Top 6 Causes for Tight Bodies!

There are many reasons you can experience tightness in a particular muscle or overall in your body.

Nearing 40years of age, I have been training since I was 15, coaching many athletes from almost two decades. I can give you a general know how that why you get tight even after regular physical activity or otherwise.

1) Hormones: - In women as they age nearing 40 estrogens levels start dropping they can become tight and inflexible. On the other hand in men as the testosterone levels peak up in their twenties they can become tight and stiff as collagen fibres tend to dense up with increased testosterone levels.

2) Dehydration: - It’s not about grabbing a glass of water just now. Chronic dehydration surely is a huge cause for stiffness in any age group and gender. Black coffee, alcohol, sugary foods and high simple carbs diet worsens the situation.

Having an apple instead of a black coffee and muffin will help you to reduce tightness in hamstrings if you feel like munching while sitting on a desk. Drinking plenty of water throughout the day is advised as it makes muscles supple. Also frequent loo breaks will add up to your daily active minutes.

Most of us fight with early morning stiffness that’s because of less water intake the day before followed by high carb dinner and dessert. Remove simple carbs completely from your dinner plate and a big no to post dinner dessert.

Another reason of morning tightness is that your organs ligaments and joints absorb more water as you sleep. Your fascia and muscles hold enough water at night so body drives that water to the organs that make you feel tight in the morning. It is advised to have a glass of water before you sleep and at least a 500ml as soon as you get up before putting your first step down on the ground. 

3) Inactivity: - Chair sucks your fluidity. Sitting on a desk for more than an hour or while commuting makes you tight, your hip and spine becomes stiff no doubt about that. A simple four word formula works like magic for most of the sedentary population "M.O.V.E". As simple as walking around in office, while talking on phone, standing work tables, standing meet-ups will make a huge difference in your musculoskeletal system and you may feel relief from chronic aches and pains.

Things can get worse with prolong sitting as constant pressure on some areas like more weight on one side while sitting can compress nerves and arteries of that area and you might even feel referral plain in other parts of the body for e.g. sciatica nerve pain. So get up and move as you read this article...

                                                             

4) Lack of proper warm-up and mobilization techniques: - This is for my fitness lovers and fairly active people. With new fitness trends coming up every other day and time crunch for a full one hour workout people try to squeeze it into short bouts of high intensity multiple times in a week. Good for many but there is a problem; ideally there is a transition time between rest to exercise and then back to rest. “Warm-up - Workout - Cool down” This applies even to a 10min exercise session with 5 min warm-up and 5 min cool down exercises. Without these transition periods you are just shocking the body with immediate stress and its leaves muscles, organs and fascia in dilemma state and you might not see any major improvement but keep falling prey to injuries and prolonged stiffness.

Even if you want to stretch your hamstrings in office it is advised to walk for a few minutes before attempting the stretch.

5) Injuries: – A fall, soft tissue injuries or bone fractures all can make a joint or series of joints stiff and tight, so if you are feeling tightness in hip while running when you are 40 it can be your ankle sprain in a football match in class 10th. Idea is to ask few questions before accessing any issues for pains and aches at any point of time in life. Aggressive rehabilitation work is required to fix musculosketal injuries including the past ones as fresh issues will keep coming back till the time we don’t fix the old ones. 

6) Inflammation: - Minor stiffness post a hard workout is ok and gets better in a day or two but chronic inflammations can make you feel tight and sore all the time. Check your diet and lifestyle to counter these issues. Caffeine and nicotine can make things worse on the other hand having a cup of warm turmeric milk can ease out the situation and then you can work upon mobility and flexibility exercises to release stiffness.

The EYE OPENER!

Due to my early morning commitments, I use to sleep for about two hours after my lunch. Even with a very light dinner comprising vegetables chicken breast and soup I was unable to figure out what’s going wrong with my left shoulder as it was getting tighter and I was unable to lift weights as I used to do few months back. Reduced range of motion and clicking sound was bothering me in every workout. Trigger point releases during warm-up enabled me to complete my workout but next morning it used to go back to same position. It became a long non breaking cycle. Then one day I was just so tired I skipped my lunch and just fell asleep after my classes in first half of the day. I got up around 4:00pm and my shoulder was not bothering me. I had my pre workout meal and headed to gym. I was surprised with the range of motion and flexibility in the shoulder. Since then I started replacing my lunch with fruit yogurt protein smoothie and a handful of almonds giving a time gap of 30-60mins before my afternoon nap. I started improving on my shoulder stiffness and had a pain free push up after a long time. Looked up for articles, researches and journals but could not find any.

What I concluded if your insulin levels are still high and blood still has higher sugar levels and you lie down high sugar blood gets trapped in muscles as skeletal load restricts blood flow on the side you sleep (I sleep on my left) you tend to get up tight on the same side more often.

