11 Feb Warmup for Lower Back Pain – Best Warmup to Avoid Lower Back Pain
Warmup for Lower Back Pain
The best warmup for lower back pain! I get a lot of questions about how to deal with lower back pain. I am NOT a doctor, so take your doctor’s advice over mine because I don’t know your specific situation, BUT I want to share my story. I personally had ongoing lower back pain that was getting in the way of everything I wanted to do. Mine was caused from arthritis in my lower back and some disc issues. I always thought that those were the reasons my back was hurting.
What I came to learn, however, is that it isn’t just the injury or arthritis causing the pain, but it’s all of the muscle imbalances of underdeveloped muscles around it! If you’ve heard of having a strong core to help with lower back pain, this is what I’m talking about. If you can strengthen all of the muscles in your core and get your body working functionally, you’re going to feel less pain.
Women tend to have an anterior pelvic tilt (a c-curve in our lower backs) aka a pooch look to your stomach when not overweight, or the appearance that you are sticking your butt out. Doing this overstretches our hamstrings — and that is NOT a good thing (think of a rubber band being pulled until it snaps!) What we want to do instead is work to stop using our quads as much and further develop our hamstrings.
There are three warmup moves I have to do before any workout, and if I don’t, I start to feel my lower back pain again:
Warmup for Lower Back Pain #1: Foam Rolling
Use the foam roller to roll out your quads. It’s the only body part I recommend rolling before your workout when you’re dealing with lower back pain. Rolling is like stretching, and when you stretch a muscle, you’re essentially turning it “off”. This allows our efforts to be concentrated on other body parts like our glutes and hamstrings.
Warmup for Lower Back Pain #2: Dynamic Hip Flexor Stretch
Instead of doing a static (still) stretch, I move during this one (dynamic). I like to do little pulses on each side. Do one side and then switch.
Warmup for Lower Back Pain #3: Glute Bridges
These will activate your glutes. We want to get rid of the hamstring pull and activate your glutes. You can do one leg up at a time or do both legs down.
Be Happy… Be Healthy… Be FIT!
-Natalie Jill
Get STRONGER in a back-friendly way HERE
