The office gym
Chairs pose a double threat to runners. Sit ting down for too long makes muscles lazy and weak, says personal trainer and sports therapist Matt Holmes ( mattholmesft. com). ‘ The saying, “If you don’t use it, you lose it” is very true,’ he says. ‘ Excessive sitting can unbalance the body, often at the spine and hips, with anterior tilts, posterior tilts and pelvic torsions examples of likely problems. Those issues limit range of motion and change the way we move, ultimately resulting in injury – though it ’ s common for the injury to be in a different area than the dysfunction.’
Holmes recommends we get up from our desks every one to two hours. ‘ If you can squeeze in a 10-minute walk, great. If you can use the stairs, even better. If you work at home, sit on a Swiss ball to improve core strength, or slot in a few minutes on a foam roller.’
And there’s plenty more we can do during the average working day to become better runners. While waiting for the kettle to boil or cleaning your teeth, calf raises are subt le and versatile strength exercises – great for the kerb at the bus stop, too. Or simply stand on one leg, which I try to do whenever I’m in a queue. Try to hold the position for 60 seconds, then swap feet. If it gets easy, close your eyes. This develops key balancing skills.
When you’re back at that evil desk, Holmes recommends trying the onelegged sit- to- stand (single-leg squat with a seat). ‘ Control the movement down for four seconds, then up for one second,’ says Holmes. ‘ Keep your knee tracking in line with your standing foot and repeat 15 times. This is a great way to get those lazy glutes working.’
‘ Resistance-band leg extensions are good to get the quads working,’ says Holmes. ‘ Wrap a band around your ankle, attach it to your chair and straighten the leg so the ankle, knee and hip are all aligned. Do 15 reps. And if you’ve got any foot tightness, you could also roll a tennis or golf ball underfoot as you work.’
If you don’t feel comfortable doing these moves when you are surrounded by your work colleagues, a subtler exercise to get glutes and quads working is an isometric hold. Sitting upright, squeeze your bum and drive your heel into the ground. Hold for 10 seconds and repeat six times (one leg at a time). Or simply hold in your stomach muscles for 30 seconds, breathing normally, to improve your core strength.
Talking of breathing, Benzie a lso encourages breathing practice. ‘Just like our dynamic posture, our dynamic breathing will always be an extension of our everyday breathing,’ he says. ‘ During the day we tend to breathe shallow, from the chest, We can get away with this, as our exertion is low, but lungs are like muscles – they work in the way we train them. So lots of belly or yoga breathing – slow, deep breaths through the nose – during the day will prepare the lungs for action.’