Compression as a form of treatment has been in regular use for thousands of years but RockFloss has only been around for the last few years. Athletes from Crossfit and lots of other sports, now routinely use elastic latex bands to warm up and increase range of motion before training and during their rehabilitation sessions under the guidance of rehab professionals.
The concept sounds rather simple; wrap the band around a joint or extremity, with moderate to firm pressure, then add movement. Nothing really wrong with that, but I like to use metaphors to make things more visible. Just imagine you own a Ferrari and only use the first gear, waste potential.
The same happens when we only use a Floss band in a simple way.
What else can you do with RockFloss?
In this article I will try to give you some more ideas to increase the use of Floss bands, not only for athletes but also for medical professionals.
Most of us have dealt with injuries in the past, these injuries lead to mechanical changes in tissues but they also change our perception which leads to fear and brings us to avoid certain movements. The result can be a loss of performance, range of motion and we start to compensate.
Here is where Floss comes into the game.
A Floss application can help you to create a new awareness of the injured body part, like a big hand that drives your brain to this specific area.
‘Wakey wakey brain – focus on this bit of me’.
What is the idea behind this? The answer lies in your skin. When we are in this injured situation, the nervous system is irritated and the perception is disturbed. One possibility is to find new ways to get your nervous system back on track. The skin is full of mechanoreceptors that gives your brain a lot of information on where your body is in space, how much tension we have to create and also if we feel safe with a movement.
Let us do a little test. Just place your left hand on your right shoulder and grab around your deltoid with a little pressure. Now try to feel which shoulder is more present in your brain.
Let me guess, the one with the hand on top?
So we can lead awareness of the brain to certain body parts and help the nervous system to analyze and change the situation.
We can get more precise with our Floss technique.
Instead of adding the same compression circular around the body part, we should increase the compression only on the injured point. This will give the nervous system an exact spot to interact and make it easier to perform the right movement again.
Now, lets add exercises to it. You heard right. Try to perform the difficult movements with this Floss application to the possible range of motion.
You will see that the movement feels more safe and precise.
This is only one of several benefits of Floss. If you want to learn more about it, visit our You Tube channel or join a course with RockTape.
Just give it a try and keep Rocking.
Physiotherapist
Oliver Derigs
Rocktape Master Instructor