Somonauk Blue Room Blog: Topic of the week 1: Posterior Chain

I have came up with the idea of having a topic of the week for this blog and the lifetime fitness classroom. This weeks topic is the Posterior Chain. This consists of your lower back, glutes, and hamstrings. I focused on this topic for a couple of reasons.
With high school athletes and students I often see people with very poor hamstring and lower back flexibility. This greatly reduces our performance in athletics, as well as poor posture in our everyday lives. As a Coach I often see athletes who are great accelerators but below average stoppers. Often they lose their balance while slowing down, or perform the skill they are performing at a much lower level.

Things to remember:
Good athletes have amazing control of their bodies
Don't over work the quadricep and forget about the hamstring
Always start light and slow when working the posterior chain

Exercises:
1. Dynamic stretching before any activity. This works on balance, skill performance, and muscle flexibility while warming up for activity.

2. Static stretching after any activity. This old school type of stretching should not be performed before activity due to it's negative effect on muscle performance.

3. Supine Bridges Back & heels on the floor. Knees bent at 90°. Curl your toes up. Lift your hips by squeezing your glutes until your body is straight from knees to shoulders. Hold for 5 seconds, come back down, repeat.

4.Mule Kicks. Bend over on a bench. Face down & hands on the floor. Kick 1 leg back & up by extending your hip and squeezing your glute. Hold the contraction for 5 seconds and come back. Repeat for 10 reps, switch legs.

* Don’t Use Your Lower Back. Keep your spine neutral. Brace your abs hard as if someone would punch you in the stomach.
* Don’t Use Your Hamstrings. Squeeze your glutes hard while extending your hips. You can bend your knee.
* Quality not Quantity. The goal is not get as high as possible, the goal is to squeeze your glute as hard as you can. Lead with your glute.

5. Birddogs. Get on all 4s. Arms & thighs perpendicular to the floor. Brace your abs as if someone is going to punch you in the stomach. Extend your hip while extending your opposite arm.

* Keep Your Spine Neutral. Don’t hyper-extend or arch your lower back. Brace your abs. Put a water bottle on your lower back for feedback.
* Quality not Quantity. If you can’t do them correctly, keep both arms on the floor. If that’s still too hard, go back to mule kicks.

6. Fire Hydrants. Get on all 4s. Arms & thighs perpendicular to the floor. Lift 1 leg to the side by contracting your glute. Press your heel back by extending your leg. Come back. Repeat. This is a mix of birddogs & clams.

* Keep Your Spine Neutral. Don’t hyper-extend/arch/rotate your lower back. Keep your abs braced.
* Don’t Use Your Hamstrings. Cramps in your hamstrings means you’re not using your glutes. Squeeze your glutes as hard as you can.
* Quality not Quantity. The goal is not to go fast or doing a lot of reps. The goal is squeezing your glutes. Hold each position.
Source:http://stronglifts.com/how-to-optimize-posterior-chain-power-glute-activation/

7. Romanian Deadlifts http://www.exrx.net/WeightExercises/OlympicLifts/RomanianDeadlift.html