A quick thought on mundanity
I don’t want my daughter to live her life just going through the motions.
I want her to find something that fills her up and chase after it with her whole heart.
I can’t just tell her that, though. Actions always speak louder than words.
If I want her to avoid a mundane life where she goes to a job she hates, stresses about little things, and wonders “what if” constantly, then I have to avoid that life myself.
Chase down what’s important to you.
A deep dive on arm care
Throwing a ball is the fastest human movement in sports. The arm can rotate at a ridiculous speed of 9,000° per second.
With great power, though, comes great responsibility. In order to stay healthy while dealing with those insane speeds and the forces that come along with them, you need to have an arm care plan in place.
I need to make sure we’re clear: arm care is not a collection of exercises that you throw together and do before or after you throw.
Arm care is a strategy; a holistic process that incorporates all aspects of training. Your entire training plan, from weight room work to isolation exercises and throwing plans, should all be integrated and strategized to care for your arm.
This article focuses on a part of that strategy. These are 4 tips for isolation exercises that you can incorporate into your overall training plan to shore up areas that are extra important in arm health.
- Strengthen the heck out of your posterior rotator cuff
You’ve might have heard the shoulder joint be described as a “golf ball on a tee.”
The job of your rotator cuff is to keep the golf ball (humerus) centered on the tee (glenoid fossa of the scapula).
The backside (posterior) of your rotator cuff is responsible for external rotation. When you’re throwing, the posterior rotator cuff is what slows down and stops your arm after you release the ball.
Throwing a baseball is the fastest human movement in all sports. The arm can rotate at an insane 9,000° per second, which means that the forces that it take to slow down your arm are astronomical. Your posterior rotator cuff is made up of two tiny little muscles (infraspinatus and teres minor) that have carry a huge load.
Producing that much force repeatedly can lead to some pretty big wear and tear. Obviously a weak and worn rotator cuff can lead to some rotator cuff issues, but it can also lead to other issues (like SLAP tears) if the cuff isn’t doing it’s job.
Some good exercise options here are: 0 deg Cable External Rotations, 90/90 Cable External Rotations, and Band Uppercuts
2. Tap into serratus anterior
Serratus anterior is the most under-appreciated muscle in a throwing athlete’s body.
Serratus has two main jobs: upwardly rotating and protracting the scapula. But, it also plays a signifcant role in posteriorly tilting and externally rotating the scapula, as well as keeping the scapula flush with the rib cage.
The best way to see why serratus is so important is to see what happens when it’s not working at all. The video below shows an injury to the nerve that controls serratus anterior.
If serratus can’t do it’s job, then the scapula won’t rotate upwards. If your scapula won’t rotate upwards, then your humerus will be jamming into your acromion over and over again.
Our objective with choosing our isolation arm care exercises are to keep the ball centered on the tee. Serratus is largely responsible for that.
Some good exercise options here are: Serratus Wall Slides, Landmine Press, and Bear Crawls.
3. Isolate your low trap
Low trap is kind of like the Robin to serratus anterior’s Batman. It plays a big role in upwardly rotating, posteriorly tilting, and externally rotating the scapula.
All 3 of these are important because they keep the golf ball centered on the tee.
Keeping a healthy arm takes an entire village of muscles working in unison. If low trap isn’t targeted and strong enough to do it’s role, issues can arise somewhere in the chain.
Some good exercise option here are: Prone Ys and Cable Ys
4. Bridge the gap with rhythmic stabilization
Strength is important, but strength alone is not enough. You have to be strong, fast.
Rhythmic stabilization exercises can help bridge the gap between strength work and actual throwing. They require you to react quickly to an outside force and resist it to stay stable. This works on strength, rate of force development, and proprioception.
You can do these with high force at a bit slower speeds, or you can do these with lower force at really fast speeds.
These are best done with a partner who knows what they’re doing, but you can get a similar effect from something like I to Y Wall Taps.
More from me…
- If you want a video of any of these exercises, just shoot me an email at zach@gtperformance.co and I’ll send it over to you!
- If you think this newsletter doesn’t suck (or maybe you even enjoy reading it), I would really appreciate you sharing it with some other parents that might benefit from reading it. You can just send them to gtperformance.co/free and they can subscribe there!
Thanks so much for your help in spreading the word about long-term athlete development!
Be >,
Zach
Dr. Zach Guiser, PT, DPT, CSCS