Can You Use a Rowing Machine with Sciatica?

We all agree that regular aerobic exercise should be a part of our daily life. Aerobic exercise is not only a good way to lose excess fat so as to help us keep a perfect figure, but also has great benefits for keeping our heart and lungs healthy. At the same time we also all know that pure aerobic exercise can only get limited exercise results, but if you use a good piece of aerobic equipment can help our exercise more effective. The fitness rowing machine is an outstanding representative. It is a popular piece of exercise equipment, which can provide you with a low-impact but high aerobic exercise experience, and to ensure that your whole body muscles can get an effective exercise at the same time can also let your joints get enough rest. It can be said that no matter what your fitness goals are, it can help you achieve them.

In recent years, rowing workout machine has become more and more popular in both commercial gyms and home gyms, and there are good reasons for this. This machine also known as indoor rower or ergometer, allows you to imitate the action of rowing on the water and benefit from it without really venturing into the water. For many people, a rowing machine is an ideal piece of exercise equipment because it can bring countless benefits, such as providing low-impact exercise, enhancing cardiovascular endurance, helping you lose weight, effectively exercising your muscles and so on. But it is to some of us, and if you’ve developed sciatica or if sciatica keeps coming back and makes exercise painful, you certainly aren’t alone. Facing such a good piece of exercise equipment as rowing workout machine, you must also want to know whether you can use it with sciatica. I will give you a detailed answer in the following article, please continue reading.

What is sciatica?
Sciatica is a relatively common kind of lower back pain that is typically felt in your buttocks, through the thigh, and leg. The sciatic nerve is the longest nerve in the body, running from the lower portion of your back, near the top of the buttocks, down the back of the thigh, the calf, and the bottom of your foot, all the way to your toes! Sciatic nerve pain is caused by irritation or compression of the nerves that make up the sciatica nerve exiting the lower spine. Sciatica has a variety of symptoms, such as numbness, tingling, burning or weakness in the buttocks or legs, or a sharp pain that may make it difficult to stand up or walk.

Can you use a rowing workout machine with sciatica?
The answer is undoubtedly yes. Nearly all types of exercise that stretch the legs are good for sciatic nerve pain. This includes exercising on a rowing workout machine, a recumbent bike or an elliptical machine. Therefore, if you’ve developed sciatica, you can use rowing exercise machine completely. But if your sciatica or lower back pain acts up when using a rowing workout machine, it could be that you’re not performing the rowing stroke correctly. One of the best ways to stop sciatic nerve issues or lower back pain is to stretch the legs, especially the back of the thighs, and strengthen your core.

What are the ways to prevent and relieve sciatica?
The good news is that sciatica is a non-contact injury, which can be prevented and relieved to a certain degree. Here are a few ways to prevent and relieve sciatica.

1. Remember the important tips of rowing
To prevent and relieve sciatica, you have to keep in mind several important tips when using the rowing machine. First of all, adopt and maintain a neutral spine position throughout the entire stroke. Adopting a slumped position can increase the risk of developing low back injuries such as sciatica. Secondly, you can reduce the amount of lumbar flexion and stress on spinal structures by maintaining an anterior pelvic tilt during the catch phase. Thirdly, stretching of the gluteals and hamstrings can help maintain the ideal pelvic tilt. You can also reduce the amount of anterior pull on your spine by stretching your hip flexors. Finally, emphasize endurance training in the erector spinae muscles in order to reduce excess flexion of the spine.

2. Hot/Ice compress
Heat compress and ice compress can help for both acute and chronic cases of sciatica. If the sciatica is a result of an acute injury, you can use a procedure called contrast bathing. This involves placing ice or a cold compress over the area for 10 minutes and then immediately after placing heat over the area for 10 minutes.

3. Stretching
The good news here is that sciatica can often be reversed. In many cases, you can greatly reduce sciatic nerve pain simply through stretching. When muscles or connective tissue becomes tight (such as what happens when we spend too much time sitting), it puts pressure on the nerve. By stretching the muscles in the legs and back, you can stop or greatly reduce sciatic pain. Therefore, in order to better prevent and relieve sciatica, you'd better do stretching exercises every day, especially before using your fitness rowing machine. But if you feel any intense pain while doing stretching exercises, stop immediately and consult with your doctor or chiropractor.

I believe that after reading this article, you can know that you can use a rowing machine with sciatica. So even if you have sciatica, you can continue to enjoy rowing!