Lean Bodies Consulting

Gym ’sighting’ of the day. There’s this girl at the gym, I swear I’ve never seen her actually workout yet. Well, she’s been on the ellipticals, but I’ve never seen her lift weights yet, but she sits on the equipment and walks around the gym. I was watching her today and she literally just strolls around the gym, stops, leans on something, looks around for a while, strolls to another area, etc. Weirdest thing. I remember one time I was on the treadmill and there was a guy about three treadmills down running. This girl was just watching him. Staning on an ellliptical, completely motionless, watching him run. I figured she must know him and is just waiting for the guy to make eye contact. Next thing I know she’s on the treadmill beside him. No acknowledgment from him. She walks for 5 minutes and then goes back across the cardio area to the elliptical. I guess that strategy didn’t work.

Here’s one of my light hamstrings exercises that I’ve been doing for a while and really liking - the Anterior Reach (demonstrated by Laura). It’s an ‘integration’ movement that works the hamstrings and glutes with a balance component. People use the Anterior Reach for different reasons, but one of the great things about it is that it really engages the muscles of the calves, hamstrings and glutes together. The together part is the key here. In addition to that, it helps to develop functional balance and strength in both the core and the lower extremities. (JC Santana)

But, it looks easier than it is. It’s not a ‘hard’ exercise as in say a widowmaker set of 20-rep squats, of course. It’s a different kind of hard. Tbe slower you go, the more proprioceptive demand and the more demand placed on the muscles. So, the goal is to do these S-L-O-W-L-Y. (slower than Laura is demonstrating, or at least progress to very slow)

Some general guidelines:

- The knees line up with the feet.
- Limiting knee flexion places more emphasis on the muscles of the posterior chain (this is how I do them).
- Increasing knee flexion adds emphasis to the quads.
- Can be done contralaterally or ipsilaterally.
- Bench over and reach forward, and then stand straight up at the top.
- You can progress the movement with multi-planar reaching (so you’re not always just reaching straight forward)
- Try to keep the back foot off the ground for the duration of the set; touch down to stabilize if needed however.

Give a few sets of 12-15 reps per side a shot before your next hamstring workout; or even to finish off for that matter. Remember, the slower you go (both eccentrically and concentrically, the better). If you’re getting it right, your glutes and hamstrings will let you know.

Related posts:

1. Hamstrings and Leg Curls
2. Hamstrings - The Triple Threat
3. Shoulder Injuries / PreHab / ReHab

This entry was posted on Friday, May 9th, 2008 at 7:08 pm and is filed under Training . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.