The endangered glutes!

Why are they not firing and what to do about it.

There’s a fairly obvious giveaway about the importance of our gluteal muscles; they are rather big! Having a big, powerful set of muscles such as the glutes should indicate to us that, through our evolution, the body has developed a demand for strength and power in that area.

Human anatomy has evolved to cope as efficiently as possible with the forces exerted upon it. Perhaps the most important force of all is gravity. Every time you take a stride, or step off from a curb, or land from a jump, there is a demand for the body to control this movement. Without our muscular system engaging to catch us, we would collapse like a bag of bones under the force of gravity.

The most powerful hinge in the body, which has evolved to adsorb these forces, is the hip. It makes sense, therefore, that the hip would need a big set of muscles surrounding it in order to absorb these forces and exert the control that is required – hence the big glutes!

Having developed a powerful set of muscles such as the glutes, it would be efficient for the body to regularly recruit their power when performing tasks. If I want to perform a movement efficiently, such as bending down to empty the dishwasher, I would like the powerful parts of my body to control this movement – rather than the smaller and more vulnerable muscles.

If we don’t use the large muscle groups appropriately, then smaller muscles may be asked to do more work and may end up failing.

The importance of the glutes is widely recognised and often discussed in gyms and clinics all over the world. You may have even been told that “your glutes aren’t firing” and may be currently trying to rectify this! Unfortunately, however, the glutes are often blamed (and trained) in isolation.

A lack of understanding of how the glutes work, leads to a very limited approach to gluteal training. The important question to ask is; why are the glutes not firing? Only by answering this will you be able to improve your gluteal activation and strength.

So, why do so many of us under use our glutes and how do you actually get them to work harder for you?

Evolution lesson #1 – use it or lose it!

I always feel that any announcement to a patient that “your glutes aren’t firing” should be delivered with a caveat. The caveat being that, for most of us, this is simply a bi-product of our modern lifestyles, it is not an unfortunate affliction that you just happen to be unlucky enough to have developed. Don’t worry; we’re all in the same boat. It’s not your fault!

A quick look at the animal kingdom can help to explain this point. Often we identify animals by their anatomical features, without necessarily knowing that we do so. If I asked you to look at the images below of the Capuchin Monkey and the Springbok and tell me where their “big bits” are, then I’m hoping you would say the Capuchin’s tail and the Springbok’s hind legs.

Even without knowing the habits of these animals, you would probably be able to make a fairly good guess as to what they were good at. The monkey has a powerful tail for climbing and swinging from trees, the Springbok has big hind legs for jumping.

Their anatomy has evolved to be fine-tuned for their lifestyles, habitats and activities and their continued success as a species is dependent upon them using these powerful areas to gain advantages in the wild. These animals take maximum advantage of their powerful areas!

This is where the problems for humans arise. We are far more sedentary now than at any time during our evolution. For many of us, the continued demands required to maintain the strength and power of our big muscle groups has significantly reduced. Our anatomy has been fine tuned to cope with regular, unpredictable, multi-directional movement such as jumping, landing, walking on uneven ground, running, sprinting, changing direction. By sitting, moving less and existing in very flat, unchallenging habitats we are no longer putting these demands on our bodies.

The gluteal muscles fire when they are placed under load through movement combined with the forces of body weight and gravity. They respond to three dimensional movement, so not just up and down, but side to side and rotational movements. We, not only, have a habit of being too sedentary but also training and exercising in a very one dimensional fashion. This leaves our glutes fairly underwhelmed.

So, how do we actually get the glutes to fire?

Although there is no literal need to throw out the trappings of modern life and return to an animalistic state in order to rescue our glutes, there may be a figurative one.

The best way to get the muscular system to activate, and to make any long term changes to the firing of muscles, is to make them do authentic movements. It is crucial for us to really understand what the gluteal muscles have evolved to do.

The glutes are designed to slow down and control our hip movements, both from the ground up and the top down.

Every time our foot hits the ground, the forces from above and below place a huge demand on our hips and the large glutes are there to cope with this significant work load. As the hips absorb movements such as landing or squatting (combined with gravity), the glutes fire in order to control this movement and convert these forces into elastic and kinetic energy. This energy is then utilised to fire us off into the next part of the movement, whether it be the next step or a jump from our squat.

If we want to train the glutes, then we need to create authentic movements at the hip. Only then will the nervous system recognise the movement and create the appropriate activation.

Glute bridges don’t cut it.

If you have been told that you have lazy glutes then you may currently be doing regular glute bridges to switch the blasted things back on again. This is where you lay on your back with your knees bent and lift your pelvis towards the ceiling.

