole body.)

Video Tutorial on How to Use the Lacrosse Ball

Where to buy?

These balls on Amazon are pretty great. If you have a store called “Big 5” near you, they may sell them in packs as well for slightly cheaper per ball, but I’ve noticed they are like 10-15% less hard than the ones on amazon for some reason, so the ones on Amazon are actually worth it.

Alternatives

If you don’t have a lacrosse ball, you could use a tennis ball, baseball, softball, billiard ball, cricket ball, floor hockey ball, golf ball, spalding bouncey ball as alternatives. They don’t work as well as the lacrosse one in some cases, but it’s better than nothing and sometimes it may even be better!

I’ve also tried “massage balls” meant to mimic the lacrosse ones made by Triggerpoint and RumbleRoller because they make GREAT foam rollers. Unfortunately, I found their balls to be extremely ineffective/less useful than a lacrosse ball and much more expensive to boot. You could also use golf balls, but because they’re small, they’re not as versatile. Tennis balls work great when you’re new at this, but again, they collapse and overtime will collapse easily and be useless while the lacrosse ball is quite permanent.

What to watch next?!

Definitely check out my tutorial on how I use my foam roller, which is my other favorite self massage tool. It’s incredible for loosening up large areas of the body, like the upper back and legs!

How I Use My Foam Roller

As you probably know already, I’m a huge fan of self massage because back in 2012 I had made this post on how to get rid of muscle knots. Well, I finally made a video that shows how to use the foam roller, my favorite self massage tool! And I know not everybody needs to watch a 6-minute video to understand how to use a foam roller, so I made looping GIF’s of it to help save you time at the bottom of this post as well. That’s just how much I love foam rollers.

What is a foam roller? How does it work?

A foam roller is a self massage tool. During a deep tissue massage, someone typically kneads their fingers/palms/elbows into you and it feels good… right? Well, instead of someone massaging you, you roll over this cylinder and the pressure of your own bodyweight helps to get the knots out and relax your muscles. So, that’s why I have one. It’s like getting free massages for the rest of your life.

How to use a Foam Roller:

Foam Rolling GIFS

Upper Back (avoid lower back and neck)

Neck (not meant to be aggressive)

Calves

Shins (lateral side to get tibialis anterior)

Quads / Hip Flexors (bent legs and/or straight legs)

IT Band / Vastus Lateralis / Hip

Fascial Release to help mobilize shoulders for Handstand

Underneath the armpit area and back of your shoulder is loaded with fascia and tendons of many muscles (lats, teres, triceps, post delt, etc)… so it’s easy for adhesions to build up in this claustrophobic space! Emmet Louis shows you how you could get into those nasty bits by putting the roller underneath your arm pit and roll to the side and back. When you feel really terrible tissue quality, just stay there and do some DEEP breathing to relax.

Why avoid rolling the lower back?

The thoracic spine (upper back) has ribs attached to it that come around and support your entire body. The lower back doesn’t, so when you roll your weight over this area, the vertebrae literally collapse toward your organs. So when you roll over the upper back, the ribs distribute the stress. Remember, the ribs wrap AROUND to the front of the body. So when you roll over your upper back, everything moves as one unit, does that make sense? When you roll over your lower back, it’s not so much the danger of the internal organs, but the danger of the actual vertebrae being pushed too far apart because it lacks the same support structures that the thoracic spine does. That is why we avoid rolling over that area.

Which Foam Roller should I buy?

The 13″ original Triggerpoint Therapy one is the original one I used and love. But to help you make a better decision, I wrote an entire guide so you could figure out which foam roller you should buy!

Want another amazing Self Massage Tool?

If you do a lot of climbing, hanging or grip relaetd work: I also love to use the ArmAid (dubbed the ‘ArmGasm’) as it’s specifically for the forearms.