8 active CUMBRIA cycling/the great outdoors Pilates can really help you get back to good health f I ran a business and my re-name it laughter therapy. It personnel office told me that encourages oxygenated blood to Ioutput was down due to the flow to the area the needle has fact that 10 per cent of the been inserted which boosts workforce were off sick, I’d be circulation, easing lactic acid pretty anxious. and alleviating pain. These Back-pain is the blight of many combinations worked to ease individuals and when levels of backache and, in my experience, staff absenteeism from the can be quite a tonic. In the same workplace due to its effects, Help: way that movement can provide reach such high levels there are Malcolm the answer to the problem once it serious issues to be addressed. Thomson has occurred, so it can be the You see, it doesn’t just affect the takes part prevention. employee with the backache. The very same movements that There are significant in a Pilates the therapists use to ease the consequences. taster tightness caused by backache are Back problems can affect session with the ones that strengthen the almost anyone in their day job. In Carol smaller muscles around our fact, it’s estimated that the Westmorland joints and make us more robust agonising affliction costs the UK and better able to avoid the economy £5 billion a year and problem in the first place. that 10 million working days are between. Unsurprisingly, most sneezed unexpectedly. Either way, technique to release joints that Something Pilates practices. lost annually because of people wish they had started to when you are in the initial stage have got stuck, the therapist Indeed, this is where we musculoskeletal problems care for their backs and joints of acuteness, try to take it easy combined massage and started. Businesses and including lower back pain. sooner in the acute stage before for the next 24 hours. Do not to mobilisation to the soft tissues individuals alike seem to need to The traditional remedy for a it became chronic. stop altogether, but take things at with a short, sharp thrust so that be reminded of the benefits of ‘bad’ back is to dose up on I recall being told, some time a gentler pace if you can. the stretch went through to the prevention over cure. painkillers and take lots of bed ago, by my father that cycling If that is impossible, then lie on underlying joint. This thrust, A workforce that can reduce its rest. A more modern approach is shoes were not designed to be your back and with knees tucked with its associated cracking absenteeism by any margin to engage in movement with no walked in. After time they wear gently in to your chest rock from noise, is thought to release through providing on-site bed rest and minimal medication. down and will then not fit side to side. In the privacy of carbon dioxide trapped in the preventative therapy will find it Masking the very feeling you are properly onto the pedal. This your own home! This is joints so that the fluid between money well spent. experiencing with pain relief will once led to a very regrettable important to keep your healthy joints can flow into its It doubles as a way of ensuring only prevent you being able to incident involving a call of circulation moving. place, lubricating the bones and that the employer can be seen to ‘tune in’ to your body. nature, hot tarmac and a slope. You may already have a easing movement. It even sounds genuinely care about the well In any given day, I see a variety Fortunately the combination of a relationship with a local fantastic in black and white. being of its workforce. of people with lower back pain in time trial –my body was full of physiotherapist, osteopath or You could also combine No individual in their right my Pilates classes. They may endorphins and three weeks of chiropractor. If not, after three massage with osteopathy and mind wants to be laid low with differ in age, size and weight and intensive help put me right. days, it is worth being put in acupuncture, using needles in back or joint problems. A regime their issues may be caused by When, as I frequently hear in my touch with a professional who the muscles which are cramped of what is, after all, gentle bad posture, arthritic limitation work the words, ‘I landed on my can give you the very best care. It and causing pain and also in the exercise, will build up strength through injury and sport or coccyx’surface I have my own is recommended that you seek traditional energy meridians. and improve postural stability other. My purpose is to help them fond memories. help early. My first acupuncture session that will go a significant way manage their back and joint pain Back pain can occur, unlike my I received manipulative was extraordinary. towards reducing the risk now, by awareness, through movement experience, without necessarily therapy for an injury which, I left the clinic giggling for no and in the future, of being and strengthening, to ensure knowing the cause. You may have although uncomfortable, worked good reason for the rest of the afflicted. future episodes are few and far slept awkwardly or simply immediately. Using an age-old day. In my opinion they should Quality of life is restored. Can I end my Wainwright collection on a real high? ’ve never been much of a including High Pike, which is a Active Cumbria, I decided to make times on my way to somewhere ‘collector’. I briefly flirted favourite of mine on summer a detour to ‘bag’ Catstye Cam. The more interesting. Iwith stamps as a child and – evenings. And I’ve lost count of previous weekend, while on the So, what’s it to be? Soggy Sour confession time –Istill have how many times I’ve climbed fells between Ennerdale and Howes or Sallows? Nondescript a horde of Abba memorabilia in Skiddaw and Helvellyn. But his Wasdale, I decided it was time to Seathwaite Fell? Or Armboth Fell, my loft. (In my defence, it was the comment got me wondering how tick off Steeple too, adding a which even Wainwright described 1970s and I was very young!) But many Wainwrights I’d ‘done’. couple of hundred feet of ascent to as one of the few fells that are “not –and here’s another confession – So, I downloaded a list from the an already tough outing. really worth climbing”? I’ve got a I have recently become hooked on internet and started counting... I’d My biggest problem now is feeling it’s going to be Kirk Fell the Wainwrights. done about 160. Since then, trying to decide which of the because every time I look at that A few years ago, a friend of mine without really dedicating myself to remaining fells I should save for amorphous lump, it simply looks proudly announced he was coming the task, I’ve ticked a few more off, my grand finale. Nothing too too much like hard work. An to the end of his plan to climb all but these have largely been as a tough, just in case I decide to pop unrelenting ridge that climbs a 214 of the fells given their own by-product of walks rather than as open a bottle of something bubbly massive 2,300ft in just one mile; a chapter in Alfred Wainwright’s an end in themselves. That is until with a few friends –but it needs to tricky scramble up from Black Sail seven Pictorial Guides to the very recently. .. be a top worthy of celebration. Pass; or a steep, loose clamber from Lakeland Fells –known as the With only 24 Wainwrights left, That’s where the problem lies. In Beckhead Tarn. These are the Wainwrights. “Oh, you’ve probably I’ve suddenly become more serious almost every case, those 24 fells routes on to Kirk Fell. None of done them all four or five times, about completing this popular hill- haven’t been climbed because I’ve them appeals. And it’s not exactly a haven’t you?” he said. walking challenge. While out simply had no desire to climb fitting tribute to so many wonderful Well, there are some fells that researching the Red Tarn route them or, as in the case of Rossett years of fell-walking. Maybe I need I’ve been up dozens of times, that appears in this edition of Pike, I’ve bypassed them countless to give this more thought....