I have purchased the foam roller and started using.  It hurts, but it

is "good" pain.  For those who have used it successfully, how many

times a day and for how long do you "roll"?

See the "guide to the foam roller" at www.smiweb.org and read that carefully.

There are some areas that you should NOT roll, like the back of your neck and

the backs of your knees. I can personallly assure you that rolling your kneck is

a bad idea. :-(

I generally roll once or twice a day. I think rolling slow and steady is better

than rolling fast. If you are really tight, your will have to support part of

your weight using your other leg or roll both legs at once. But as you loosen

up, you can put more weight on until you are putting your full weight on just

one leg.

I don't think I've ever spent more than 10-15 minutes rolling, and this covers

rolling my calves, hamstrings, sides of my legs, quads, butt and back.  Rember

to turn your legs to rotate your legs to different angles so that you cover the

entire muscle, not just the bottom. (For example, when rolling my calves, I will

angle my legs so that I also roll the inner (as much as I can) and outer parts.

With my upper leg I start sitting up with my hamstrings rolling as much of the

inner thigh as I can and then rotate my body slowly until I am on my stomach so

I progressively cover ther rest of the leg (first the side of the leg and then

the quads.)

If you hit a tight tender/painful area, stop with the roller pressing right up

against this spot and hold this for at least 20 seconds. This HURTS (but not

unbearably so), but afterwards, the tight spot should be noticeably looser and

less painful. It's almost magical!

What I've stared doing is to use the roller to loosen up the muscles and also

find tight spots and loosen them up a bit. But then I go over the areas that

seem to be tight with my hands prodding the muscle with my fingers and zeroing

in on the tight spots. Then I put pressure directly on the tight spot for at

least 20 seconds or sometimes use transverse friction.   (see

http://www.drgrisanti.com/friction.htm for exmaple).  A close friend or

signifiant other can really help you with this.

This is more precise than using the roller, althought the roller helps greatly

in over-all loosening up and in locating tight spots. After using the roller,

there are sometimes small tight spots that the roller "missed."

For putting pressure on the tight spot, a massage tool is very helpful.

Something like the Knobber II or the Jacknobber (see

http://www.bindependent.com/hompg/bi/bindep/store/aisles/exercise/balls/massager\

.htm for example but look around for the best prices) I don't use either of

these myself but have something similar to the Jacknobber except it is wooden

and labeled "Pacificare."

The pressure should be enough to where it is painful without being unbearably

painful. Also you need to be careful that what you think is a tight spot in the

muscles is indeed a knotted up muscle and not a tendon or something that is

supposed to feel tight. Be expecially careful close to joints. One thing that is

really helpful to do is to compare the area to the same area on the other leg.

If it is tighter on one leg, it is probably tighter than it should be.

The only downside I've noticed about the foam roller is that the foam eventually

wears out, esp once you are donig better and rolling aggresively with all your

weight on one leg.

I personally prefer the 4 inch roller over the 6 inch roller. The 6 inch roller

is available from lots of places. But the only place that carries the 4 inch

roller is www.smiweb.org that I am aware of. I would guess that the 4 inch

roller wears out a lot faster though.

Anyone know a cheap source of 4 inch foam rollers?  I'm trying to find a place

where I can buy in bulk or maybe get a really long roll and cut it into pieces.

I'm guessing I'd need to get this from a packaging store, etc. not from physical

therapy product retailer. I suspect we are paying $15 for $1 worth of foam...

(Well, heck, even if I'd paid double the price, it would still have been the

single best purchase I made all year!)

    kim_jeffers <jeffers@...> wrote:I have purchased the foam roller and

started using.  It hurts, but it

is "good" pain.  For those who have used it successfully, how many

times a day and for how long do you "roll"?





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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Hi everyone



Bit of a technical question this: I'm thinking of cutting my foam roller in two,

so I can use 1/2 at my house and the other 1/2 at my girlfriends. Just wondering

if anyone has done this and were there any problems ie. it looses its firmness

or it becomes too awkward to roll etc. I don't want to cut it in half and find I

now have to buy two new ones



Hope I haven't kicked off new year with too trivial a question!



Lets hope its a good year for us all



James











[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

I have seen them cut in half at my physical therapy place so I don't

think it will harm them.



--- In chondromalaciacommunity@yahoogroups.com, thousand plateaus

<thousandplateaus@...> wrote:

>

> Hi everyone

>

> Bit of a technical question this: I'm thinking of cutting my foam

roller in two, so I can use 1/2 at my house and the other 1/2 at my

girlfriends. Just wondering if anyone has done this and were there

any problems ie. it looses its firmness or it becomes too awkward to

roll etc. I don't want to cut it in half and find I now have to buy

two new ones

>

> Hope I haven't kicked off new year with too trivial a question!

>

> Lets hope its a good year for us all

>

> James

>

>

>

>

>

> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

>