Further musings on mobility...

I've written before about the importance of mobility, and I still 100% stand by my statement about it's importance. Lately I've been asked about how it is possible to incorporate mobility work into workouts. Great question and also of high importance.

 When we are working to improve range of motion, it's important to realize that we are shortening our muscles by trying to strengthen them while causing the opposing muscles to lengthen. For instance with men, we are prominently concerned with how big our chest is and how much we bench that we constantly overlook the muscles of our back. Doing pulling exercises like rows and pull-ups, along with our pressing exercises will allow us to improve that imbalance. But there are simpler ways that I think are also effective and necessary. Doing dynamic stretches like I, Y, T TRX lunges to reopen the chest in between sets will spread the fibers back apart will allow greater range of motion and improved flexibility. What's most important to recognize is that the opposing muscles need to be shortened as well. We can't always just bench. There needs to be some pulling done as well, which is where the rows and pull-ups come in, aside from stretching.
Your body is meant to do a lot of different exercises. Pushing pulling and squatting are the main ones. So keep working all angles and all ranges of motion to continually improve and maintain healthy joint function and mobility.

Jack Lazarus