Photo by Bev Childress

Many people focus on static passive stretching as a means to increase mobility. I’m here to tell you that it may accomplish this, it’s true, but there is a better way. In my opinion, passive static stretching in adults does very little. Weighted mobility is the approach I take with my athletes and in my Gymnastic Strength Program.

There are three types of clients I come across most often. Are you one of these?

• Flexible + Weak
• Strong + Tight
• Tight + Weak

Weighted mobility can help in each of these situations.

Flexible + Weak

Flexibility with little strength through an increased range of motion (ROM) does very little for a person and can be a set up for injury. There is little benefit to being able to place your body through a wide ROM if you have no control over it. Take for example forward folding your face and torso to your knees while standing with straight legs compared to hanging and lifting your legs towards your face in a leg raise.

Weighted mobility forces these types of athletes to control and strengthen their already wide ROM. It is a misconception that they need to “tighten up.” They just need to get stronger. Applying resistance is a perfect way to achieve this. Don’t force these athletes to lose their flexibility, teach them to own it.

Strong + Tight

This section is for those who are strong and have large muscles but can barely move. We’ve all seen these individuals. They have plenty of strength but struggle to get down on the ground. They work up more of a sweat during stretching than any other part of their workout and find navigating through a narrow space the biggest obstacle they’ve ever encountered.

These individuals have such bulky muscles and so much tension that they practically get nothing out of just reaching for their toes. They need something pulling them down, fatiguing the muscles slightly so that they can increase their ROM. This application of a resistive force leads to connective tissue adaptation.

Weak + Tight

These folks are our desk workaholics. Years of sitting and not doing any ROM exercises has pulled their shoulders forward. It has shortened their hip flexors and caused their hamstrings to become extremely tight, among other mobility issues. It should be obvious at this point what the solution for these individuals is—weighted active stretching will both strengthen and increase the ROM for your classic “workaholic.”

Weighted Stretching Has Many Benefits

There are many ways to move, increase range of motion, and strengthen muscle. The benefit of weighted stretching is that it covers a lot while doing a little. Any time we can condense our training into movements that give us more bang for the buck, I’m all for it. This helps free up time to train what is more fun or sport-specific. Try it out. See what incorporating weighted mobility into your routine can do for you.

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Most people involved in fitness train using pulling and pushing exercises in the forward and overhead positions (e.g. rowing, push ups, bench press; pull ups, military press), but rarely train the pull and push backwards. This lack of shoulder extension strength and mobility often contributes to achy shoulders. Can you relate to this? If you can, don’t worry, I’m here to get you started on making your shoulders more well rounded and pain-free.

Shoulder Extension Stretch

Let’s start introducing some shoulder extension through some light stretching. While seated on the ground, place your hands (palms facing down) behind you, about shoulder width apart with your thumbs pointing away from each other. From this position slowly slide your hips away from your hands as far as possible and hold for about 30 seconds. As your mobility improves, your hands can be placed narrower than shoulder width, so that eventually they are touching. Check out these 3 Exercises To Improve Your Shoulder Mobility.

Table Raises and Reverse Plank Holds

Now that we have started the process with some stretching, let’s load the position. I use two exercises for this. In the table raise, you will start seated on the ground with your hands behind you as in the shoulder extension stretch. From here, bend your knees and place your feet flat on the ground. Lift your hips and chest up towards the ceiling so that you resemble a table.

For the reverse plank, start seated with your legs straight and your arms placed on the floor behind you. From this position, lift your hips and chest towards the ceiling. I like to take two different approaches to these exercises:

1. Stay in each position for a longer hold to both build strength and mobility (hold for 10-60s depending on the athlete).
2. Use the 10x10s approach. This is an approach is better for a quick loosening up—you do 10 repetitions of the movement and on the last rep hold for 10 seconds.

Skin the Cat

These are a great way to start building strength in shoulder extension that will later progress towards skills like the back lever. This should be loaded progressively. Ideally, you can use a spotter to assist you through the exercises, with the spotter assisting less and less as time goes on. If you are training on your own, I’d suggest progressions that I use in our Gymnastic Strength Training Program where you start on the ground with light loads and gradually progress to working on the rings.

When not performing any of the above mentioned skills, placing your hands behind you regularly can strengthen the posterior shoulders and stretch the anterior shoulders and chest.

Piked Shoulder Extension Pulls

Here is another excellent stretch for the shoulders. Use a weight that is appropriate to your strength and skill level.

