What a Foam Roller Does, What it Doesn’t, and How to Use It To Improve Your Cycling
The foam roller has had a moment. And rightly so. This cheap block of high density styrofoam offers performance and flexibility benefits to everyone, from office workers to olympic athletes. The foam roller and stretch out strap are the most democratic of performance tools. But what does sliding around on styrofoam actually do to your muscles? And, equally importantly, what doesn’t it do?
I’ll only be talking about using a foam roller to roll out muscles and the IT band. This article won’t get into more creative ways to use a foam roller, like for balance exercises, stretching out your back, or mobilizing different joints in the body.
The essence of a foam roller is the application of pressure. Rolling is implied (I mean, it’s called a foam roller), but most of what a foam roller does his apply pressure in a controlled way. Think of it as a topical massage. Not as deep, not as focused, not as expensive.
The pressure that a foam roller applies affects the myofascial junction. If you’ve ever had someone push hard on a knot in your trapezius, you’ve experienced deep pressure on a muscle. You’ll note that this feels quite different from rolling on a muscle. That knot in your trapezius is inside your muscle, deep in the fibers. A foam roller is not specific enough to reach knots like that. What a foam roller does do is clear out adhesions between the muscle and the fascia that wraps it. This frees up the muscular motion and allows it to function more smoothly.
Every muscle is wrapped in a tight layer of fascia. If you’ve unwrapped a pork tenderloin and cleared off the silver skin, then you’ve seen and felt fascia. Fascia has many purposes, but the main one is lubrication. Much of what muscles do is slide across one another. In your quads, for example, you have five muscles (vastus medius, vastus lateralis, vistas intermedius, rectus femoris, and sartorius) working over each other and sliding across one another. If these muscles weren’t well lubricated, they couldn’t function effectively. Because of their layering, muscles do often bind on one another, bind on your skin, and don’t slide freely. As muscles are worked and they slide across one another, adhesions form on the fascial layers. This is completely normal, but it does interfere with the muscles’ ideal functioning. One area where foam rollers can help it is at this fascial-fascial junction. By clearing adhesions through consistently applied pressure, foam rollers allow muscles to slide more freely.
MyoFascial Effects
Myofascial problems come in many shapes and sizes, beyond simple binding together. Fascial constriction can actually shorten muscle, changing its functional length. Since the muscles are wrapped up in the “bag” of fascia, if the bag shortens, the muscle shortens as well and you lose some of that muscle’s functional length. This is where the rolling element of foam rolling really comes into its own.
Rolling a log of foam across the muscle’s fascia applies a gentle stretch to it, like a rolling pin to dough. Parts of the fascia adhere to the skin as it stretches, pulling it out and slightly lengthening it along the direction of the roll. This gentle stretching affect works mostly on the fascia, but can pull along muscle fibers as well, stretching everything out. That’s why multiple studies have shown that foam rolling increases range of motion and flexibility.
Fuzzy Effects — Relaxation
Muscles and fascia are devilishly complicated. On the face, they seem like simple structures, conglomerations of cells with similar purposes. While this is true, they get more complicated as we zoom farther in. Many issues in physiology are like the coastline paradox, the closer we look, the hairier things get. Buckle up, because we’re about to zoom in.
Muscles are bundles of protein inside cells, wrapped up in complex layers, but they’re also more than that. Fascia is a big bag of cells, wrapped around muscles to lubricate and protect them, but it’s also much more than that. Both of these tissues are made up of a conglomeration of molecules, for lubrication and for signaling. They’re inextricably linked through neurons and chemical transmitters as well. Muscles and fascia work together as a package, and so must communicate with one another constantly. Foam rolling sends these signals haywire.
Put simply, the act of foam rolling over knots, bumps, and adhesions in muscular and fascial layers sends them into signal overdrive. The fierce pressure and continuous motion causes them to bounce chemical signals back and forth to one another, eventually resetting the whole shebang. Over the course of a workout or a day, chemical signals from muscle to fascia and back can be confused and unwieldy, leaving themselves unresolved. This confusion can cause bundling up, adhesions, and tension. The goal of a foam roll session, an intense massage, or dry needling, is to bang out so many signals that the earlier ones are overwhelmed and the whole system resets.
What Foam Rolling Doesn’t Do
Remove cellulite.
I don’t know where this claim originated, but it seems to be one of those propagated by online beauty magazines and crappy YouTube videos. Lets put it to bed right away. Foam rolling has no impact on fat distribution, skin turgidity, or skin dimpling. It won’t change how you look.
Help with bone density.
This claim seems to originate from the old baseball tradition of bat boning, where a baseball bat would be rubbed up and down against a bone or bottle to make the wood more dense and harden it. Bone density doesn’t develop like this. According to Wolff’s law, bones become stronger relative to how they are used. It’s a physiological change due to outside stresses, not a mechanical change due to compression, like in baseball bats. This claim does not hold up at all.
Directly improve performance.
While foam rollers have been shown to decrease pain, increase range of motion, and improve recovery from workouts, pre-workout foam rolling has not been demonstrated to improve athletic performance. Of the several studies that have looked into this phenomenon, only a few have shown any difference, and most showed none.
However, if you’re in a sport where range of motion is important, a foam roller could certainly be helpful. Athletes looking for an edge in recovery from hard workouts could be helped by foam rolling as well.
Foam rolling before a race or event won’t help you win that event, but foam rolling as part of an exercise plan could certainly be helpful.
Heal injuries.
A foam roller is never a substitute for a qualified Physical Therapist when recovering from an injury. They may make that pulled muscle feel a bit better, but no studies have yet demonstrated a foam roller’s ability to rehabilitate any injuries. If you’re sore, they can be incredibly helpful. If you’re hurt, seek professional help.
How to Use a Foam Roller Properly
Believe it or not, the process of using a foam roller is about as simple as it looks. All you have to do is roll it over muscles in a longitudinal direction and voila! Because it’s so simple, I’m not going to go through muscle-by-muscle here, but I am going to stick in just a few do’s and don’ts to get you on track.
Roll warm or cold, it doesn’t matter if it’s in the morning or just after a workout
Roll along the length of the muscle, not across the fibers. It won’t hurt you to go the wrong way, but it won’t help nearly as much as a longitudinal roll
Focus the roller over knots and sore spots, but don’t push too hard. You can bruise yourself if you’re not careful
Be sure to get your gluteus medius and the lateral muscles of your legs too. They’re important!
Here are the don’ts
Don’t roll over injured muscles. Sore muscles are fine, but don’t traumatize a strained or pulled muscle
Don’t roll over bones and joints. This probably won’t do any damage, but it won’t feel good
Don’t roll over broken skin (like rashes and scabs). Cuz ow!
That’s about all you need to know to use a foam roller well and improve your cycling with it. Enjoy your foamy bliss!
