All right!
Last time we were demonstrating plank with breathing. Today we’re going to talk about mobility. A lot of people confuse mobility and flexibility. Let me do quick differentiation.
Flexibility is your total range of motion. If I actively take myself into a position that’s mobility. So, this is mobility. Holding a bar or a pull and stepping into it – that is flexibility. Well, flexibility is great.
If we don’t have a corresponding level of mobility we put ourselves at risk of injury. And when we’re talking about skiing or any sport, that becomes an issue. Ideally the closer our mobility is to our flexibility level, the safer we are, because we can control that range of motion.
Now, I’m gonna go through three exercises that are great for skiing.
We’re gonna walk through them. You can do mobility and flexibility at every joint in the body. But the core, the hips, and that rotational ability is something that’s really important in skiing. That’s what we’re going to dive into today.
The first exercise to test your rotational ability and work on mobility through that pattern is just to cross your arms over your chest, stand up, all in good posture.
Brace your core and we’re gonna keep our hips pretty stable and turn the chest to one side. Come back to the middle, turn the chest to the other side.
Notice whether one side was easier than the other. If you rotate further on one side than the other, it’s pretty common. But, If you are someone who golfs and you are lefty when you rotate towards the right that’s my natural way. If I rotate towards the left it feels more awkward, it’s more restricted in general.
So, if we know that when we think of skiing if you’re skiing down, you’re turning your hips. If you don’t turn well one way that’s going to limit your ability to turn when you’re-up slopes. So by practicing that and training, you can make a big difference.
Stand up tall, rotate one way, rotate the other. Watch the mirror if you need to, so you can see if the hips turn. A lot of people do this and their hips and their ankles and their knees are all turning. Can we keep our lower body stable and rotate the upper body? That’s the important thing to practice. Practice doing it well and you’ll notice you get better quickly.
The next one I’m going to show you is what we call the fetal arm circle or side-lying arm circle.
All right! Now we’re down on the ground in what we call the fetal position. You don’t have to put your hand on your head. What I usually do is put my bottom arm holding my knees, and we’re going to keep them on the ground. Take the top arm, touch it to the ground and you’re going to draw a circle as big as you can around your body, keeping your knees on the ground and keeping your hand touching the ground.
This rotates our bodies. We get a hip stretch here while using the core to turn. It’s actually really good for shoulder mobility as well so when we get there, just reverse it, bring it back, and then back again.
Try keeping those fingertips touching the ground the whole time. Once you’ve done that side flip over, and do the other side again, you’ll notice the difference from one side to the other. Practice it. Work on it.
The next one we’re going to do is called 90-90 hip flow.
I’m going to bend my knees to about 90 degrees. Flex my toes back, sit up in good posture, and from here I’m going to turn. Bring both knees to the ground and across and back again, maintaining the posture.
Tendencies to round your back. Stay up tall, both knees to the ground, keep that 90-degree position posture, as well as your breathing.
Try it! Let me know what you think.
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