Balancing Your Shoulders Is Important

Many individuals, either sedentary or active, cause their own shoulder issues by over developing the anterior shoulders and/or under-developing the posterior shoulders. This type of situation leads to pain and chronic tension that limits a person’s ability to grow in more complex movements. It is an issue that I often run into with clients coming to me to develop their muscle up or improve their Olympic weightlifting technique, among other scenarios. A lack of shoulder extension mobility makes the transition phase of the muscle up difficult, sometimes impossible. My article demonstrating progressions for muscle ups is a good resource for some of the things you will need to know.

For my weightlifters, keeping the bar properly positioned overhead to successfully achieve a lift and reduce the risk of injury is made possible with appropriate range of motion and strength in the shoulders. These are only two examples among many that convey the merits of training shoulder extension when it comes fitness goals. Even for those individuals who don’t desire more complex movements in their training, shoulder extension is essential for overall shoulder health and injury prevention and can be very easily trained. Don’t skip your shoulders, they will thank you.

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Do you press weights overhead frequently? Or stand on your hands regularly? Or maybe you spend a lot of time with your elbows bent, and your hands in front of you? If any of these situations sound familiar, do your shoulders or upper back feel tight?

While pressing and handstanding may seem to have little in common other than the straight arm position at the top, they both require load to be dispersed across the shoulder girdle. When you press a weight overhead, the load from the weight comes down, into the arm, and into the scapulae, where, depending on the position you are in, the muscles of the back and torso work to resist the overhead load and not buckle. The legs and hips provide additional support to the movement, keeping the low back and pelvis from moving.

The Anatomy of Pressing

When you handstand, you press into the floor. The load from the floor moves up through the arm, into the upper extremity, and the muscles of the torso work to stabilize. If the legs are engaged, the line will be straighter because their contraction acts to counterbalance the downward force by reaching towards the ceiling.

For both of the skills, total body strength is beneficial. It allows the load to be dealt with using more of the body. While this makes things feel a little more challenging in the moment, it enables you to generate more force and do more work over the long run.

However, there is a tipping point. If you only press weights (or your body) overhead, you are more than likely going to develop a sense of tightness through the shoulders. It could be general fatigue, as though your upper back is tired and your neck is tight (whatever that means), or it could be you feel your arms are restricted and no longer have the range of motion they once did.

What does the person who spends hours typing have to do with any of this? Your grow into the position you spend the most time in. If you spend many hours a day with your hands in front of you on a keyboard, your upper arm not moving, your shoulders are going to become very comfortable in that position. If you never move the arms into the opposite direction, you no longer have access to a full range of motion through the joint.

Create a Plan of Action

What can you do? If you are a weight room enthusiast, you probably already balance out your pressing work with pulling, and more than likely you do farmer carries to load the arms in a downward position. However, you probably still feel like an element of your workout program is missing.

If you are a desk worker, toying with becoming a weight room enthusiast but feel foiled by your lack of range of motion, moving the arms around through the day will help immensely. I always encourage my professional clients to change their position, including their arms, once an hour. Whether that’s taking a moment to reach the arms forward, overhead, or back, or making some arm/shoulder circles, encouraging the joints to move in different positions promotes good joint health.

Hanging for Shoulder Health

After about a year of working consistently on handstands, I noticed my shoulder mobility wasn’t getting any better. My hands stubbornly stayed a little wider than I wanted, and I struggled to maintain an evenly balanced position in my hands. My upper arms moved slightly inwards to elevate my shoulders in the top position. The worst part about it was that I could feel myself doing it and couldn’t quite figure out how to stop it.

Like all good fitness professionals, I went on a mission to deal with my shoulder mobility. I tried a variety of things, to no avail, and it wasn’t until hanging started showing up regularly in my life that things began to change.

Hanging differs from pull ups. It’s kind of like the difference between holding a plank and moving through a plank to do a push up—both are good, but planks offer an opportunity to focus on set up and experience.

When you hang, load is no longer being moved down into the shoulder girdle. Instead, gravity is pulling the body down, away from the bar. Another way to think of it is like this: overhead work compresses the upper extremity while hanging work decompresses the upper extremity.

If you follow fascia research at all (because that’s what everyone does in their spare time, right?), the fascia researchers might suggest hanging is a good way to elicit a stretch response in the myofascial system. Fascia is the plastic wrap like coating that surrounds your muscles and tissues. It links muscles together and is believed to be partially responsible for the transmittal of force throughout the musculoskeletal system.¹ The involuntary stretching of soft tissue that occurs while hanging is similar to the stretch-yawn-syndrome (aka pandiculation) that researchers speculate may help with intramuscular coordination necessary for integrated movement.

