Recovery and Body Maintenance Adjuncts
FOAM ROLLER
Cam states that the foam roller “is great to keep muscles supple and reduce tension, but the key is to not bruise yourself up. Apply some force but be gradual”. In addition to lower limb foam rolling, a great option is increase thoracic spine mobility by rolling across your back, important for us hunchbacked cyclists but anyone who sits at a desk or drives for long period of time.
SPIKEY BALL
The spikey ball is your best friend and worst enemy: it’s a fine line between pleasure and pain, as they say, but embracing the discomfort of trigger pointing can do wonders for keeping your body injury free and ready to go.
Trigger point your glutes, TFL and any trapezius areas that get sore ONCE a week, follow this with any muscle recruitment exercises, then any strength training you do.
SLEEP
With all the fancy tech and workout equipment out there it can be easy to forget the basics. Sleep is key to performance as it’s the time when your body repairs and adapts to the training to make you harder, better, faster, stronger (tm Daft Punk). In the wise words of Cam “it’s better to be 100% recovered and 80% fit than 100% fit and not recovered at all”.
RESISTANCE BANDS
Resistance bands are great for stability and rehabilitation exercises and can be used in conjunction with other tools (ie: fit ball) to increase the resistance of bodyweight exercises such as wall squats. Cam states ‘looped bands are great to add resistance around your knees for glutei exercises like supine glut medius bridges (see image) and longer bands can be used for exercises like rows, adding resistance to squats and rotator cuff exercises’