Hey guys… it’s Stephen here from CORE Therapy and Pilates, I hope it’s a great week for you.
I want to go into our second video for our spring break skiers series… so lets build on what we started last time where we started talking about the arches and the ankles. Today we’re gonna still think about the arches and the ankles but we’re gonna work up into the knees a little bit…
Ski Series #2… we will get into the knees when we do some squats and lunges with different varieties. I’ve taken my shoes off off because I like to do the strengthening with the shoes off… if your shoes are on you’re not going to change the position of your arch, you’re just going to feed into the position that your shoe is holding you in. I want you lifting those toes, lifting those arches with all of the strengthening… so with that said, let’s jump into a little bit of work. In this standing position we’re going to create that same lift that I talked about the other day (Ski Series #1) and then relax… the toes lift and splay, the arch lifts then as we are in that position we’re going to go into a squat and up, it’s a Mini Squat… lift the toes, lift the arches and squat and as you’re doing this you want to think of keeping the back and core engaged as well. You don’t want to be arching your low back, but instead keeping your back in a good neutral position… so there’s a mini squat….
Alright then we’re going to take our heels together and we’re gonna lift that arch we’re going to do bend those knees in an outward motion like this. Now I’m not a dancer but this is called a Plié in the dance world… so as we’re getting into this position we’re still strengthening our knees but yet we’re still strengthening the arches at the same time… back and forth, now this gets a little bit of some different activation in the glutes firing in this position.
Alright so we’re squatting for 20 reps in parallel and then we’re doing it turned out… Don’t forget to breathe…Inhale as you bend the knees and exhale to straighten the knees.
Now we’re going to do a Lunge Series for 5-10 reps … for the lunge series, what I like to do is, show you lunge series (2 reps shown) with the left leg and then we’ll do it with the right leg… so I like to go forward and lunge, come up, do it at 45° and lunge, come up go lateral and lunge and back and lunge, forward and repeat… back to the front.
Now we’ll switch legs and do the same thing… forward lunge, 45° lunge and lateral lunge, 45° lunge and forward lunge and we’ll do that one more time… good and good…
Alright so that’s getting real heavy into the quads, now we will do another one for the quads that will require a step or stairs or you can take a couple of books or a yoga block to stand on to to do this. So now we’re going to stand on the step and the idea is to create that arch in the right foot and I’m lowering down to touch the left heel to the ground… It’s called a Lateral Step Up… and do it on the other side, create the lift of the arch, a little less control on this side for me, it’s a little tougher at that very end range.
Okay so that’s a lunge progression and a lateral step up, alright now what we want to do is work the hamstrings with a Bridge a little bit because they need to be strong as well. So we’re going to get into position here on your back with your feet up on the big swiss ball… now you’re going to lift your rear end in the air, firing your glutes and hamstrings, engaging your core… Lift up in the air, hold and lower down. We’re going to take an inhale without moving, exhale lift, take an inhale at the top of the bridge and then exhale to lower your pelvis and spine down. To challenge you more, we will go up into a bridge and then bend the knees and go back (straightne the knees) and then lower the hips… Good…
So those are some things to work on to strengthen the back line of the body after working on those quads, because we don’t want to just be quad dominant… The quads are going to be way over worked when it comes to skiing just based on the position you’re in…like this… so they’ve got to be ready for that…
That’s what we got for you today: the lunge progression: forward, 45°, to the side… some squats some pliés and then step ups and then some bridging on the back… Alright guys that’s it for today I hope that helps and makes sense we’ll see you around next week…
Take care…
Do you need some treatment before heading to the mountains for Spring Break? Back Pain, Knee Pain and Hip Pain make for a bad skiing trip. Call 512-215-4227 NOW and we will listen to your story… And then help you reach your goals…
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