In addition, hanging feels good. Almost everyone I have ever met with low back pain enjoys hanging as an immediate way to feel better. Maybe it’s the involuntary stretch noted above, or maybe it’s the fact that you are literally taking a load off the area that feels kind of crummy. The thoracolumbar fascia is thick connective tissue that essentially connects the head to the tail.² Think of it as one of the ways force moves from the upper extremity to the lower extremity or vice versa—it’s like a trail map moving the force across channels. When you hang, this area is stretched as force pulls the feet down and your hands counterbalance the movement overhead.

What Is It About Hanging?

What makes hanging different from many of the mobility techniques out there is the stretch is involuntary. If your arms don’t go overhead, you can’t hang on and you will fall. In addition, if your grip strength is lacking, you won’t have the ability to hold on for very long. This isn’t necessarily bad, but it can be helpful for shoulder mobility to increase your hanging endurance progressively and slowly, giving your tissues time to adapt to the new position and your hands a chance to build the necessary strength needed to grasp the bar.

One other aspect to hanging, and all mobility training, really, is I have found that when you spend time in positions doing other things, you get stronger and more flexible without thinking about “stretching.” What I mean by this is that if you hang and you do something with your legs, or you hang and you work on shifting your weight, you spend more time than you normally would in that position and your mind is focused on whatever movement you are making, rather than fixating on the discomfort of the stretch.

Research consistently suggests we are physically capable of more than we think we are. Our brains register discomfort in the form of muscular fatigue quickly.³ Overriding the sensation of discomfort, once we are fixated on it, is extremely difficult. Instead, thinking about something else takes our minds off the uncomfortable, fatiguing position and instead takes the focal point to the task at hand. (As an aside, it is important to be able to discern between muscular discomfort and pain. They are different, and I am not suggesting you ignore a position that feels painful.)

Hanging: Practical Application

It’s helpful to have a baseline before you implement mobility training into your routine. Set a timer. Hang from a bar. Just hang, no movement. How quickly do you fatigue?

If you don’t even feel comfortable hanging from a bar, here is a quick tutorial covering how to move from feet on the ground to feet off of the ground. If you work on this twice a week for a month, you will be much closer to hanging from a bar unassisted.

Now that you have a baseline, pick one or two days a week where hanging makes sense. I like hanging on days I do handstands. Hanging deloads my wrists and makes me feel effortlessly long. I find it harder to hang on days when I am doing farmer’s carries or deadlifts. My grip strength is usually the first to go when I hang, and lifting heavy things first impacts my ability to hold on to the bar for very long.

Below are four ideas of different hanging drills. Pick one or two to work on during days you hang. You can vary them, doing different combinations each time or you can work on two for a little while, and then choose a different combination for a little while. The goal is to build up stamina in the position, not work so hard you can’t lift your arms the next day.

And these are just ideas. You can swing, go side to side, practice swinging from one arm, or find a set of monkey bars and swing across them. Whatever you choose to do, develop a sense of control by building up the strength and endurance to hang from both arms without feeling unsettled when your feet leave the ground. Remember, mastering the basics are the foundation for success.

How to Program Hangs

Start with one set of low reps (4-6 reps) for the first week, or choose a specific amount of time to hang that you can tolerate. Starting with 10 seconds and working progressively towards a full minute can be a good goal. The second week, add a second set, gradually working up to four sets. Once you can do four sets easily, begin slowly increasing the reps, working towards 10 reps. Remember, you are working on increasing your mobility. While strength is a by-product, don’t view hanging as a traditional strength exercise.

If you have access to a pull up bar (or well placed tree branch), hanging periodically throughout the day is another way to improve your tolerance to this position. Plus, if you have a desk job, it feels good.

Add Hanging to Your Routine

Hanging falls into the nebulous category of not exactly being a strength exercise (though it will strengthen your grip and shoulders), and, while it’s a mobility exercise, it’s not a position everyone can get into right away. There is a bit of prep work required before many people can think about hanging comfortably. Most of us don’t spend a lot of time with our arms straight in the overhead position, which means the endurance takes a little while to build. However, if you like to lift heavy things over your head, balance on your hands, or you sit for any length of time, hanging can benefit your upper body in ways traditional stretching can’t quite achieve. So embrace your neighborhood park and channel your inner simian to reclaim freedom of movement in your shoulders.

References:

1. Bertolucci, L.F., (2011). Pandiculation: Nature’s way of maintaining the functional integrity of the myofascial system? Journal of Bodywork and Movement Therapies, 15(3), 268-280.

2. Willard, F.H., Vleeming, A., Schuenke, M.D., Danneels, L., and Schleip, R., (2012). Thoracolumbar fascia: anatomy, function, and clinical considerations. Journal of Anatomy, 221(6), 507-536.

