Yoga for Roller Derby Resources

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Post-Practice Psoas Relief

If you’re tired of angry hip flexors after practicing or bouting, here’s a combo of moves you can try for some post-practice psoas relief. And of course, since one of your hip flexors is also a low back muscle, these moves can potentially help your low back feel better, too.

Anatomical image of psoas major - art by Stephanie Cost

For those unfamiliar, your hip flexors–which include your mighty psoas, pictured above–are the muscles located at the front of your hip that connect your leg to your pelvis and abdomen. Their job? Any action that brings the front of your thigh closer to your torso: think high knees! It also unsurprisingly that when we sit a lot, they weaken, and when we skate and spend a lot of time squatting, they get grumpy.

Happier Hip Flexor Yoga Flow

Start out lying on your back with the soles of your feet flat on the floor.

Constructive Rest Position

Wiggle your feet away from each other so they’re as wide apart as your mat, and let your knees drop in toward each other (feet apart, knees together). Slowly begin to rock your legs from side to side. Those movements can be as big or as small as makes sense for your hips and low back–in other words, your legs don’t have to come anywhere near the floor.

Psoas Release Step Two

Bring your feet back to hip-width apart (about in line with your sitz bones, the bony parts in your butt). Hug your left knee toward your chest, and slide your right heel toward the front of your mat. Your right leg does not have to straighten fully! You might only slide your heel as far forward as it will go without arching your back away from the floor–which might just be a few inches.

Hold for 5-10 breaths, and repeat with right knee hugged in toward your chest.

001Derbylife002Derbylife

Make your way over onto hands and knees–don’t be shy about cushioning your knees with a blanket or three–and begin to move in cow/cat. As you inhale, lift head and tailbone up and feel your shoulders slide away from your ears (left image). As you exhale, round your spine and curl head and tailbone toward the floor (right image).

Hip flexor magic

From cow/cat, step your right foot forward–you might want to have your hands up on blocks or books–and move into hip flexor magic.

Tuck your back toes, and press back through your left heel to begin lifting your left knee off the floor—but only lift your knee as much as you can without changing the position/height of your pelvis. That’s probably going to be a pretty tiny movement, and that’s a-okay: you’re strengthening and stretching your hip flexors. Do this about 10 times, and then lower your back knee to the floor. Before you switch legs…

004Derbylife

…lower your left knee down to the floor. Place your right hand on your right thigh, and as you inhale, bring your left arm alongside your left ear. As you exhale, lean toward your right with your left arm overhead.

Hold for 5-10 breaths, and then switch sides: bring your left foot forward, and repeat hip flexor magic and this side-stretching lunge (left hand on left thigh, reach right arm overhead) on the opposite side.

Hip Flexor Tree

Return to your back. (It’s easier to see when I’m standing!) While lying on your back, cross your right ankle on top of your left thigh. You might take one end of your skate noose or a belt around your right ankle, and hold the other end of the noose with your left hand. Try to keep your left hip from lifting away from the floor! You could place a book or rolled-up towel underneath your right knee to help support that.

Repeat with your left ankle crossed over your right thigh.

2015-06-08 08.10.46

Last but not least, REST. You might want to place a rolled-up blanket or towel underneath your knees for a little support.

Go on, give your hip flexors a little love and attention!

2015 East Coast Tour!

Two of my favorite things in life are traveling and teaching yoga, which is why I’m beyond thrilled to announce Flat Mat’s 2015 East Coast Tour!

I’m kicking things off with a visit to the awesome Carolina Rollergirls in early September, and shit gets real once I arrive in DC later in the month. I’ve got a few sessions that are open to anyone who wants to join them, as well as some dates that can still be claimed–perhaps by your league?

What’s in it for you and your league?

  • Flat Mat classes are developed specifically for roller derby. I retired from Gotham, and I still skate today with a rec league and at rinks. I understand what derby is doing to your body more than your average yoga teacher, and I plan my classes with that in mind.
  • You get to choose the focus of the class. I’ll book any of the classes that I teach at RollerCon; you can view the list here. I never teach exactly the same class twice, so even if you’ve taken my class before, you’ll walk away with something new.
  • I provide suggestions for you during the class. And not in a “Hey, you in the purple shirt!” kind of way. I offer heaps of variations for most poses, and I’ll come around and point out things that will help you access a pose in your body (not some ideal that may or may not feel attainable).
  • You’ll feel better! That’s the number one response I’ve gotten from skaters when I asked what they enjoyed about my classes. Injury prevention, less muscle soreness, and better balance and stability–what’s not to love?

