Another key to mobility and pain-free living is “Give-N-Go” – the ability of the joints and muscles to sustain impact (i.e. a foot strike) by “giving” or dynamically flattening with impact and then bouncing back to its original position.
As an example, think about the arch of your foot. In this case, the “Give-N-Go” system is like a spring-forward system.
Here’s what I mean –
At rest, your arch gets it’s shape from several bones, a collection of tendons and ligaments, and largely, the posterior tibialis muscle. The “posterior-tib” lightly contracts and helps maintain the arc shape.
In the case of running –
As your mid-foot takes the impact of your foot strike, your arch dynamically flattens its shape to “give” with your weight and the impact of your foot strike. In an ideal world, your arch then bounces back to it’s original arch shape and in the process, gives you a “spring forward.”
The potential problem –
Often, my clients have an arch that has become immobile – it’s an arch with “No Give.” And that creates the problem – When your arch is rigid and “has no give,” with every step and so there is “no bounce.”
Without an arch that “gives” with foot impact, every foot strike becomes jarring, often creating a “slap” sound. AND, a further painful result – your hips often become compacted.
