This technique involves applying gentle, sustained pressure to specific points on the body to release tension and tightness within the fascia. By targeting areas of restriction, myofascial release aims to restore elasticity and flexibility to the fascia, facilitating better movement and reducing discomfort.

The benefits of myofascial release are manifold. It aids in breaking down scar tissue, enhancing blood flow, and promoting relaxation of the muscles. Many individuals seek this therapy for relief from chronic pain conditions, such as fibromyalgia or lower back pain, finding significant improvements in their symptoms and overall quality of life.

Moreover, myofascial release isn’t confined to physical benefits alone; it can also have a positive impact on one’s mental and emotional state. The release of tension within the fascia can induce a sense of relaxation and well-being, reducing stress and anxiety levels.

In conclusion, myofascial release stands as a valuable therapeutic approach, addressing both physical discomfort and promoting holistic wellness. Its gentle yet effective methodology makes it a promising avenue for those seeking relief from various musculoskeletal issues while enhancing their overall health.

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You may ask, “what does winning like Carlos Alcaraz and Tennis Elbow have in common?”.. Sit back and I will explain! As many times as he pumps his fist during a tournament, he is bound to at some point injure that elbow.

All kidding aside, and the fact I think he pumps his fist too much during a match, what can I do to guard against Tennis Elbow? The diagnosis you will receive from a doctor would be lateral epicondylitis. The over-use of the elbow without sufficient strength is the culprit. Over-use happens when you do too much of one thing without the proper strengthening needed to do the action consistently. Too much tennis, too many days a week, week arms. The pain comes and goes at first, we have all felt it. That’s the point to do something about it. Most folks wait until the elbow hurts so bad that it keeps them awake at night. At that point it takes many more sessions and much more time to clear the problem. So, what can I do to help guard against tennis elbow.

1. After playing, ice if needed. Stretch properly.

2. Limit time playing until a proper strengthening program has been devised.

3. Pay attention to your racket, which could be causing some of the issues

   1. Weight – Don’t use rackets less than 11 oz.

   2. Balance – Don’t use racket that are Head heavy

   3. Stiffness – String your strings properly. Your coach will have a better idea what weight to string your racket

   4. Length – Keep your racket length under 27.5 inches

4. Finally: Do not pump your fist at every point of every game of every set of every match.

A couple of fist pumps a match is sufficient, unless of course you are Carlos Alcaraz!

ADVERTISEMENT: If the pain persists then let Advanced Muscle Therapy have a look at it. We have the tools and knowledge to get you back on the court. Active Release Techniques – a state of the art soft tissue therapy program, Piezo Wave – Our Shock wave machine that blast scar tissue to smithereens, and FaStR – myofascial release with effective stretching to help maintain flexibility and strength however much you want to play.

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We are going to find out the best course of action between all healthcare providers when presented with the idea that we have some sort of muscle or joint pain, let’s say we have low back pain.  

Let’s see, let’s ask your primary care doctor what’s in their bag.  The answer, is…are you ready for this, a script pad.  Yep, about all we get from this line of defense is a script for further tests, more meds or maybe even physical therapy.  Will any of this help.  Let’s dive deeper.  More test, for what reason?  To make your wallet lighter.  How about medications.  Sure these may hide the pain but the problem still exists and the meds usually make you sleepy.  Physical therapy, good referral, however, the PT profession is overworked now and is it really necessary to send someone with tennis elbow, or running injuries or even low back pain.  Don’t get me wrong, someone has to be able to direct the flow of health care and who better than the doctor with many years of education and of course, a script pad.

1. Let’s say you get a script for more tests.  It’s your low back.  80% of the adult population will at some point experience low back pain.  What test, initially, will tell you exactly what’s wrong.  All tests will be inconclusive at this time.

How about medications?  These may work in reducing the level of pain; however, they will not repair or make movement any easier.  Typically, you will get anti-inflammatories and/or muscle relaxers. Short term results along with drowsiness.

You get a script for orthopedic or physical therapy to help decide why your back hurts.  Well, not a totally bad suggestion, but you have to ask yourself, self, do I really need to go to an orthopedist for my back?  The only thing he has in his tool box is maybe a scalpel.  Let’s look at the physical therapist, they are the busiest of all healthcare providers.  Do we really need to tie up their time with low back issues that may clear up in several days?

