ITB foam rolling

[Deleted User]

Anything else that hurts or is tight, I go at it with the foam roller and it eases off and improves. But when I'm rolling my ITBs, it's as uncomfortable now as it was when I started 6 months ago.

Is this normal? I know your ITB is more tough and inflexible than the rest of your muscles, but does rolling it commonly hurt more than you'd expect?

Reason I'm asking is because I don't even have any specific ITB issues! At least none that are causing noticeable problems to my running and none that my physio has picked up on. I'm just doing preventative rolling.

socks up to

Not sure but probly theres no reason to roll your ITB if there are no problems. usually it hurts when you start rolling, then should ease off.

you could stretch it instead?

[Deleted User]

You might be right but I'm just trying to prevent any future problems. With all my other strains, pulls and stiff bits I've found foam rolling to be way more effective than stretching so I was just applying the same principle. I've read loads of times that the ITB is like a bit of tough old leather and nigh impossible to stretch effectively anyway.



So... How DO you do it then?

socks up to

Yeah its kind of tough and fibrous and so wont stretch a lot.

The standard standing-up stretch i cant do, it just hurts, so i find some of the yoga stretches better.

just google 'Yoga IT Band stretches' and you'll find quite a few.

Also-ran

Is the pain from the ITB or are you hitting your outer quad. If I roll the ITB it is painless, yet I have had ITBS from time to time - wierd

If I suffer with ITBS, my physio recommends rolling the outer quad, glutes/hips and lower back. He told me not to roll the ITB itself. It seems that there is very little blood supply to the ITB. For prevention of ITBS I was prescibed the above rolling, combined with some resistance exercises to help with strengthening.

Every time I look up ITB issues on the web there is a different answer

Six Physio

Lots and lots of conjecture on ITB and rolling and what it does and what it doesn't do...

It's fair to say that your ITB has the same strenght as soft steel and so doesn't stretch much. It's lenght can be influenced by doing stuff to TFL at the top, or the lateral retinaculum at the bottom.

No idea how rolling your ITB (or the deeper VL) works, but it does a pretty good job in relieving some knee and some back pain. It's only ever a pain reliever, never a cause changer.

There is a big correlation between functional control (and not strength) of glut med. The less control the more pain there is on rolling ITB...