Some time back I read an article by Mike Reinold about the Teres Major.  I also had this drilled back into my head while going over his and Eric Cressey Functional Stability Training of the upper body videos.  Since I’ve been treating a lot of Teres Major for overhead mobility limitations.  It’s fairly amazing how well it works too.  We often thinks pecs, lats and thoracic spine for poor overhead motion.  Next time you’re working on overhead mobility take some time to work on the Teres Major and see how much improvement you get.

Super Mobile Teres Major Over Here,

Dan Pope DPT, CSCS

P.S. If you enjoyed this article then sign up for the newsletter to receive the FREE guide – 10 Idiot Proof Principles to Performance and Injury Prevention as well as to keep up to date with new information as it comes out via weekly emails.

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One of the biggest things I focus on clinically in the crossfit athlete (and any other individual that requires full overhead range of motion) is overhead mobility.  I regularly get patients that complain of low back pain and pinchy shoulders with overhead movement.  It makes sense.  If you’re lacking this motion then you’ll be constantly compensating at the lower back and adding more stress at the shoulder during overhead movement (Think kipping, overhead press etc.).

One of my biggest goals as a therapist and coach is to give people the tools they need to take care of their own mobility issues.  Sure manual techniques work well in this population but if we aren’t giving people tools to help themselves then they’re lost when they leave your practice.  Also keep in mind that manual therapy generally gives short term effects which isn’t always best for a long term fix.

The next piece of the puzzle is that we need exercises that are easy to perform and don’t require a tremendous amount of time.  For the coaches and trainers out there who can’t perform manual techniques and wouldn’t be able to regardless because of working in a group setting we need tools that are effective.

I’ve done several overhead mobility videos in the past but I’ve decided to make another video.  This time I’ve selected the exercises I find to be most effective and also time efficient.  Here it is, 5 minute overhead mobility:

Go get mobile,

Dan Pope DPT, CSCS

P.S. If you enjoyed this article then sign up for the newsletter to receive the FREE guide – 10 Idiot Proof Principles to Performance and Injury Prevention as well as to keep up to date with new information as it comes out via weekly emails.

The average person will gauge the quality of his workout by his level of discomfort. But is driving yourself into the ground every workout necessary? …read more

Crossfit throws a lot of strange olympic lifting variations together that you wouldn’t normally find in an olympic lifting meet.  This complex puts together several exercises to help build proficiency in thrusters, push press and split jerk,

Try throwing this into an olympic lifting warm-up sometime.

Thruster Split Jerk Clean?

Dan Pope DPT, CSCS

P.S. If you enjoyed this article then sign up for the newsletter to receive the FREE guide – 10 Idiot Proof Principles to Performance and Injury Prevention as well as to keep up to date with new information as it comes out via weekly emails.

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Properly bracing your abs can immediately boost your strength. Combine that trick with three core exercises and you’ve got high performance and great abs. …read more

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