Although this will indeed shorten the glute muscles and may cause them to fatigue – it is by no means an authentic movement. A glute bridge is not something that you are really required to do in daily life.

Putting one foot out in front of you, while reaching forward to pick something up is an action you are required to do frequently. Landing on one foot, while rotating your upper body, is a movement that you do every time you walk. By exercising and challenging the hips in these authentic positions, we begin to re-educate the glutes as to their true purpose. Our nervous systems are very plastic; they have the potential to adapt quickly. If we actually encourage the body to move in the way that it is designed to, our nervous systems will soon catch on to what we are asking of the body and begin to adapt and create the appropriate firing of muscles. If we continue to train in a non-authentic way, our nervous systems will remain confused and will seek ways of compensating – often leading to dysfunction.

Blog post by James Dodd

The Glutes, the butt, the big one and lower back pain

Your Glutes!

A bit of contention, but we all have big butts for a reason.  Or compared to your biceps, shoulders or calves anyway!  This is because the Glutes need to be able to do so much.  They control the ‘top down’ movement of your head and trunk etc and also of the ‘bottom up’ part of you ….meaning of your legs and the reaction of you contacting with the ground.

Glutes NEED to be able to control movement and be strong.  So many of us extensively sit and this does nothing to help with strengthening your butts.  This even deconditions your glutes.  Then some of us go to the gym or exercise and only train this fantastic muscle in one plane.  To really get your glutes working well (‘switching on’ or firing) you really need to to a combination of multi-plane exercises.  The exercise that you do must not all be in one direction.  This should involve some side-to-side and some rotational loading.

Many people garden at this time of year and this involves a lot of bending down.  Great glutes will really assist with this.  Yet we do very little to help with our bending.

If I went to lift a heavy weight with my arm, many may say ‘that’s too heavy, you have not done that before.  You need to regularly exercise those muscles in your arms to be able to do that.  Your gluts are the same.  To enable you to bend well, your glutes need to be able help with the job of bending.  If a crane was only rated to lift 1000kgs – you would never load up that crane with 1500kgs because you would be worried it will fail.  And it probably would fail!

When we bend many muscles, our glutes included, have to be able to cope with the weight of our head, shoulders and trunk and then be able to sustain that bend for as long as we are bending.  If your butt or glutes are not strong enough, one of the parts that often fails is our lower backs.  And lower back pain is massively prevalent in today’s society.  There is way too much of it.

Dr Rangan Chatterjee recently did a post about back pain.  One of the things he mentions in his post was the butt and how it really helps our backs.  It is massively important!

The last think I wanted to say was that along with training your glutes in a multi directional way, you must train them in an ‘integrated’ way rather than in a ‘isolated’ way.  It is not just about that buzz word – ‘the core’.  All our muscles work as a team and no one muscle ever works by itself when we move.  Your glutes NEVER work by themselves and so you must train them in an integrated way.  For example, when you bend, your calves and hamstrings switch on along with your glutes and the muscles in your lower back.

Thinking about this when you train can make exercise much more fun, but also more challenging.

If you are worried about a problem or want some advice, come in and see one of our osteopaths at Back to Back.  Call 020 8605 2323.

Blog post by James Dodd

Knee pain and running

Very recently, there was an interesting article in The Guardian on ‘runners knee’ and knee pain.  The link is here.  The article contains some great information.  But we feel where is does fall short is not mentioning how critical it is for the landing hip to work (not just your gluts) and how essential it is for the foot to be able to sustain the mass of your landing.   With knee pain, sometimes the last place you need to look at is the knee.  So many other factors can affect the knee.

Knee pain is certainly not just about ‘pronation’ or the ‘rolling in’ of your foot.  If you have a high arched foot your knee takes more hit as you are unable to react to the ground well.  Sometimes people need to pronate more!  Gary Gray from the Gray Institute coined the phrase ‘Everything changes when your foot hits the floor’ and he is so correct!  You also need to assess what happens to the ‘back leg or trailing hip.  If your left hip does not extend fully – the knee of your right leg will have to work harder.

I think it is critical to appreciate that everything is connected in our bodies.  How one area not working may or may not increase the load onto another and make the body compensate.    Then knee is stuck between your hip and your foot.  It is more likely that one of these is not working well and the knee pain is only the symptom.

Then the rehabilitation must then target the areas that are not working, rather than just the symptomatic areas.

If you are concerned about your running or indeed are suffering, make an appointment to come and see one of our great osteopaths.

Blog post by James Dodd