"Voodoo Flossing"

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mctrials23 said:
abarro81 said:
After a few days trying this I've found it makes my finger feel nice and flushed out for a few min after but has changed nothing on actual holds, as might be expected given the timeframe

What are you hoping to fix and what stage in the recovery are you at?

I've got an old collateral ligament injury. It's basically fixed but that finger clicks and crunches extensively whenever I put it into extension after flexing it closed first so I think there's a lot of scar tissue etc in there. Picked up a slight pulley tweak too in the finger but that's pretty minor, I have a suspicion that it may partly be down to all the shit n that finger making the tendons and pulleys not run smoothly.
 
Worked suspiciously well on my long term shoulder pain. It came back with a vengeance by the end of play yesterday, tried this for four 2 minute pumps this morning, pain gone!!! Enough to encourage me to keep it going throughout rest days for awhile. :2thumbsup:
 
IS2 said:
Worked suspiciously well on my long term shoulder pain. It came back with a vengeance by the end of play yesterday, tried this for four 2 minute pumps this morning, pain gone!!! Enough to encourage me to keep it going throughout rest days for awhile. :2thumbsup:
How did you wrap your shoulder?
 
Nibile said:
IS2 said:
Worked suspiciously well on my long term shoulder pain. It came back with a vengeance by the end of play yesterday, tried this for four 2 minute pumps this morning, pain gone!!! Enough to encourage me to keep it going throughout rest days for awhile. :2thumbsup:
How did you wrap your shoulder?
Used an old lightweight thearaband, with wife's assistance wrapped from mid bicep up to armpit and over the deltoid ... Fairy tight. I then did my usual "shoulder opening " routine ( foam roller along the spine, 1.5 Kg in each hand, arms spread, gradually stretching with slight lift on the inhale and drop on the exhale)...and a few light bicep curls.
 
Ok my experience with wrapping/flossing after one session this evening:

Niggles:
I have a load of scar tissue in left shoulder from a mixed climbing injury 8 years ago - managed with regular stretching and massage.
Niggling tennis elbow in right elbow - I manage it with eccentrics and massage (ergonomic mouse/keyboard at work may help) and it doesn't stop me doing anything.
Niggling scar tissue in PIP joint of LH index following an old tweak - doesn't hold me back.
3 days ago I tweaked I think the bicep longhead in right shoulder while frigging on draws, currently painful when I flex bicep.

I wrapped the left shoulder and did some range of motion and bicep tendon stretches as per the youtube vid you'll no doubt find if you search.
Then did same on right shoulder.
Then wrapped right forearm and elbow and performed ROM/eccentrics
Finished by wrapping the RH index and doing ROM.

Results:
Left shoulder has better range of motion than it has had in many years, after 3 mins.. That's not subjective it's objective - I can lie down and lift my left arm overhead and touch the back of hand on the ground. I haven't been able to do that for years without forcing it, even after massage.
Right shoulder - reduced pain, good ROM without pain - better than before wrapping.
Elbow/forearm - feels good and well flushed.
Finger - better ROM than before wrapping.


I'm impressed.
 
I don't know if it's doing anything yet but I glossed five times today. My finger feels nice immediately after flossing but it's too early to tell until I get on some rocks to find out. I guess I'll find out tomorrow morning whether it hurts when I wake up too.
 
I've tried using cut up theraband but it seems quite difficult to get it to work. For a start I can barely fit the strips between my teeth at all, and when I do it doesn't seem to shift any plaque. Where am I going wrong?
 
Fricking telephones and alcohol-induced reluctance to proof-read!

Glossing over that matter, I'm not entirely sure it's helping my finger, but perhaps I need to give it more time. On Sunday morning the usual dull pain when I wake up was gone, but it was back this morning after climbing yesterday. I'll stick with it though and see if it helps after a bouldering session.
 
There's no question that flossing is improving the range of motion in my left shoulder. Been flossing this over the weekend a few times a day and the shoulder is the best it's felt in years, better than after sports massage which was my previous go-to for loosening it up.

Flossing has also noticably loosened up my forearms after climbing, and the minor niggling tennis elbow I've had for the last few months has gone.

Tried it on my hamsting insertion/psoas on sunday and it immediately improved range of motion.

It's great!
 
petejh said:
Flossing has also noticably loosened up my forearms after climbing

Was talking to 3-9 about this earlier on FB, we were wondering if it would be good post-climbing/training recovery tool to flush blood around the arms a bit
 
abarro81 said:
petejh said:
Flossing has also noticably loosened up my forearms after climbing

Was talking to 3-9 about this earlier on FB, we were wondering if it would be good post-climbing/training recovery tool to flush blood around the arms a bit

Don't know if this is a good idea, but I've been doing it to my fingers as the first part of my warm up, to flush the blood to them. Seems to work quite well.
 
And so, the hobby of climbing takes another step closer to wearing rubberised gimp suits permanently.
 
dave said:
I've tried using cut up theraband but it seems quite difficult to get it to work. For a start I can barely fit the strips between my teeth at all, and when I do it doesn't seem to shift any plaque. Where am I going wrong?

It's the little doll's teeth that you floss, not your own.
 
abarro81 said:
petejh said:
Flossing has also noticably loosened up my forearms after climbing

Was talking to 3-9 about this earlier on FB, we were wondering if it would be good post-climbing/training recovery tool to flush blood around the arms a bit

I had the same thought and think it'll be really good for this - it flushes the shit out of muscle tissue. I also think it'll be a great warm-up for climbing. I'm going to try it at the diamond this evening before a burn on The Shining.
 
Following my previous comment about it aggravating my finger, I can confirm that flossing is actually quite brilliant.

I strained my A2 pulley on my LH ring finger about 9 months ago and it never really fully recovered. My PIP joint has been slightly swollen since and would hurt a tad if I squeezed the sides, or if made a really tight fist. Furthermore, the pulley would hurt if I probed it in certain places.

On grit I could climb as hard as I pleased, but whenever I pushed myself too much indoors my finger would ache and become quite stiff the following days, and sometimes swell a little more.

For the first day I flossed whilst flexing and that's what caused the aggravation. So instead I just kept my finger stationary for the minute of flossing, with the aim to simply promote some serious blood flow, like icing.

Anyway, the PIP swelling has effectively gone, squeezing the joint produces negligible pain and an A2 massage produces considerably less pain than previously. Although there's still progress to be made there.

It's obviously early days and I've yet to pull hard with my new slender finger. But currently, I am really impressed.
 
In the link that Barrows posted it mentions at the end about a follow up article on de-pumping using voodoo flossing.

It sounds logical but you would look like a right tool at the crag/wall.
 
Oh and when you read some of the more thoughtful literature around compression wrapping/tack n wrap/voodoo flossing, nitric oxide is quite widely theorised to play an important role. There's your beetroot shots again.
 

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