Jared Fleming shares the exercises he used to help him recover from back injury (“two Lumbar disc bulges and severe back spasms”).
Most of them follow the common theme of actively stretching (rounding over) and contracting (arching back up) the spinal erectors.
His Template:
- Dead Walks
- Split Good Morning
- Seated Good Morning
- Standing Good Morning Curling the back
- Glute Ham Raises
- Back Extensions
- Banded Walks (45° steps and side to side)
- One Legged Romanian Deadlifts (RDL)
Update: Here is his stretch video
I have to strongly disagree with the idea of moving the spine through flexion-extension under load, especially for a lower back injury, and even more for a disc problem.
Taking the spine through flexion-extension cycles creates disc bulges/protrusions and every literature points to the direction that under load, the lower spine should not be bend. Most famous is surely Dr. Stuart McGill with his excellent book “low back disorders” explaining these things with a scientific background.
A lot of weightlifters do these exercises – but are spines of weightlifters healthy??
I would not rely on such advice only because it works for him for a certain amount of time in a certain setting.
(Preface, I’m licensed physical therapist, strength coach, and compete as a 77kg in olympic lifting)
I’m not going to disagree with you, but I would adopt a more moderate stance.
1) Intelligent rehabilitation from injury is not, never has been, and never will be cookie cutter and it would be ill-advised for anyone with back pain to adopt another’s rehabilitation regimen. Regardless if they have the same “injury” (i.e. bulging discs).
2) The spine can (and should) flex and extend, in a controlled manner, without pain. Research, clinical experience, and good sense tells us that flexion and extension should not be “loaded” repetitively. However, a national level 94kg weightlifter has an entirely different definition of “loaded” than most humans (20kg bar for him = gravity for us)
3) McGill is the back pain godfather and his writings should be considered among the best on the subject…
4) …However, the idea of discogenic back pain is becoming more and more discredited with every study comparing “healthy” and “low back pain” patients. Disc bulges tend not to matter in young populations without neurlogical deficits.
5) Sitting as much as Americans do (“unloaded” spinal flexion by most definitions) for 30-40 hours a week is immeasurably worse for back health than anything Jared did in this video.
Rant over…
No rant – good comment. I think my stance is moderate 😉
1) Totally agree with you – but thats why I caution to replicate what jared is showing – it is as best successful for him. Most of the people looking for rehab stuff don’t know how to evaluate this material, especially when a top level athlete presents it the will follow and potentially harm themselves.
2) Agreeing partially – I encourage unloaded motion (although not excessive and far less than most of the guys – for what?). But even a lot of top level squatters (300kg + ) don’t do loaded stuff. How much load is ok ? Even for a strong individual I think to increase the capacity of the back is important – but without overloading or aggravating a maybe existing condition. So I see no benefit of the shown exercise over exercises without movement in this segment. There is simply no data showing any advantage of loaded flexion/ext, but some data showing effect of stabilization exercises.
But this is of course a bigger discussion of “out of position” training etc. – a topic with little evidence and a lot of philosophy. I follow the moderate stance to avoid what could be harmful and rather stay safe.
3) Thats why I mention him – he would not favor this approach i think.
4) Agreed – but aside from all the pain updates and nonexistent correlation of radiographic measures and pain in some spine patients – the topic is more complex than saying “the tend not to matter”. You especially should know the drawbacks of some studies and this very general stance that is often not applicable in my opinion. Only because of limited correlation in a general population with unknown acitvities it is not good to advise exercises known to create shear stress patterns and possible degeneration.
5) Correct – in believe that you dont increase loads and are prepared to these exercises. As you rely on research – sitting in good or bad posture also showed poor correaltion to back health. (Loungers are supposedly less painful).
All in all – I just think that the shown exercise imply a weight progression and advocate a loaded movement that can cause problems in more cases than other exercises while offering no proven additional benefit. Seems like a bad benefit/cost ratio to me, and it will be worse in individuals that dont have a very experienced background. They might, like i said, help jared – but even this is not sure, especially in the long term.
Tom Hirtz?
No, sorry. Unknown Tom…