3. Noakes, T.D., (2012). Fatigue is a brain-derived emotion that regulates the exercise behavior to ensure the protection of whole body homeostasis. Frontiers in Physiology. 3(82).

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You do not need to train the kettlebell overhead squat in excess. Like the pistol and many other movements that require an extreme range of motion, the kettlebell overhead squat risk:reward ratio remains too high to train it with intensity for most athletes. You can achieve a similar training effect through many other safer movements.

All of that said, it is important to have (or be working toward) access to the full range of motion in at least the single-arm version. The overhead position, upright squat, balance, and stability that the kettlebell overhead squat requires designate a capable and mobile athlete. I use it mostly as a diagnostic tool to periodically revisit to measure progress. Once you achieve a proficient position, you can add intensity with longer sets, extended holds, and heavier weights.

Work your mobility you need for this movement on three fronts:

• Shoulders and overhead position: Improve these with the arm bar and crooked arm bar.
• Thoracic spine: Work both extension and twisting with the kettlebell windmill.
• Squat Position: Work hip external rotation, but do not forget the often overlooked piece of dorsiflexion (ie. how far your knees can go over your toes).

Kettlebell Overhead Squat Cues and Pointers

As with all new or technical movements, hold a few key points in your mind as you perform them. Remember these aspects as your train the kettlebell overhead squat.

Wear the Weight Through Your Whole Working Side

While standing in overhead lockout, actively push the weight up with every piece of the chain from your foot to your hand. Press your foot into the ground. Feel your leg, hip, and butt engage. Extend your spine and shoulder.

Rather than simply stacking underneath the weight in support, actively push the kettlebell away from the ground to remain engaged through your entire working side. Maintain this tension and intention throughout the entire range of motion.

Turn on Tension in Your Opposite Side

You will inherently bear more loading on the working side in a single-arm movement. As with other two-leg/single-arm movements like the one-arm swing and press, use tools to turn on full engagement through your entire body.

Your opposite side will not naturally engage as much, but you can manufacture tension to remain engaged through your full body. Make a tight fist in your empty hand to turn on your opposite side arm, shoulder, and core.

Squeeze Your Abs

Press your opposite foot into the ground and drive your opposite knee out. As you descend into full squat depth, your working side leg will inevitably bear more load. This can lead to leaning excessively to this side, and allowing your opposite knee and hip to collapse. Actively pressing into your opposite foot will keep your hips square, and the load distributed more evenly.

Resist the Twist

While the single-arm kettlebell overhead squat allows for some thoracic twisting (like a windmill or bent press), keep it minimal. Be sure to remain active and engaged through both sides as you allow a small twist.

Let the twist come from actively reaching your working shoulder up, rather than dropping your unloaded shoulder. Maintain a proud posture and twist your entire shoulder line with a neutral spine. Do not allow your twist to lead to collapse.

Excessive twisting can lead to a complete collapse in your opposite side. This looks like the shoulder and arm dropping toward the middle, core deflating as your unloaded-side ribs accordion together, and the knee, foot, and hips collapse in.

You can train some intentional twist to supplement your windmill and bent press training. Remember that a more square and upright position will improve your overhead and squat mobility. Resisting the twist will help you develop the double kettlebell version.

How to Get There From Here

• Overhead Carries – Train both double and single-arm overhead carries. Adding motion and time to your overhead lockout increases stability in that position.

• Overhead Lunges – Overhead lunges offer a perfect introduction to kettlebell overhead squatting. Develop your stability and overhead mobility here before progressing to the overhead squat. Lunges also offer the best alternative for training volume and weight for those who cannot yet access the full overhead squat position.

• Overhead Box Squats – Overhead squat to a target (box, bench, ball, etc.) to shorten the range of motion. Select a depth that brings you to the limits of where you can maintain an upright position and strong lockout. Incrementally lower your target as your mobility improves.

• Elevate Your Heels – Elevate your heels to remove some of your squat mobility limitations. Great options include Olympic lifting shoes, small metal plates, a folded towel, or a door threshold. Progressively reduce your lift height as the bottom position opens up.

A Benchmark of Capability

Kettlebell overhead squats are an elusively sexy movement for most athletes, and might not yet have a place your regular routine. Whether you can access the full range yet of not, use the kettlebell overhead squat to as a tool to measure progress. If you can get to full depth, measure your progress by how square and upright you can stay while progressing toward the double kettlebell version. If you cannot yet achieve full depth, use progressive scaling to work toward the bottom position.

I know many very capable (and mobile) athletes who cannot yet perform an overhead squat. As in all things, the benefit comes from the journey. Keep moving forward and celebrate every step in the right direction.

Once you’re there, when do you move up?

Sizing Up: How and When to Increase Your Kettlebell Weight

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