2015 East Coast Tour Schedule

Sunday, September 6 – Carolina Rollergirls

Thursday, September 24 – DC Rollergirls

Friday, September 25 – no classes

Saturday, September 26 – available! (NY or VT)

Sunday, September 27 – Southshire Roller Derby
Open to all: 10:00 – 11:30 am. at 160 Benmont Ave, Bennington, VT
Class: Stretch. It. Out.
Cost: $10

Monday, September 28 – Albany All Stars Roller Derby

Tuesday, September 29 – Cape Cod Roller Derby
Open to all: 10:00 – 11:30 am. at The Dollhouse, 17 Shad Hole Road, Dennis Port, MA
Class: Did Someone Say Core Strength?
Cost: $10 advance, $12 at the door

Wednesday, September 30 – available! (ME)

Thursday, October 1 – available! (ME)

Friday, October 2 – available! (MA)

Saturday, October 3 – What Is Movement
Open to all: 2:00 – 4:00 p.m. at What Is Movement, 22 Dewey Ave Unit 7, Warwick, RI
Workshop: Beyond Pigeon Pose: Happy, Healthy Hips
Cost: $25

Sunday, October 4 – Philly Roller Derby

Want one of the limited available spots?

  • Complete the team training application form. Note: I will not be offering custom classes during this tour, and I also cannot do venue research and booking.
  • My rate is $125/hour for up to 25 people ($5/person after that), and I offer 1, 1.5, or 2 hour classes. There aren’t any other secret fees, though crash space is very much appreciated if you’re not in central PA, the DC metro area, or southern Maine! Once we confirm a date, I’ll send you an invoice for a 50% deposit.

Not in the Northeast?

Don’t despair: I’ve got some travel lined up for 2015-2016, and I’d love to visit you then.

October 2015: New Orleans

Late December 2015: Indiana

February or March 2016: Japan

July 2016: RollerCon

I can’t wait to meet so many of you in person and hang out and do some yoga with your leagues!

How to Roll Your Feet with a Tennis Ball

How to Roll Your Feet - Self-Massage Techniques from Flat Mat Yoga

You spend countless hours rolling around on your feet. When was the last time you took a few minutes to roll out your feet? If you’ve got access to a tennis ball, a lacrosse ball, or a ball specifically designed for self-massage, you can roll your feet in a few minutes and it’ll help them feel better after you’ve had them crammed into skates and shoes all week.

Reasons to Try Rolling Your Feet

People often discuss the benefits of foam rolling–and there are certainly plenty! There’s a lot to be gained from taking some time to pay attention to the soles of your feet, too. For starters, the soles of your feet possess an incredibly large amount of nerve endings: somewhere between 100,000 and 200,000.

In other words, the foot is designed to sense what’s underneath it, both to prevent injury and also to help your body move more efficiently. Taking time to walk around barefoot and also give your feet a little massage love can help keep all of this functioning well even when you’re spending heaps of time in skates.

If that’s not already enough reason for you, it’s also worth noting that the same fascia that you’ll find at the back of your legs–you know, where you might have grumpy calves or hamstrings–starts at the soles of your feet and runs all the way up the top of your head. Seriously.

Rolling your feet even a few times a week can help keep everything a little happier and functioning better.

Ready to Give It a Go?

Here are some techniques to try. Especially at first, don’t go too hard: you can hurt yourself rolling, and that would kind of defeat the purpose. You’re trying to help things, not mash them into oblivion!

In the video, I’m using Yoga Tune Up Therapy Balls, which I like because they have both grip and pliability, making them better and safer to use for a variety of self-massage techniques (as opposed to a lacrosse ball, which might be cheap and works for somethings, but its hardness can lead to greater risk of pinching a nerve). You can also easily and safely use a tennis ball for your feet, too!

Strengthen Your Outer Hips, Part 2

Check out how steady standing poses can be–this is totally possible for you, too!

If you watched the video in my last blog post about how to strengthen your outer hips, you might have wondered how to use those moves while you’re actually, you know, doing yoga. This video will show you!

You’ll need two blocks–or two stacks of books–and a folded up blanket or towel for this practice. You can use this to get ideas to add in when you take yoga classes or watch yoga videos, or you can do it on its own as a quick practice! (Note: if you do not want to kneel, skip to the second half of the video for some standing moves.)

This will all help create stability, which will help your balance–and you know that’ll be useful on the track! Bonus: when these muscles are all working they way they’re supposed to, you’ll be less likely to compensate and overuse others.

