♪ Bob and Brad ♪
♪ The two most famous ♪
♪ Physical therapists on the internet. ♪
(Brad grunting)
- (claps) Hi folks, I'm Bob Schrupp, physical therapist.
- Brad Heineck, physical therapist.
- We are the most famous physical therapists
on the internet.
- In our own opinion, of course, Bob.
- Today we going to show you to fix tight hamstrings.
This is a new approach.
It's really using mobilizations.
Maybe its not a new approach but it's fairly new to me,
and it's based upon the work of Dr. Kelly Starrett.
I'll talk about that in just a second.
By the way, if you're new to our channel,
please take a second to subscribe to us.
We provide videos on how to stay healthy, fit,
pain free and we upload every day.
Also, if you could go to our website, bobandbrad.com.
We're always giving something away.
Brad's gonna show you what that is in just a minute.
- Oh, yes.
- The giveaway will also be on Facebook.
It'll be pinned to the top of the page.
If you want a short version of us,
just go to Instagram, Twitter, or Tik Tok.
Brad, do you want to show what we're giving away?
- Absolutely, Bob.
We've got this wonderful balance board,
or I call it a wobble board.
It's made for strengthening your ankles,
for working on balance.
It's a wonderful tool and it's extremely well-built.
It's one of my favorite, it is my favorite one,
I've ever worked with.
They're wonderful.
- Yeah, they did a good job with it, no doubt about it.
Okay, let's get started.
Why, I didn't leave my book out.
I'm going to go grab my book.
- Oh.
- So a lot of what I'm going to talk about today
is based on the work of Dr. Kelly Starrett,
and he wrote this book.
He's a physical therapist.
He wrote this book, "Becoming a Supple Leopard".
What a title, huh Brad?
- Yeah, I really gets me thinking. (laughs)
- Yeah, well, anyway, this book,
I wouldn't say is necessarily for the layperson.
If you have some background anatomy, and physiology.
- Kinesiology.
- Kinesiology, maybe some education,
it'll be okay for you.
Maybe if you're a little bit like Mike,
you work out, our cameraman.
And I mean, if you have a fair amount
of knowledge of muscles and stuff, it'll be good for ya.
- Sure.
- But it's becoming one of favorite books, Brad.
It's just he really puts--
- I know, you get very excited about it. (laughs)
- Yeah, get really, so check it out if you want.
We'll have to put the link in below on that, too.
But he was talking about on mobilizing the hamstrings
and one way he was talking about doing it is
that he likes to do it from an elevated surface,
because that way you can put weight on the hamstring easily,
as opposed to if you're on the floor.
Now, let's talk about first, Brad,
I want to show why you want to stretch the hamstrings
for one reason.
It's all about function.
Am I too close?
Okay. (laughs) (Brad laughing)
It's all about function.
Like what you're going to do throughout the day.
Now if I bend over like this,
now this is demonstrating a hamstring here.
- Right here.
- And if my hamstring is tight what's going to happen,
it's not gonna allow my pelvis to go like this
and keep my back straight.
See right now my back is straight the entire time, isn't it?
- You got a little bit of a curve,
but it's pretty darn good.
- Okay, how's that?
- [Brad] There you go.
- Okay, if my hamstring is tight,
and it's going to pull on my pelvis.
- [Brad] Oh.
- I'm going to do a posterior tilt
and what's my back going to do then?
- Oh, it's rounding out, you're losing your lordosis.
I believe we got what they call the butt wink.
- The butt wink, right.
- And putting a lot of stress on those lumbar,
on those discs in your lower lumbar.
- Exactly, and if you do this repeatedly,
thousands of times over a period of a year,
you're putting that little bit of stress
on your back each time,
and eventually you end up with back pain and problems.
- [Brad] I think they call it cumulative trauma.
- That's a very good point, Brad.
- [Brad] Say no more.
- So, if we can get to the point
where those hamstrings are stretched out,
again, you can you can get way down
and still maintain your back straight.
- [Bob] Right.
- So, it's really important to try to stretch them,
and mobilize the hamstrings.
- Yep, get 'em loose and supple.
- So what you're gonna need, is you can use
a tennis ball, a softball.
We're going to show you some,
you can take like a lacrosse ball.
This is a, I don't know, it came
with one of the mobilization kits.
