Hi coaches and everybody. I am 37 years old, and would categorise myself as a weak brick ;-) In my younger years i was playing basketball, tennis and doing triathlon. The past 15 years i´ve spent surfing, usually 3-4 month out of the year, really intense for many hours a day, always paddling through pain. At home i would go paddling on a lake as exercise. Never any stretching, off course ;-) In my surfing time i had couple of episodes with lumbago (nearly going chronic), and a shoulder operation ( SAD and AC- joint) 3 years ago. It took one year of intense physio to be pain free again. Before the operation 20 pushups or 10 pull-ups were not a problem, now i struggle with one.
I read about GST in a surfing article about a year back, and was sold! I started with Fundamentals, then slowly added Foundation 1 and the three stretching classes. I've been doing them since with moderate to high consistency (moderate on my surf trips). I feel better than i have in years, being able to surf first thing in the morning feeling loose, before i basically struggled getting out of bed. I have been taking it easy on the PE´s, because i knew it would take me a long time to master the IM´s, and mobility first, right? Stretching wise i can complete FS up to vertical shin in modified versions, TB until the bridgework, MS i struggle with everything.
Now to my question: I had the first episode of minor lower back pain again in a year (surfing), and did hamstring and quad restore 2 times daily for a week, with gave me great relieve.
Today i did a standing pike, and suddenly i could touch the floor cold without even really trying!!! After one year of FS i could barely touch my toes towards the end of a workout.
Should i maybe rather concentrate on doing the Restore series in addition to Foundation for the next couple of month instead of the stretch series? The benefits just blew me away!
Excuse the long post, and thank you for the awesome program!
Bjoern