Key Concepts - Building athletic performance (Part 3)

 1. Aim

To introduce the Sanari Fitness model of athletic performance and why it should be the definitive approach to athletic development.

2. Intended Audience

Sports coaches, S&C coaches, healthcare professionals, athletes

3. Introduction

Continuation explaining the model below. Visit https://www.sanarifitness.com/2020/09/key-concepts-building-athletic.html for the beginning in the series.

4. Level 3 - The 5 base movement patterns

So the basic concept here is that all movement flows from proximal to distal, so close to far. Meaning that in order for your limbs to perform your spine must function correctly. As we are developing the brain splits the body in to functional groups if you will, in order to learn how best to move the complex machinery that is your body. It does this by using the 5 base movement patterns:

1. Core/Distal - To calibrate close to far

Core/Distal Pattern

2. Spinal - To calibrate front from back. This pattern also breaks into associative and dissociative. 

Dissociative being similar to cross lateral but rather than co-ordinating on a diagonal line it is simply about being able to disconnect shoulders and hips.

Spinal Dissociative - Upper Body  Pattern

Spinal Associative

3. Homologous - To calibrate upper from lower

Homologous Pattern

4. Homolateral (or Unilateral) - To calibrate left from right

Homolateral Pattern

5. Cross Lateral - To calibrate the diagonals

Cross Lateral Horizontal

These patterns are the basis for all other athletic movements. If these aren't embedded by 7 years old then compensatory movements are used to achieve the outcomes required. This in turn leads to less then optimal performance and/or increased injury risk. People who have these fully functional patterns are often termed "natural sportsmen/women". They seem to effortlessly do well across a wide variety of sports and people put it down to their "sporty genes". Although genetic inheritance will play a role for the performances of these athletes, it is actually the exposure to as many different stimuli as possible during development that allowed them to test and embed the movement patterns above and therefore have a solid early foundation for future development of more complicated movement strategies.

Generally speaking, when one or more of these patterns are missing we tend to either over use our limbs, over use one of the other movement patterns or various degrees of the each. Some examples of these compensations are:

• poor rotational mobility at the hips and thoracic spine. During running the requisite rotational "cost" must still be paid. Often this means looking to the knee or ankle to foot the bill, leading to excessive inversion/eversion at the ankle or excessive rotation at the knee causing a heavy screwing action whilst running.
• Weak lumbar engagement leading to poor setting of the pelvis. When running we require a slight anterior tilt of the pelvis. This helps to create the right force vectors for efficient propulsion. If the lumbar extensors aren't engaged correctly then often this tilt can be lost, rotated or asymmetrical. The most important being the engagement of multifidus. With out this the anterior tilt is lost or we create a rocking motion of the pelvis when viewed in sagittal plane (from the side). Both examples lead to less the optimal mechanics and each have varying degrees of injury risk associated with them.

In summary, with out the base movement patterns embedded you will create compensatory patterns of movement to achieve the movements required. It will also means that yo have to use up the small amount short term memory you have in order to attend to these patterns that aren't embedded properly, effecting things like concentration and attention span in school or work environments. But the academic applications of movement are for a separate article altogether.

Next up we discuss level 4 of the model balance, C.V., stability and mobility.

All the best