Hi.

No stress about the overactivity thing

For me, something is overactive when it is inappropriately activated - if that makes sense... For instance, during relaxed standing, your should not have your obliques switched on since they are a phasic muscle and relaxed standing (not doing anything) is a tonic muscle activity.

Another example is when your patient is lying prone and their hams are obviously not relaxed and you have to keep reminding them to "let go" of their muscles or "relax" and then they switch them off for a short period of time but they gradually come back on again.

For me, their "normal" pattern of muscle activation is stuffed.

In contrast, a tight muscle is where the physical length of the muscle is decreased at rest. This can be seen well in women who wear high heeled shoes for most of their life - short soleus muscles.

A simple example for seeing an obvious difference in a test would be a passive SLR. Get the patient (or a friend) to active their hams and then do a SLR. Vary the amount they switch their hams on and you will get a varying amount of ROM. Ask them to completely relax and re do the test. You should get further.

A simple rule is that phasic muscles should only be really used during phasic activity. If you are trying to teach someone how to switch on their "core" in supine or crook-lying (supine with knees bent), you have to watch for the activation of the obliques and rectus abdominus. But if you were getting them to do a roll-up from supine with a twist, then you are concentrating more on having the sequence of core before phasics because movement of the trunk will require the obliques.

In the case of this biker, are his deep posterior hip rotators tight or overactive? Are his muscles balanced?

Hope that helps - and that I got it right! Please correct me if I didn't explain it properly...:lol