 

Strengthen Your Outer Hips

Sometimes, stretching isn’t the answer, and you need strengthen your hips to get the results you want. When you’re working on things like mohawks, transitions, and plow stops, having the right muscles doing the right things is going to be a big help.

This quick video will show you some movements that you can do to help strengthen your outer hips so that those muscles can do their jobs–and you can kick more ass on the track.

Since I didn’t specifically call it out in the video, when you’re doing the leg lifts out to the sides with hands down on blocks/books, try to keep your hips as level as possible to get the outer hips to do the lifting. Just like in tree pose, you don’t want to trick yourself by doing a hip swivel!

What muscles are doing the work? If the ones I mention aren’t doing the work, what might be compensating?

Over the next few weeks, I’ll show you some ways to incorporate these moves into a yoga practice, share more hip tips, and help improve your transitions on the track.

Stretching Tight Hips Might Not Be the Answer

Last week on Facebook, I shared a post from a fellow yoga teacher about identifying imbalances in your hips. Which hey, we’ve all got from roller derby, right? I think it’s great info for figuring out what’s going on with your hips, but the conclusion–“So, spend some extra time each day “opening” your hips in whatever range of motion (and on whichever side) is most challenging for you, which will help ease those imbalances over time”–had me feeling pretty uncomfortable. Stretching tight hips might not be the answer.

Our bodies have “typical” ranges of motion. Yes, there’s some variation depending on bone structure, and yes, everyone is different! As skaters, extreme flexibility isn’t necessarily going to help our game as much as balanced bodies and functional movement will; in other words, more hip openers isn’t necessarily the way to go. It’s important to know whether a muscle feels sore or tight because it needs to be stretched, or if things are feeling off because the muscle is weak or fatigued (or something else entirely).**

Want to know more about the range of motion for internal and external rotation of your hips? Check out this video and play along to learn a little more about how your derby hips move.

**I am not a medical professional, and I can’t diagnose conditions in your body. I can tell you that if you’re noticing a really extreme imbalance, it’s worth seeing a physical therapist if you can to start resolving things.

Unwind after Practice…in Bed

It’s 10:00 p.m. (or 11:00 p.m., or midnight) and you just got home from another late night roller derby practice. You have a snack, shower, lie down in bed, and…nothing. Your mind is racing, and sleep isn’t happening. You need something to help you unwind after practice, and you have no idea what that would be.

Sound familiar?

Exercise later in the day–especially when it’s a high-impact sport like derby–triggers our bodies to produce more of our stress hormones, adrenaline and cortisol. If these are bumped up right before bed, chances are, you’ll have a harder time falling asleep. Enter: restorative yoga.

A restorative yoga practice is generally slow, gentle, supported stretches; you’re not trying to go deep into poses. It’s designed to help calm your nervous system! Basically, it’s a lot more about being comfortable and letting your breath get slower and steadier, which can help chill out your stress response. (Think about it: when you get really anxious and hyped up, it can be harder to breathe. Calming your breath can make a big difference.)

This video is a yoga practice that you can do in bed! It’s targeted for the parts of your body that you use at practice–just in case you didn’t stretch–and, even more importantly, it’s slow and steady with some breath focus to help you settle down for bed. Take a hot shower, get cozy, and give it a try.

Hip Flexor Magic

Don’t let the featured image fool you: you’ll be doing some lunges today, but they might be nothing like the ways you’ve done lunges in yoga before!

While I’m a big fan of constructive rest for hip flexors, it’s definitely only one piece of the puzzle. I bet you can relate to the feeling of “I’m sore–I should stretch!”and sometimes, stretching isn’t the needed solution. If that’s the case, give your hip flexors a break in one of the rest poses from my last post, and then give this awesome hip flexor magic that I learned from Jules Mitchell a try.

When you give this a go, move slowly. Slooooooooowly. Even if you don’t have someone’s hand there, pretend someone’s hand is pressing on the back of your thigh and you’re trying to move it. Create your own resistance!

As I mention in the video, it could be really helpful to have a teammate or partner around to place their hand at the back of your pelvis so that you have some resistance and become aware of when you’re actually moving! That will help with proprioception–knowing where you are in space–and won’t let you cheat.

And last but definitely not least, don’t worry if your movements are really, really tiny when you try this. (I’ve taught this in a lot of classes already, and most of my students don’t go very far.) Over time, as you strengthen and stretch your hip flexors in this new and exciting way, you’ll have more control and range of motion.

Like I said: magic!

Stop Beating Up Your Hip Flexors!

