Hi Laurie,
I hope you and your family on two and four legs are enjoying late summer!
It has been a while since we met and at this time I’m preparing a lecture series on performance optimization for the canine sports center where I’m also working as a physio. Since I will make it a great deal about motor control for the owners of those agility/hunting/obedience/working dogs I was wondering
a. whether you had any hands-on exercises for isometrics that actually work for canine athletes and
b. whether you can back the statement that with this type of exercise ”the body is able to activate nearly all the available motor units” (quote http://breakingmuscle.com/strength-cond ... -correctly)
The two studies I could find were, not surprisingly, conducted on humans: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16195033 and http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/569576. It would be really interesting to see if adding isometrics (i e more than standing and balancing hind/front legs on a wobble board or standing on a peanut) has the potential of improving motor control and thereby lowering the rate of injury. I very much hope that you are able to provide a few exercises to that effect and appreciate your personal opinion on the usefulness of this!
Kind regards
S.
Isometrics for improved motor control
Isometrics for improved motor control
LAURIE EDGE-HUGHES
Re: Isometrics for improved motor control
Hi S.,
Sorry for my tardy reply. Your question requires careful thought!
So, firstly one must question whether or not a dog can actually perform an isometric exercise. Isometric would essentially mean a full voluntary contraction without movement or change of length of the muscle. Can a dog do this? Not really. Not as it can be done in people. And therefore can we use the people research on isometrics to validate any of our canine exercises... I doubt it! The closest we can come to is lifting a leg or two and making them balance. But you can't tell the dog to contract the quads as hard as they can.
As well, a point of clarification. As you incorporate balancing and an unstable surface (wobble board, fit disc, etc), you are not doing isometrics, you are doing dynamic stabilization. And YES, we have seen in people that THIS can prevent injuries so long as you are retraining the times and motions in which injuries could occur. (i.e. Volleyball players volleying a ball while standing on two fit discs. Basketball playing jumping and landing on two fit discs as they throw or catch a ball.) Essentially, the training needs to be functional!!!
And no, I don't agree with the statement that the body is voluntarily able to contract all of the available motor units. That's why we use NMES in rehab (and with exercises), to recruit the fibres that the body cannot recruit volitionally. Can we train the body to recruit MORE? Yes. But there is always a reserve. - I think I have it somewhere the % that we can voluntarily recruit and I think it's 60 - 80%... but I'd have to look that up.
I hope this helps!
Laurie
Sorry for my tardy reply. Your question requires careful thought!
So, firstly one must question whether or not a dog can actually perform an isometric exercise. Isometric would essentially mean a full voluntary contraction without movement or change of length of the muscle. Can a dog do this? Not really. Not as it can be done in people. And therefore can we use the people research on isometrics to validate any of our canine exercises... I doubt it! The closest we can come to is lifting a leg or two and making them balance. But you can't tell the dog to contract the quads as hard as they can.
As well, a point of clarification. As you incorporate balancing and an unstable surface (wobble board, fit disc, etc), you are not doing isometrics, you are doing dynamic stabilization. And YES, we have seen in people that THIS can prevent injuries so long as you are retraining the times and motions in which injuries could occur. (i.e. Volleyball players volleying a ball while standing on two fit discs. Basketball playing jumping and landing on two fit discs as they throw or catch a ball.) Essentially, the training needs to be functional!!!
And no, I don't agree with the statement that the body is voluntarily able to contract all of the available motor units. That's why we use NMES in rehab (and with exercises), to recruit the fibres that the body cannot recruit volitionally. Can we train the body to recruit MORE? Yes. But there is always a reserve. - I think I have it somewhere the % that we can voluntarily recruit and I think it's 60 - 80%... but I'd have to look that up.
I hope this helps!
Laurie
LAURIE EDGE-HUGHES