It’s really important that you understand how your body works so you can minimize the risk of injury. One of the things that runners will experience is lower back pain.
Unfortunately, runners won’t understand why or how they are getting the pain in their lower back. And when the pain comes, what they need to do to resolve the pain.
When lower back pain comes, people think that they need creams, ice packs, pills, or physio.
It’s more likely that the lower back pain is coming from tightness in your muscles. There are things that you can do to prevent this, without having to opt for expensive treatments.
If your lower back is sore, check for tightness in the following muscle groups.
Sore lower backs usually occur from tightness that pulls the muscle attached to the lumbur spine. The muscles pulling muscles that will affect the tightness will either be:
- Hamstrings
- Glutes
- Hip flexors
- Quadriceps
The first thing you need to do is work out if the muscle groups are tight and if they are responsible for pulling the muscles in your lower back.
If you have tight hamstrings, it isn’t the hamstrings that need to be stretched. It is actually the hip flexors or the quadriceps that need to be stretched since they are rotating the hips forward.
Stretch your hip flexors
You can do this by doing lunges on the ground. If you are unable to go forward, your hip flexor is too tight. So you need to work on getting the muscle to relax.
Stretch out your quadriceps.
A quadricep stretch will help. Sometimes, you need to keep on stretching and waiting for the muscle to relax over a few hours or days so that it stops pulling on your spine.
Stretch your glutes
Stretch your glutes and also get them to relax.
Do dynamic stretching with lunges.
Simply lunge forward until your knee touches the ground. Then stand/power straight up so that the movement goes through your glute. This will dynamically stretch the hip flexor, quads, and glutes.
Do weight training to help you overcome any lower back pain.
Squats, Deadlifts, Bulgarian split squats, and reverse lunges are great for strengthening the core and stretching out the muscle groups. Even though you will feel the pain and you think you won’t be able to do the exercises, it is actually one of the best ways to help you recover.
You will need to strengthen your abdominals and hip flexors for running.
It’s likely that you’ve got a sore back because you are weak in your abs and your hip flexors. This means you need to do core exercises that will allow you to build the strength endurance with these muscle groups.
Hanging leg and knee raises will be key, but you will need to train them so you can do them at a high volume.
Once those muscle groups fatigue when you are running, it will incorporate other muscle groups including your lower back, which will lead to lower back pain.
Train yourself to run with high-knees
You can focus on developing your running technique so that your abs and hip flexors won’t tire and start using your lower back muscles. A simple trick is to keep running with your ankles going over your knees.
Pay attention to make sure that your lower back isn’t being used. If you find that your lower back is being used, lower your knee movement and running pattern. Make sure that your core remains engaged at all times.
