***[This post is repeated on the Page, "SI, Artists, Athletes & Everyone Else"]***
Sometimes performance has reached a plateau and needs more than a push. Sometimes old injuries decrease flexibility or even prevent us from practicing our sport. Structural Integration can help the athlete by freeing up range of motion, creating better body alignment and balance, relieving chronic strain, and fine-tuning specific movements to improve performance.
In most sports, the results of Structural Integration—length, flexibility, balance, and more efficient use of the body—are assets. Strength is improved because muscles that are no longer stiff, contracted and/or held have greater range of motion and therefore greater power. Length and flexibility are increased for the same reasons. Balance is better because Structural Integration helps to unwind rotations in the joints and allows muscles to do their job without being held back by other tissues.
Every body is different, and the theories behind Structural Integration provide the flexibility to cater each session to the client’s individual needs while reaching toward the goal of alignment with gravity. The basic “recipe” of Structural Integration is comprised of ten sessions called the Ten Series. Because each body is unique, every session is catered to the individual, meaning no two series are ever alike. As a matter of fact, because the body is not perfectly symmetrical, how each side of the same body is worked is unique. That means no two runners will ever get the same rote strokes, nor will all swimmers or all cyclists, for that matter. During our sessions, the client’s sport will be integrated into the work with the intention of creating healthier movement patterns for that individual. As a practitioner, I work with each athlete to create a customized strategy in order to encourage the healthiest performance.
