So last month you spent entirely on your back, and now you can finally do all types of rolls:
1. Supine to prone upper quadrant soft roll
2. Prone to supine upper quadrant soft roll
3. Supine to prone lower quadrant soft roll
4. Prone to supine lower quadrant soft roll
5. Supine to prone superman hard roll
6. Prone to spine superman hard roll.
You’re on your stomach, what can you do now???
There are once again dozens of exercises you can do from the prone position, the first two namely are a cobra, and a superman. It’s kind of fitness suicide as a trainer to program only two exercises for a client, because supposedly a person will get bored with that. However, since this is not a program for you to workout with, but a movement practice with the end goal of fitness in mind, that’s exactly what I’m going to do. In essence it’s your job the next month to continue to practice all the movements you were practicing last month on your back (or supine), then roll over to your stomach (prone), and begin to add cobra’s and superman’s.
Now if you were thinking, “awwwww man this is going to be boring… it’s practically the same workout as last month,” you’re in for a real AH HA moment. Once again there are literally dozens of types of supermen and versions that you can and should do once you are on your stomach:
1. Superman jumping jacks
2. Superman jumping jacks just arms
3. Superman jumping jacks just legs
4. Swim kicks
5. Opposite arm opposite leg
6. Supermen
7. Superman just upper body lift
8. Superman just lower body lift
9. Crocodile breathing
10. Superman military presses
11. Superman frog legs
12. 90 degree arm lifts
13. Straight arm flies
Ohhhh wait I named 13 not a dozen, (hehehehe- evil laugh).
Now here’s a list of all the cobra’s you should be doing:
1. Hands wide cobra
2. Hands close cobra
3. Hands uneven cobra
4. Cobra with play at the top (swaying from side to side)
5. Cobra static holds- just breathing deep at the top for 5 breaths
6. Dynamic Cobra (repetitions)
7. Cobra to quadraped-
8. Cobra to quadraped to child’s pose
9. Cobra to quadraped to child’s pose to push up position
10. Cobra to quadraped to child’s pose to pushup position to downward dog.
11. Cobra to quadraped to child’s pose to pushup position to downward dog to upward dog
12. All of # 11 with lowering yourself with a pushup back to the ground.
13. All of # 10 with bear crawls at the end.
The flows are really endless here, and just like a child goes from prone to his/her hands and knees and then begins to crawl you can do the same.
Furthermore just like a developing baby, you are going to work on connecting with the ground through your hands, and spinal extension. If you have an 6- 8 month old around look at their play while they’re on their stomach.
They try a cobra, then they realize they can’t make it all the way up, or hold the top position for any length of time, so instead of giving up and dropping to the floor they try to lift their hands to use their back muscles instead of their arms (i.e. they try to do a superman from a cobra position). Then once they can’t hold it any more they go back to the ground, and then they pound the ground with their hands and feet.
Listen to the way they breathe. At first when it’s a new position their breathing is shallow and fast, and then they try to normalize that. In fact the largest obstacle I have with my clients that are under 12 is that they don’t want to challenge themselves to the point of having difficulty breathing- (part of this is that it’s a natural reaction to want to be comfortable, and stressful breathing is an indicator of a bad situation, thus when a child is young enough and not accustomed to harder work they try to stay away from the challenge of difficult exercise, rather than realizing that they should seek it out and make breathing easier through self control). In other words try a cobra- which ought to be fairly easy for much of the range of motion, but eventually you’ll get to a point where it’s hard, and at that point try to hold it, connect with the ground through your hands while also trying to superman with your back, and then use some self control to regulate your breathing. If it gets hard lower yourself to the ground through a superman, and then go through the 13 exercise superman sequence. Apply the same type of Posterior Chain tension (or the feeling you’re getting on the back of you) to the cobra, and try it again. Once you master pushing yourself up with your hips on the ground try to shift around moving your weight from hand to hand, and then try to lift your hands and hold the top of the cobra with just your superman muscles.
When ever you feel ready to add another part to the cobra go ahead, and try it until you’re doing a whole flow from cobra, to quadraped (hands and knees), to child’s pose, to pushup position, to downward dog, to bear crawls, to upward dog, and then through a push up lower yourself to the ground.
Take your time and keep at it, furthermore lay down whenever you need to and then do it again.
The workout should look like this time wise:
· 10-15 minutes practicing last month’s supine moves and rolls
· 30-45 minutes practicing cobra and superman’s, and trying to progress through connecting one movement to the next till
This should take you anywhere from a month to two months, and once you can move through that flow 20 times straight, you’re ready to move on to the next step in our perfect workout program! Keep Moving, and NEVER GET TIRED AGAIN!
