Mobility Work

We all know how important it is to be mobile…so why don’t more of us incorporate mobility into our training?  Too ofteen we focus on the main even, muscle growth, strength, cardiovascualr fitness and even flexibility but too few of us inncorporate mobility work into our routunes.

Mobility work is a great way to warm up for a full workout, just a quick 10-15 minutes is enough to prepare your body for the moves to follow, its great for strengthening tissues around the joints and for ensuring there is enough synovial fluid build up to create cushioning for joints meaning your less prone to injury.  I use this for every workout i do, or every strenuous activity, so if i working with weights, pratising yoga or working with my dad on a building site its great preparation.

I also like to perform a longer version about every 4th day, getting more in depth moves with more reps to work on general range of motion and keeping everything mobilized on my rest days.  The moves i use generally origionate from the tacfit teams workouts with a few variation, although the accompanying facial expressions for some of the moves are all my own! ha ha

Long term it can help keep a wide range of motion throughout life, so less ageing to joints and its a great way to compensate for the reduction of the range of motion often experienced with lots of resistance training.   Its also good for co-ordination, some of the more complex moves (not shown in this clip, maybe later) can be quite a challenge to get both sides doing the same moves or indeed different things at the same time, or just to get your body moving through a new range of motions.

Mentally its a great way for either preparing your mind for a workout to follow or when im using it on my rest days, i find it quite theraputic, particularly once you know the moves and can follow them through without too much thought, the rhythmic, yet reletively gental movements seem to let the mind wander…well either wander or focus depending on what you need at the time.  It gives you a time where the body is active, but your mind is free!

Anyway here is a short clip of some of the basic moves i use for my warmups, give them a go.  I’ll follow up sometime with some of the more complex moves and some longer clips.