Saturday, December 8, 2018

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In order to get your elbows into a high rack position, you need a sufficient amount of lat flexibility.? . The lat muscles span from the low back and attaching on your humerus. When elongated they allow your arm to move up and over your head. However, just because you can raise your arm above shoulder height, doesn’t mean the lats are flexible enough for a quality front rack position.? . Take Robby for example. From the start it’s hard to tell but watch his right elbow. It’s difficult for him to maintain the high elbow rack positon compared to his left. He can also clearly raise his right arm above shoulder height.? . Sufficient lat flexibility allows you to raise the arm, externally rotate it and isometrically contract in this position to aid in core stability and trunk stiffness.? . When I placed him on his back, pulled his arms into external rotation and tried to move his arms overhead, you can see he clearly lacks lat flexibility on his right compared to his left. (I didn’t show it but he has a good amount of external shoulder rotation on his right side)? . In the front rack position without any warm up, he could easily lift his left elbow more than his right. After a few minutes of foam rolling and stretching the lats I retested and he showed great improvements in flexibility on that test and the ability to get his elbows higher into a more efficient rack position.?? . To see more of the lat flexibility exercises I have Robby, check out the blog article linked in my bio? . Shout out to Robby from @do_work_crossfit for being today’s model, @3d4medical with the Complete Anatomy app for the visual of the body, @eleikosport for the weights & @velaasa for the weightlifting shoes featured today?? ___________________________________________ This is the 53rd #SquatUclub eligible post. Remember from here on out – “like,” & comment using the hashtag #squatUclub within 60 seconds of a new post going up and I’ll pick one person to start working with on whatever help you need (squat technique, an achy hip with deadlifts, etc). TURNING ON post notifications at the top of my profile (click the •••) will help you be first in line each day!

A post shared by Squat University (@squat_university) on Dec 7, 2018 at 1:02pm PST