antiquity
08-20-2002, 07:33 PM
Bench warmers beware: Sitting's bad for the back
By Jay Caldwell
(Published: August 20, 2002)
This study may fall under the category of proving the obvious, but I suppose it's always nice to back up common sense.
Theoretical and laboratory data and tons of personal experience -- including yours truly's -- suggests that people with back problems get stiff and sore when they sit a spell, especially in an ill-fitting chair. It has to do with the physics of the lumbar disks and the elasticity of the soft tissues in the low back.
It is common practice for sports teams to warm up before a game. The idea is that the starters should be fully primed to go full-speed at tipoff or kickoff. The problem is with the nonstarters.
Often they are relegated to the bench but are then expected to pop up, enter the game and perform at full speed and effectiveness.
A group from the Spine Biomechanics Institute at the University of Waterloo in Ontario, Canada, has recently reported the results of a study, "Low-Back Stiffness is Altered With Warm-Up and Bench Rest: Implications for Athletes."
These Canadians built some strange, almost medieval-like devices to which they strapped volleyball players before and after warm-ups and after sitting on the bench. They then measured flexibility and stiffness in a variety of planes of motion.
After a 30-minute warm-up, which included jogging, jumping and hitting drills and six minutes of stretching, the scrubs sat on a bench for another half hour. With back flexion and twisting there was no change in stiffness, but there was definitely increased stiffness in arching backward and side-bending. This could create back pain and injury.
A lot of volleyball teams have taken to having subs stand throughout the game, cheering and high-fiving. Baseball players often stand leaning over the dugout railing; relief pitchers always warm up thoroughly just before they enter the game. Football and soccer substitutes pace the sidelines. Hockey players rarely spend much time on the bench, their shifts being so short. That would seem to leave basketball teams as the only group not to have become enlightened.
The trouble is they're so tall, nobody wants them standing in front of them.
Jay Caldwell, M.D., is director of is director of the Alaska Sports Medicine Clinic.
By Jay Caldwell
(Published: August 20, 2002)
This study may fall under the category of proving the obvious, but I suppose it's always nice to back up common sense.
Theoretical and laboratory data and tons of personal experience -- including yours truly's -- suggests that people with back problems get stiff and sore when they sit a spell, especially in an ill-fitting chair. It has to do with the physics of the lumbar disks and the elasticity of the soft tissues in the low back.
It is common practice for sports teams to warm up before a game. The idea is that the starters should be fully primed to go full-speed at tipoff or kickoff. The problem is with the nonstarters.
Often they are relegated to the bench but are then expected to pop up, enter the game and perform at full speed and effectiveness.
A group from the Spine Biomechanics Institute at the University of Waterloo in Ontario, Canada, has recently reported the results of a study, "Low-Back Stiffness is Altered With Warm-Up and Bench Rest: Implications for Athletes."
These Canadians built some strange, almost medieval-like devices to which they strapped volleyball players before and after warm-ups and after sitting on the bench. They then measured flexibility and stiffness in a variety of planes of motion.
After a 30-minute warm-up, which included jogging, jumping and hitting drills and six minutes of stretching, the scrubs sat on a bench for another half hour. With back flexion and twisting there was no change in stiffness, but there was definitely increased stiffness in arching backward and side-bending. This could create back pain and injury.
A lot of volleyball teams have taken to having subs stand throughout the game, cheering and high-fiving. Baseball players often stand leaning over the dugout railing; relief pitchers always warm up thoroughly just before they enter the game. Football and soccer substitutes pace the sidelines. Hockey players rarely spend much time on the bench, their shifts being so short. That would seem to leave basketball teams as the only group not to have become enlightened.
The trouble is they're so tall, nobody wants them standing in front of them.
Jay Caldwell, M.D., is director of is director of the Alaska Sports Medicine Clinic.