The most frequent question that students ask me is how to stretch their psoas.  They tell me it’s “tight” or “short.” Or they point at the front of their pelvis and say, “This. This hurts. What can I do?” I have an answer that I always give–in short, “Stop beating up your hip flexors!”–and nine times out of ten, they don’t like it.

I’m going to tell you about it anyway.

Here’s the thing: the more I read about the psoas, and the more I talk with medical professionals and teachers who know much more than I do (like the rockstar physical therapist Jill Nye the Science Guy of the Rat City Rollergirls, and yoga therapist and exercise scientist Jules Mitchell), the more I’m convinced that all of the stretching and rolling that we do for our poor psoas muscles isn’t the solution. In fact, when I talked with Jill, she told me that she’s never–yes, never–seen a short iliopsoas. Jules’ research on the science of stretching backs that up: “Your [muscle] length is your [muscle] length – determined by the distance between your attachment points.”

So…your hip flexors feel tight. Or sore. Or both. What do you do?

Stop Beating Up Your Hip Flexors: The Long Answer

You rest. Constructive rest, but rest!

This is why my students–roller derby players like you, rock climbers, and other athletes–hate my response. Everyone wants instant relief, and trust me: I do, too! With the psoas and other hip flexors, though, less is often more.

Get yourself set up to rest well. Make sure you have enough layers on to stay warm so that you’re not jumping up two minutes in. Lie on your back with your knees bent, and place the soles of your feet flat on the floor at least a foot from your hips. You can wiggle your feet a a bit further away–even a few inches more if that helps you feel more settled. One thing that can be pretty awesome is to loop a belt around your thighs so that you don’t have to use your inner thigh muscles to hold your legs up. Give them a break, too.

Constructive Rest Position - Image of a person lying on their back with knees bent and feet flat on the floor

And then…you stay there. Possibly for five minutes, maybe ten, maybe even 15 or 20. I know, I know. You want to be up skating! You’ve got things to do! You want instant relief! I hear you, and I’m telling you that it’s not a thing. Lie on the floor. Do nothing. When you start feeling stuff–discomfort or sensations–stay there. Keep breathing. (Don’t torture yourself, of course! But try to stick with this until you start feeling some relief.)

Of course, you might not end up feeling anything. That’s the other thing about this. Then again, you might feel your pelvis sink down a little heavier. You might feel your hip flexors breathe an epic sigh of relief.

And that’ll be worth it. F’reals.

But Kickit, I Really, REALLY Can’t Just Lie There…

If lying on the floor is causing pain or panic, here’s another gentle option for you. Because again: stop beating up your poor, already-derby-abused hip flexors!

Start in the same rest pose as above, only this time bring your left knee in toward your chest for a hug–only so far as the position of your back doesn’t change! (Your low back might want to round and press into the floor. If that’s the case, don’t bring your leg in as close.) Your leg might be nowhere near your chest/belly, and that’s a-okay. If you’re having a really tough time reaching your shin without changing the position of your spine, hold the back of your thigh, or place a belt around your shin and hold the belt instead of your leg.

Psoas Release Step One - Image of a person lying on their back with one foot flat on the floor, bring their other bent knee toward their chest

Once you’re settled in there, begin to slide your right heel forward to stretch your right leg out in front of you. Your leg doesn’t need to fully extend. Again, only go so far as you’re able to go without changing the position of your spine. If that means your right knee is still bent, let it be bent. (This time, your low and mid back might want to arch away from the floor. If you’re allowing your spine to arch, you’re taking away the possibility for your psoas to release. The more you know, right?)

Psoas Release Step Two - Image of a person lying on their back, with one bent leg coming toward their chest while they begin to stretch out their other leg

Hang out here for 5-10 breaths, maybe up to 20 if you’re feeling pretty good here. When you’re ready, release and repeat on the other side.

And y’all: don’t do these immediately before you head to practice, okay? Give your body a little time to chill.

Want to score a weekend pass to The Big O?

The Big O, Eugene, OR - May 1-3, 2015I’m stoked to share that Flat Mat is one of this year’s sponsors of The Big O! If you’ve been living under a rock and haven’t seen the schedule, let me tell you: there are some amazing teams competing, and it’s sure to be a hell of a tourney! I’m personally excited to check out my former Gotham leaguemate Sweet Sherry Pie, who’s now skating for Bay Area Derby Girls–what about you?

If you haven’t bought your ticket yet, get pumped: I’m giving away two weekend passes! Enter below, and you might get lucky and make it to The Big O!

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