Monday, August 27, 2012

Functional Exercise of the Week...

Today's exercise is the push up with hip extension:


Functionality: This exercise strengthens your chest, shoulder and arm muscles, as well as your core muscles and glutes.


Exercise: Begin on your hands and knees, with your hands wider than shoulder-distance apart. Extend your right leg straight back and pull your belly button up towards your spine, and tightening your core muscles. Keeping your leg lifted, lower your chest to the ground until each of your elbows is at a 90-degree angle, about fist distance from the floor, and then push up. Repeat 10 to 15 times for each leg.


As you get stronger, consider doing this on your toes, with one leg extended as described above. A typical progression might be to perform this on your knees, in a quarter position, move to a 3/4 position (back flat, knees at the end of the lever arm), and progress to your toes into a full push up, eventually adding in the extended leg.

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