We continue on our series of tough but super safe posture fix exercises. Exercises which combine a useful workout move with a postural fix. With compromised low back, shoulder, neck and upper back problems on the rise a key is to have such exercises as a regular part of ones workouts.
Here we use the Romanian style deadlift with ‘working’ to hold kettlebells in the top of an arm curl position. By playing on your shoulders natural tendency to stabilize while performing arm curls and rows we teach with greater efficiency. Instead of letting the weight hang at arms length (see pic below) you must fight to keep the kettlebells in place as gravity works against you. Many think that a barbell is the way to go here (see pic below) but our personal training experience has uncovered an issue with this. A bar encourages over using your strong side and when trying to correct a stubborn issue like posture this adds more mistakes than it fixes.
These versions though ok don’t offer a full fix
Go light here to start! This is way harder than it looks…really. Follow the video and notes on proper execution.
This is tough and the key is to lock into the posture before you start. Take your time squaring up shoulders, standing tall, pulling elbows back and soften knees into position. You must not over bend the knee to go lower and you must dig through your heels especially on the way back up. This activates your hamstrings to work harder instead of your lower back. Really pull those kettlebells into you as you hit the head down position at the bottom.
You can place small weight plates under the ball of your feet to help remind you to dig heels in to the floor.
Start slow and take your time. Mix this with last blog posts exercise to increase effects : https://wefit.ca/2017/03/27/kettlebell-posture-fix/
Be well, be strong,
Andrew and Tierney
wefit.ca 