- Sure.
- It kind of looks like two lacrosse balls together.
- Yeah, it just helps you get two different
locations of pressure.
- Yep, so I'm going to work on this hamstring.
Now, he recommends you going across the fibers.
- Okay.
- He does, so basically,
you can put it underneath the place like this
and you can roll back and forth like this,
but what's nice about this when you're elevated,
you can put weight on this area.
Could you see if I was on the floor
how difficult it would be to put weight on this, Brad?
- [Brad] And you're actually gonna be elevated,
so your foot does not touch the floor
when you're sitting down.
- Absolutely, because you're also gonna
add this component, Brad.
You're gonna actually do kind of almost flossing here.
- [Brad] Oh, sure.
- So I'm stretching the hamstring and I'm rotating it,
so it's helping the muscle glide.
- [Brad] Yep.
- The entire time so you can hit different spots,
and he's recommending you're going to pick out the spots
in your body that need the work.
- [Brad] Because you can feel it, feel the tight spots,
when you're doing it?
- [Bob] Yeah, or if you know,
like if you have trouble bending over
'cause your hamstrings are tight.
- [Brad] Sure, I see what you're saying.
- [Bob] So, what you are going to do is,
he tells you to spend like two minutes on that area,
or until it starts to feel better.
- [Brad] Sure.
- [Bob] But you can really get into that area real fast.
- [Brad] So you're saying you could use,
like a tennis ball looks like it might work out.
- [Bob] Tennis Ball, a softball.
The other thing I'm going to mention here,
this is the coolest little device.
This is like a miniature foam roller.
It's by FITINDEX.
It's a new one that they have.
It's the Peanut, I believe, FITINDEX Peanut.
But it's got three levels of vibration, one, two, three.
This works out great for this.
So, I can roll back and forth on this.
- [Brad] Now, I do it'll bring up the point,
Bob is doing it on a cushioned bed,
which is probably not what you want.
You're definitely not gonna on your bed.
You know, a firm surface is best.
- [Bob] Exactly, this is the only thing we had
in our bunker here (laughs) that worked.
It would be a lot better to be like a higher chair.
He actually has like a box that he made
that he does this elevated stuff on.
You know, he does a lot of stuff on it.
But this really works well.
You know, this you can use
for almost any muscle of the body,
and it does a great job.
Do you wanna show it on the floor there, Brad?
- Oh, I like it already.
You can actually get a visual of,
whoa, look at it go.
- [Bob] Now to turn it off,
you actually have to hold it for three seconds, Brad.
- One thousand one, one thousand two.
- [Bob] No, you gotta hold it down for three seconds.
- Ah, there we go, look at that.
- [Bob] All right, so, again,
you gotta do it.
You're gonna, again, you can start
with a tennis ball, or a tennis ball might be
even too aggressive for you to start off with.
I mean, if you haven't.
And go ahead and do some floss with it,
and then I want you to go ahead
and do a little bit of stretch with the hamstring
by doing some posture squats.
I want you to go--
- [Brad] Keeping my six foot distance, Bob.
- Yeah, so you're gonna go ahead,
and I'm stretching the hamstring.
- Look at that nice straight back Bob is maintaining.
I'm gonna show you with that Booyah stick.
- So you can do some of these to stretch the hamstring.
You could also stretch it this way, Brad.
You could put one forward and bend,
and keep the back really straight,
that way you're getting weight through the hamstring,
it's functional, but you're keeping the back straight
and you're stretching the hamstring at the same time.
- What about doing this one?
- You're not getting as much weight through it.
- [Brad] Oh, he wants weight through the foot.
- You know, and here, I'm getting weight through the foot.
Yeah, 'cause them it's functional again.
You're that much closer to what you really do in life.
- [Brad] I understand.
- All right, any other comments, Brad?
- [Brad] Well no, Bob, should I have some?
(Bob laughing)
You did a such a good job,
I couldn't really add anything, so, once again.
- All right, remember,
Brad and I can fix just about anything.
- Except for-- - A broken heart.
- Maybe this thing is gonna help.
Let me give it a whirl.
- Let me just step back here, you're within my.
- I think this is a good heart massager.
- Oh, good Lord, it is not.
You don't wanna do that.
- Bob, you gotta give it a whirl.
Take care.
(upbeat music)