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By now you’ve undoubtedly seen foam rollers lying around the gym, yoga studio, massage parlor, or anyplace you pay money to make your body feel better. (They’re probably in brothels by now.) If you’ve never used one, they’re the cylindrical objects that look less like a fitness implement and more like a flotation device.

"Rolling helps the muscles to relax and let go, which allows joints to move better, so moving is easier," says Susan Stanley, a Master Instructor and Manual Therapist for Equinox and Trigger Point rollers.

Right, but who actually needs these things?

"You need a foam roller if you don’t have full potential range of motion of every joint, have any kind of injury or even stiffness, if you’ve ever sat in a chair, or if you don’t move with the fluidity and grace of a jungle cat."

Oh.

Maybe it’ll help to think of rollers as your own personal masseuse. Rolling, it seems, is regular maintenance we all need to loosen up. For advice on how to actually use these things, we had Stanley break our bodies down part by part.

Calves

**"**Mentally divide your calf into an upper and lower half. Sit on the ground with a tall spine, bent knee, and your opposite leg straight with the roller under your calf. In each section, roll the roller up and down four times, by bending your knee. Then shift your leg back and forth across the roller. Don’t slide or turn the leg—it’s more like scraping ice off a windshield. Repeat this in the upper half of your calf."

Quads

"Divide your quad in half, roll up and down four times, then bend your knee to no more than 90 degrees four times in each half. Do this on the side of the body, just in front of where the seam of your pants would be."

Lats

**"**The two zones in this area are right along the side of your torso. The first zone is right about where your heart rate monitor would rest. The second is the meaty part under the armpit. Lay on your side with the roller under the first zone, and shift back and forth four times. Then sweep your bottom arm up with the palm up, then down with the palm down four times. Then repeat in the upper section."

Pecs

"Only one zone here, as there’s not a lot of space. Lay face down with the foam roller under the area where your chest meets your shoulder. The foam roller should be at an angle from your collarbone to your armpit. Roll by shifting your body four times, then sweep the arm up and down four times."

Your New Home Workout: Yoga

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