Incorporate upper body movements when doing flexibility exercises, use medicine balls and sticks and bend, twist, lean, lunge and squat.
The best flexibility routines will get boring. Plain and simple. It doesn’t matter what kind of exercise, they will get stale if they are overused and/or always performed they same way and same order. You can avoid making the extraordinary, ordinary by constantly adding variations to your stretching routine.
Here’s an example to get you started.
• Lunge with the right foot and rotate upper body with arms extended to the front and held at shoulder height
• Turn the head to the right
• Repeat with the left and alternate for 10 total repetitions
Add variety to the move by doing the following.
• When lunging with the right leg turn your shoulders as you reach across the right knee with the left hand
• Repeat leading with the left leg and alternate
• For added degree of difficulty move arms out of sync – one arm held in front while the other arm is held over head – while rotating your torso
Progress to doing the lunge while holding an un-weighted stick directly overhead or extended in front of the body and perform a variety of reaches and bends; to the side, over head, rotate towards and away from lunge leg, etc.
There are many different kinds of lunges and when you add a variety of upper body movements there is a practically unlimited supply of flexibility exercises that you can perform. Consistently change the order of these movements and even perform several different moves in a series to add more variety and complexity to your flexibility routines.
Keep these simple rules in mind and add movement to your flexibility exercises to keep your routines fresh, challenging and effective.
