I know this is going to come across as me sounding like a broken record, but I completed and filmed my first presentation for Muscle Imbalances Revealed (Upper Body) last night, and all I have to say is…..it’s pretty baller.
Baller = (Adj)
- Exhibiting those qualitites of a baller; not limited to the description of a person, ‘baller’ may be used to describe any place, thing or situation.
Put another way:
Excellence has been pissed.
Without giving away too many spoilers, the title of the first presentation is Corrective Strategies for Overhead Athletes (and Meatheads, Too), and, as the name implies, I essentially run through some common upper body pathologies that we routinely see in the overhead athlete population, as well as the meathead population to boot.
Moreover, I also touch on some assesment protocols, as well as corrective AND programming strategies with regards to things like shoulder “impingement” and AC joint shenanigans. While I geeked out to a small degree, covering some functional anatomy and using some big words and stuff (I used the word ‘plethora’ for example); namely, I just wanted to keep the presentation as “conversational” as possible and focused more on the coaching side of things – which is more of my bread and butter anyways.
As such, I included a TON of videos in my presentation, and figured what better way to wet your palate than to showcase one of those videos as an Exercise You Should Be Doing?
What Is It: Slideboard Miyagi’s
Who Did I Steal It From: your mom! Just kidding. That was mean. Sorry. I actually came up with this badboy myself.
What Does It Do: As I alluded to above, this exercise obviously has some efficacy towards maintaining shoulder health. Specifically, however, its fantastic at activating the serratus anterior, which, as we all know, assists in upward rotation of the scapulae (as well as “fixes” the scapulae against the rib cage), but also tends to be woefully “weak” and/or inhibited in the vast majority of people who are symptomatic with shoulder pain.
In addition, this exercise is also an excellent core stabilization exercise, as the trainee must “engage” his or her anterior/posterior core musculature to maintain proper spinal positioning throughout. So, really, it’s a great bang-for-your-training-buck movement. You should try it sometime (<===== that’s a subtle hint).
Key Coaching Cues: Using either a slideboard, Val Slides, or those cheap furniture glide whatchamacalits you can purchase at Home Depot, assume a proper push-up position making sure to BRACE the abs while not allowing the hips to sag (lumbar hyperextension) or the head to protrude forward. Then, as the name implies, you’ll “wax on and wax off” just like Mr. Miyagi instructed Daniel Son to do on his way to pwning some Cobra Kai ass!
You can do this one of two ways: 1) for time, or 2) for a desired # of reps per arm. I don’t really have any preference which one you choose, either will work just fine.
So, on that note, give it a try and let me know what you think!