So, who do we go see?  It has to be someone who has a bag of stuff.  A bag full of things that have been used successfully time and time again.  A chiropractor.  No.  They just crack your bones and hope the muscles listen.  But you are told your vertebrae is out of alignment.  What took it out of alignment, if it can truly be out of alignment?  The muscles.  Great answer.  So why see a chiro for a muscle issue.  You don’t!  You go see the guy who has the big bag.

When I got started in muscle therapy, I realized early on, that one modality does not make me successful, and in order for me to be successful I have to have answers to your pain.  So, I set out to discover all the things that assist me every day in all musculoskeletal pain and dysfunction.  I hope you understand what I am trying to say here today, that, educating yourself of all healthcare types and professions will help you make a better decision when you need it.  I will finish with the things we do at AMT.  You will be glad you called us to help with muscle and joint pain.  I told you I have a “Big Bag”.

Get to know more about our team!

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Surgery in two days, the countdown begins…

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It wasn’t our governments fault they followed an unethical scientist named Ansel Keyes. A scientist that would deliberately remove data from others research to make his outcomes what he wanted. Our congress believed him and thought they were protecting the American people from metabolic diseases, at least I think they believed him and there wasn’t any conspiracy.

Let’s move on. Now we have the “MyPlate”. A project released my Michelle Obama in 2011. It has equal parts fruit and protein, a little bit more grains and then a large helping of vegetables, with a smidgen of dairy. Fats by themselves are not even near the table.

What did I mean by here we go again? Well for beginners the MyPlate isn’t much different than the Food Pyramid, well one is round and the other a triangle, I see that. I feel what we need is a paradigm shift in how we think about food. With both government recommendations we as Americans have continued to watch the scale numbers rise and rise until we now are the most overweight country in the world. What is a person to do?

First let’s look at all the research we have, not just the ones that have been mainstream for 60 years, but all research. A large amount of new data coming in today states, we have made a very big mistake by cutting out fats from our diets. It’s not as simple as “you are what you eat”. Eating fat does not make you fat, just like eating vegetables and fruit only makes you healthy. Research that I have read says the more fat you eat while reducing complex carbohydrates reduces your chance for heart disease and other metabolic type diseases. Well, that statement definitely is against everything we have been taught.

Following a diet like Adkins, or South Beach, or Paleo may put us in a much better position to live longer and healthier than we first thought. These diets promote more fat consumption with controlled carbohydrate consumption. The metabolic processes of blood pressure, cholesterol, heart disease seem to improve with added fats and carbohydrate control. We are now finding sports dieticians pushing their athletes into a low carb training regimens and the athletes are doing much better without the bloating and discomfort that carb loading does to the human body.

I feel we still may be trying to figure this thing out and what is the best way to provide the necessary nutrients to the body without giving it too much of what it doesn’t need. A couple of quotes come to mind, “Nutrition, it can be the safest and most powerful form of medicine, or, the slowest form of poison”. The second is “everything in moderation” which may serve to do us all well until we figure it out.

Questions about how Advanced Muscle Therapy can help? Visit our FAQ page!

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I have trained lots of people over the last 38 years, this includes men, women, kids, ages 10-25, and seniors over 90. Fitness can mean being able to go up stairs without using the railing to finally being able to do a body weight pull-up. Both of these feats for some people can take months to accomplish, yet both feel just as awesome when the goal has been met.

It’s important to know what fitness means to you. You don’t have to be training for a triathlon, a marathon, or be a body builder to feel fit or have fitness goals.

Over the years I have had different fitness expectations of myself. One of my first goals in college was to not gain my “freshman 15.” I thought, “There is no way I will walk to class everyday up this huge hill to my dorm and still gain weight.” WRONG! I gained fifteen pounds and more. Poor eating and sleeping habits, drinking, and partying took me over the top! One of my next goals down the line was to train for the Gate River Run 15k road race. The goal was just to finish. Once I completed the training and the race, I realized running wasn’t for me. So, I moved on to other types of fitness and now I am hooked on tennis.

You can have so many different types of fitness goals.

I am a personal trainer. I should be “skinny” and muscular. Not everyone fits into the same mold. Not everyone is blessed with great genetics. Not everyone wants to eat perfectly clean all the time and not drink any alcohol to have the “perfect” or “ideal” body. What matters is that you take the best possible care of your body that you can. You only have one body for the rest of your life.

Do you feel great? Are you able to do most of the activities that you want to do in life? Do something physical everyday. Look in the mirror naked and if you aren’t quite sure if you like what you see, do something everyday to better your body or change the way you feel about yourself in a more positive light. Be good to yourself. Be what fitness means to you.

