Stick the Landing on Reducing Back Pain

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Olympics Meets Low Back Pain

The 2024 Olympic Season is in full swing and personally, I can’t keep my eyes off the USA Women’s Gymnastics team. One, because they are incredibly strong, talented and devoted athletes representing our country, but two, because I just can’t believe how their backs aren’t aching with all those flips! If you are an Olympic athlete (Simone Biles, please keep reading) or just a regular civilian without a rubber band for a spine, I have some tips to reduce your back pain.

Just like our Olympians, we must train our cores! Yes, I said it, 2024 is the year of the core! One simple way we can do this is by performing an ‘abdominal brace.’ This exercise, which I will attach a photo of below, works to activate the deep abdominal muscles and create a muscle sandwich around the spine. Having a strong core, helps keep the spine in a neutral position taking pressure off the spinal nerves, joints and discs and helps the body respond safely to movement.

To help reduce low back pain, try performing spinal decompression techniques. Self-traction over a Swiss Ball is one way to do this (photo 2). By draping your body over the Swiss Ball, you are opening the lumbar spine and taking pressure off the lumbar nerves which often are irritated when we experience low back pain. If you don’t have a Swiss Ball, don’t worry, it will only be a one-tenth deduction from your final score. Just kidding, you can perform an equally as effective technique called child’s pose. This too, will open the lumbar spine and decompress the nerves (photo 3).

The third and final tip to reduce your back pain is to strengthen your glutes (aka your buttocks). Strengthening your gluteus maximus, medius and minimums will help provide support to the lumbar spine and more evenly distribute your weight, reducing excessive spinal load. Strengthening the glutes can be done by performing a ‘bridge’ (photo 4).

I hope these three tips help you stick the landing on reducing your back pain. Give these exercises a try and if you think your routine didn’t score you a 10/10, schedule your free consult today at OMPT Specialists. If physical therapy was an Olympic sport, our physical therapists would take the gold!