Disclaimer :- This article is not intend to prevent/ cure / treat any severe medical conditions, please refer to your dietician for diet modifications and your doctor / exercise specialist for any modification in your training program or before starting one.

Lazy Indian

LAZY INDIAN

Just a Health Club Membership will not you make you Fit! 

Researches have shown even people who exercise regularly for an hour a day but are sedentary throughout the day have similar health concerns like potentially sedentary population because calories spent in an hour of exercise is a very small portion of daily caloric expenditure. 

To over come this one needs to be more active throughout the day and find ways how one can assimilate active minutes while at work or at home. 

few suggestions would be

a ) Taking a quick flight of stairs 

b ) Walking to small distances ( banks and grocery etc ) 

c ) Pet walking 

d ) Parking your car away from shopping place 

e ) Using public transport etc. 

f ) Standing 

In addition to above active minutes one can definitely take out as less as five minutes to do a small workout circuit in the morning / before lunch / before dinner 

for example ;

 1 min each 

( Jump on the spot

Squat Hold ( Isometric Squat ) 

Jumping jacks 

Step up and down on stair 

Stair push-ups ) repeat 2 - 3 times if you have more time. 

Small bout of high intensity exercises is far more beneficial than a lazy 30mins walk. 

Studies also show that exercise benefit school children exponentially.

Human body needs outdoors! 

Children need to play, jump, climb, run all outdoors. In their growing years they are powerhouse of energy if well utilised will transform into genius individuals. Sitting in front of TV and playing with phones is the worst practice which parents do just to keep kids busy while they do what they want to do.. 

Yes it's parents who need to be taught that they are suppose to spend time with their kids it's not the phone. 

Not only kids even adults who exercise have better ideas and their brain starts working better after a 30min workout.

Exercise increases blood flow in the entire body including organs and THE BRAIN! 

More blood means more cellular activity as simple as that! 

I don't remember any day in school when we haven't played a sport before 1st period. 

Human Movement is a huge subject and we can perform endless movements with this body. Body weight exercises and various functional equipment provide variety of them to make people overcome boredom which is one of the major cause of dropouts from any exercise plan. 

Siting on a stationary strength machine or exercise bike can be boring and non productive for many as we need to move with our bodies in different directions at different speeds for life...

Do Challenge yourself with these Functional Moves.

a) Muscle up- ( Beginners Pull-ups and Bar dips ) 

Equipment :- Hanging Bar 

How To do it :- It's a combination of a chin-up and press down. You pull your body up chest touching the bar then press the bar down taking your upper body above the bar. 

Areas They Help :- Great exercise for building upper body and core strength useful in many sports and physical conditioning. 

Do it for repetitions and sets. 

b) Beast Walk- ( beginners practice crawling with knees on floor ) 

Equipment :- Body Weight 

How to do it :- Start in a box position on the ground Hands right under your shoulders and knees under your hips, Tuck your toes and lift your knees just a bit off the ground ( this is very challenging for many ) Next step would be walking forward with lifting one hand and opposite toe at a time. small steps and staying close to the ground is crucial to fire right muscles and achieve optimal results. 

Do it for repetitions and sets. 

Areas they Help :- Core Conditioning

Spine Rehabilitaion 

Body Awareness and Fat Burning 

c) Tyre Flipping- ( beginners light tyres )

 

Equipment :- Big Tyres

How To do it :- It's a variation of old school DEADLIFT exercises combined with an explosive movement of throwing.

Sit close to the tyre bending your ankle, knees and hip while maintaining a strong neutral spine. Placing your hands under the tyre and using your entire body strength to flip it over. 

Do it for repetitions and sets. 

Areas they Help :- 

Power, Strength and endurance building

 Retraining Proper Bio mechanics for rehab

Practice Multiple Flips for Fat Burning 

d) Kettle Bell Swings- ( beginners hip thrust with elastic resistance and waiters bow exercise ) 

Equipment :- Kettle Bell ( starting weight for girls 6-8k and boys 12-16k ) 

How to do it :- Grab a kettle bell with both hands ( it should be heavy enough to swing too light will not work as it should be) 

Stand with your feet shoulder width apart and knees slightly bent. Keeping your arms straight sticking to your pelvis start the movement with just bending and extending your hips to initiate pendulum action on the kettlebell gradually increase the hip thrust to swing it higher till shoulder level.

Do it for time or reps. 

Areas they help :- 

Hip and low back strengthening 

Strength Endurance 

Fat Burning 

e) Battling Rope Waves-

Equipment :- Thick Ropes 

How to do it :- loop the rope to a fixed anchor point ( tree or pole ) stand far off to the length of the rope ( no need to pull ) keeping it on the floor hold one end in each hand slightly bend your ankle, knee and hip in an atheletic ready position keeping your head up, moving your arms up and down alternatively start making waves with the rope from your arm till the anchor point.

do it for time 30sec to 90 sec rest and repeat. 

So get out and get moving because you are born to move!