Get more fitness tips by checking out our blog!

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Now is a great time to begin a new fitness conditioning program, seeing as how it is the first of the year and you have made it an unkept resolution for the past twenty or thirty years! This time it needs to happen. Your body is telling you it needs fitness or it will continue to bug you with little nagging injuries until finally you will be in the doctor’s office more than you will be out to dinner. You may have already begun hearing talk of dire ailments that may lurk in your future. Have you noticed each time you and your friends get together the conversation always turns to an illness or injury that someone has experienced lately? Your medicine cabinet is starting to fill up with of all things, medicine? Medicine for all the muscular aches and pains you have been experiencing.

A little understanding about this body you live in is what you need. The human body is made for movement, although we do move, we do not move enough and we move in faulty movement patterns. It is these faulty movement patterns that begin our demise. As Shirley Sahrmann, PT says, “our body follows the laws of physics in that it takes the path of less resistance in movement.” Just simple activities of daily living, like sitting, standing, walking can contribute to our aches and pains, but it is the path of less resistance that gives us a problem. When sitting we slouch, when standing we fidget from side to side, and when we walk, well, everything hurts so we change our walking gait so much it develops other pain syndromes.

It is the poor movement patterns and lack of conditioning that contribute to America’s health care crisis, but that is a story for another day. Today we talking about your resolve to get fit and how not to get injured.

“Repetitive Strain” – you have heard this phrase used with respect to every facet of our lives, from the news, the office, infomercials, late night TV shows. What is it? It is also called “Cumulative Trauma Disorder” (CTD), a major problem in the workforce and in everyday life. CTD refers to injuries to muscles, tendons, bones, blood, vessels, and/or nerves. Your low back did not just get injured spontaneously or your rotator cuff suddenly become painful when raising your arm; odds are it all began years ago with poor posture and faulty movement patterns. With each day bringing new aches and pains, where will you be next year at this time?
Fitness training can provide an answer to that question! Why fitness training? Because training new movement patterns will induce the appropriate muscular and biomechanical adaptations that will reinforce the development of optimal neuromuscular action. However, not just any movement pattern training will do this. The training should be done under professional supervision, using principles that are biomechanically and functionally sound. Just going through the motions by yourself in the gym may not be your best solution. Many a poor movement pattern is created or reinforced in the gym and at this late stage of the game you cannot afford to make any mistakes!

What you may need is a Medical Exercise Specialist (MES) or Corrective Exercise Specialist (CES) who will instruct you in the more biomechanically and functionally correct movement patterns that will not only remove the pain and stiffness you are experiencing every day but also improve your strength, mental clarity, and your total well being. These results are all possible with exercise, but not just any exercise. Functionally correct exercise! So, go ahead and make that New Year’s Resolution and find the Personal Trainer with certifications as a MES or CES who will enable you to get your life back. What can it hurt? You may actually enjoy keeping this resolution!

Larry Ogilvie

Start your new year off right with Advanced Muscle Therapy. Contact us here!

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I am thankful for my family, as most of you are thankful for yours. My immediate family consists of my father, who is 90 years old and still as strong as the day he straightened out his jeep bumper by hand when I ran into a tree learning how to drive a stick shift at 12 years old. Then my sisters, different in every way except their love for our family, but that’s ok. We are all different in so many ways. My daughters, and I will include my wife’s daughters in this, are so special when it comes to the empathy and compassion they show to each other, and to all that cross their path. Now the husbands — I must say how thankful I am of them, because without them in my life I would have more people in my house than I need. No joke, these four guys could not have been hand-picked any better for our daughters. Now the little people — grandchildren! The most awesome thing in all God’s creation, grandchildren. These are the typical things to be thankful for. Now for more of the list.

In my muscle therapy practice, I get a chance to see a lot of people who are struggling with pain from sore muscles, painful joints, and such. I am so thankful for our therapists who help them through these issues. I get a chance to see our Parkinson’s clients and witness the positive impact our Rocksteady program has on them not only with their fitness and balance issues but their mental wellbeing as well. I get a chance to see these changes in people’s lives every day. That is what I am so thankful for. “Attitude is a little thing that makes a big difference” is one of my favorite quotes from Winston Churchill. So today, be thankful for all you have and all you will have. After all, it is about attitude. Change your attitude, and you change your tomorrow!

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