Many athletes especially baseball players are familiar with the rotator cuff muscles of the shoulder and the importance of properly stretching these muscles. There are 4 rotator cuff muscles which function as dynamic stabilizers in the shoulder. They are the subscapularis, supraspinatus, infraspinatus, and teres minor. These posterior rotator cuff muscles, specifically the infraspinatus and…
The Upper Body Step Up is a great strengthening and stability exercise for your shoulders. Two major joints help to create shoulder movement. They are your glenohumeral joint (ball and socket joint) and your scapularthoracic joint (aka shoulder blade). These two joints along with the sternoclavicular and the acromioclavicular joints must all work together to…
Rice bucket? If you were to ask any Major League baseball player what a rice bucket is, they would all be able to answer you. And that is because they have all used a rice bucket in their baseball careers to strengthen their hands, wrists, and forearms. The rice bucket is very common in the…
The push-up one arm row is a great upper body exercise. This exercise is a combination of two exercises: the push-up which strengthens your chest and arms and the one arm row which strengthens your upper back. By combining these two exercises, the traditional push-up exercise becomes more challenging and the one arm row involves…
The bridge rotation is a great core exercise to incorporate into your present core stability program. This exercise will strengthen your transverse abdominus and oblique muscles. The bridge rotation will guarantee to challenge you by the instability of the swiss ball and especially when your weight is increased. 1) First, lay with your head and…
The plank knee punch is a great core exercise and provides a variation to your plank hold exercise which is typically performed on the floor. By using a swiss exercise ball, the plank knee punch will require a greater level of core stability. This exercise will strengthen your transverse abdominus muscle and will fire your…
The catcher step up is a great exercise to strengthen your lower body. This exercise primarily activates and develops your quadriceps, hamstring, and gluteal muscles and has an upper body component. This exercise is performed with a 4-6 inch step and can be progressed to an 8-12 inch step as shown in the figures below.…
The hamstring curl plus bridge is a great exercise for toning and strengthening your hamstrings, gluteals, as well as core muscles. The two exercises, the hamstring curl and the bridge, are done as a superset. A superset is when you perform two exercises in a row with minimal to no rest in between. For example,…
The common front lunge exercise can be made more dynamic and functional to help strengthen not only your lower body muscles but your upper body muscles as well. This new exercise called the front lunge row is a front lunge combined with an upper body row. This exercise targets your lower body muscles such as…
The Scarecrow exercise is a great addition to any upper body workout program. The overhead athlete participating in such sports as baseball, volleyball, and tennis will greatly benefit from adding this exercise to their shoulder routine. This exercise not only works your rotator cuff muscles, which helps shoulder stability, but your posterior and lateral deltoid…