Eight ways to use a foam roller

1. Chest stretch

Lie on a roller and gently contract your back to open the chest with your arms at various angles. Don't let your arms hang down, but instead, use your back muscles to stabilize the chest. You may need to put your arms on pillows if your range of motion doesn't allow that much movement.

2. Vastus medialis

Find the muscle just inside of the knee and roll slowly, holding on each pressure point up to the hip and back down trying to follow the muscle on the inside portion of the front of the thigh and feel it release. This is the muscle that sits over and above the inside of the knee.

3. Calf muscles

Start at the ankle and roll slowly up towards your knee holding on tight spots letting your muscles relax. Your should use this time to roll the outside, inside and middle portion of the calf.

4. Glute muscles

Your glutes (or buttocks muscles) run in many different directions so start in the middle, close to your sacrum, and roll outwards but also up and down. You can also sit on the roller and move the knee inwards and outwards to create a back and forth motion. 

5. Hamstrings

Start just below the seat bone and roll down to just above the knee. Do this on the inside, the middle and the outside of the back of the leg.

6. IT band

Roll from the knee to the hip on the middle portion of your outer thigh. While you're in this position you can use this on the outside quadriceps (vastus lateralis) and the outside hamstrings (biceps femoris).

7. Quadriceps

Because there are four muscles that make up the quadriceps (which cover the front and side of the thigh), you may want to target various angles. Start just above the knee and roll slowly up the leg, holding on any extra tight spots. Try to relax the muscle being rolled. You can start at different angles around the knee and follow the muscles up the leg. Focus on the inside, middle and outer portions of the quadriceps as well.

8. Shins

The shin muscles run along the bones so you may want to angle the roller from the bone outwards, or roll from the ankle up, targeting the inside of the shin bone and the outside as well.

For more on whether a foam roller is right for you click here.