lockdown movements

[tei]

I'm curious what everyone's physical practices are looking like if you're mostly on lockdown due to COVID? here, it's finally gotten warm enough to be outside comfortably for activities other than running, so I've been trying to do some gymnastics-type training in the park and am considering ordering a slackline and some rings that I could hang from a tree branch.

The downside is that I really don't like people watching me. :P

Comments

[fred_mouse]

Do you have opinions on the app that you would like to share? I'm also somewhat hypermobile, but I've currently got the muscle strength to be able to use my full range of movement, and I'd really like to not lose that (I've been doing a weekly ballet class for about three years, and it has been a great way for me to strengthen everything gently)

[thistleingrey]

Doing ballet weekly sounds awesome. I think it's partly that the app's easy and medium sets are a reasonable match for my subjective easy and pushing-it-somewhat, and I like being able to opt out of a specific exercise, which feels harder for me with a YouTube video.

Also, depends on one's specific issues. For me, legs are mostly strong, back is okay (though it slips), neck and hips are terrible ... so I try to do mountain climbers and very careful side planks regularly alongside other things.

What do you do to warm up for ballet?--no worries if no answer.

[fred_mouse]

That is very useful information, much appreciated.

The weekly ballet has been amazing. The teacher used to be the principal at the school my kids danced at, and I have a great deal of respect for their attitude to ballet and pedagogy (no competitions, all body types can do ballet, focus on the individual improvement not the comparisons, etc). They took a class of adults who ranged from never having done ballet, through 'did ballet as a late teen' (me), plus at least one who really knew what they were doing, started with 'this is how to stand' and has then taken us through a range of skills, always allowing for individual injuries and limitations (I'm not the only hypermobile adult in the class).

Enough rambling - you asked about warm ups. Early on, the teacher would have us all sit on the floor with our legs straight out in front of us, and warm up our feet by flexing and pointing feet, working through the foot in the way that we then went on to learn to do in the barre work. There were variations on this, but the only ones I can remember are that you start with feet touching all the way along, and then after some number of repetitions turn the hips/etc out and do it in the turned out position. She also got us doing specific small muscle isometric exercises for the ?VMO (I've forgotten the muscle name, but I think that is the abbreviation) which is just above the knee on the inside of the leg -- this helped with knee stability. For a while she then had us doing our own warm ups, so I would do gentle squats, ankle rises, other things that move the joints slowly. Lunges sometimes. When there is space, sitting with legs as wide as comfortable, and then walking hands forwards and back, and then sitting upright and tilting pelvis back and then straightening (kind of rolling very slightly back on to the coccyx) - pulling abdominal muscles to the spine.

Current warm ups are done by the teacher again, and are about core strength. Glute bridges, with a whole bunch of variations (knees together, knees holding a ball in place, tension band around knees pulling outwards). Initially, we were just doing the pelvis tilt part of that (like the above rolling on to the coccyx, but lying on the floor). Because hips are my worst joint, I had to start with modified versions of most of these, but now can do them most of the time. Also an exercise just called 'cockroaches' which I don't think I can adequately describe! Occasionally, other strength based exercises, which get blood flowing.

Oh, and for arms/shoulders anything that makes great big movements - swinging arms across the body and then out wide, big circles, rolling the shoulders. My goal there is to loosen as much of my shoulder/upper body as possible, because my shoulders are heading for being as bad as my hips (or maybe my hips have improved enough that my shoulders now register...)

the tl:dr on this: movement to get blood flowing/muscles moving a bit, appropriate strengthening work, minimal to no stretching.

[thistleingrey]

Thanks very much for the helpful details! Minimal to no stretching is ideal. I'll look up isometric exercises for knee stability--sounds really useful for me as well.

[fred_mouse]

If I understand the research correctly, stretching before activity decreases joint stability, which is bad for the average person, and worse if your joints are hypermobile. I do stretching at other times, so that I don't risk that! The other one is 'no held stretches' for hypermobile joints, because ... umm, something about stretching the wrong thing. If I can find the reference and remember why I was looking for it, I'll come back here.