Giuliano is a young Romanian boy living in Italy, trained by his gymnast father. Thank you reader Paul J for telling me about him.
Below is a link to the short video clip where I captured the above photos. I was not able to embed this movie, by request at the source. Click to watch 5 year old Giuliano do air pushups:
I used to teach air pushups in my yoga classes. Every class gave opportunity to see, try, and learn. I'd coach, encourage, even lift the students personally if it helped them try it, or feel the leverages needed. Were students excited? Inspired? Did they get strong and focused?
They might have if they tried it. They whine, stall, pout, refuse, and complain to management that my class is haaaard, and they had to connnnnnn-centrate. They didn't want any of that.
Each week new students arrive in my yoga class, holding expensive yoga equipment. Some are yoga instructors. They explain to me that yoga cures all back pain. I ask why they have come and they tell me all about their back pain that they have for 4 years and they do yoga every day (not curing anything evidently). They say they do yoga all the time and know all about it and how it gives you peace and love and concentration and good posture and strength and balance. Then they sit in terrible posture waiting for class. They get indignant when I tell them to sit well. They correct me that "class hasn't started yet." In the first minutes of class I teach standing on one leg. They topple over and refuse to try again. I have them stand on the other foot and they are flabbergasted that we are doing it again when they just spent all that time insisting to me that they can't (instead of trying). We do simple planks and they sag their back and lock their elbows. When we start hand balancing to learn the basics of air pushups, some of these yoginis have thrown full-out tantrums.
Then the next week, a new crop comes to class explaining to me that yoga gives you love and acceptance and peace and good posture. So I teach them air pushups.
Giuliano also does The Flag - To be covered in the future.
A study of men and women over age 70 found two to three times more bone fractures occurred following a hospital admission compared to not being in a hospital. The risk of new fracture was greatest during the first year after hospitalization and increased with the number of times a patient was hospitalized. This included increased numbers of hip fracture, which leads to a fatality within the year in about 30% of people over 50.
Study authors stated, "Because the risk of fracture is greatest soon after hospital discharge, assessment and interventions to reduce risk should be started during the hospital stay or shortly after discharge. Evaluations should include measurement of bone mineral density, assessment of the risk of falling and vision testing." According to the authors, appropriate treatment for these patients include calcium and vitamin D supplements; bisphosphonate drug treatment, such as alendronate (Fosamax) or risedronate (Actonel); vision correction if needed; and physical therapy, including walking programs and exercises to improve flexibility, strength and balance.
Being in a hospital is often joked about as being unhealthy. It is also a reality:
When people are sick, it is not the time to keep them sedentary, indoors, eating institutional food, out of fresh air and sunlight, and taking medicines that reduce bone density and increase pain syndromes.
Lack of standing and activity quickly reduce bone density.
Several commonly prescribed medicines directly reduce bone density and cause stomach and body pain. Instead of stopping these medicines, others are given, which further depress health, and the mistake of further unneeded and unhealthful drugs.
It is a circular problem when people feel they must reduce activity to prevent falls and injury.
What is needed is the right, carefully supervised, healthy movement to give the physical skills that prevent falls, the stiffness that results in more pain and lack of function, and reduction in bone density, balance, strength, and mobility crucial for basic health.
Fast Fitness - Fifth Group Functional Training: Ankle and Knee Safety With Lateral Movement
Friday, January 15, 2010
Jolie Bookspan, M.Ed, PhD, FAWM
Here is Friday Fast Fitness - fifth in the series of Functional Fitness Training (FFT) to teach your group, teams, classes, students, kids, battalions…
In this FFT, learn to be ready for changing direction, cutting, lateral movement, landing to the side from jumps, slips and missteps, and more. It builds on the Third Functional Training exercise where you learned to jump with good lower body mechanics.
Assemble your group in neat rows. Stand in front in view of all. Tell them this is a basic, functional physical skill to learn how to reduce lower body injuries during sideways jumps. Remind them they use the previously learned principles from the Third FFT of vertical jumps.
Have everyone crouch using good bending (knees do not sway inward or slide forward, taught in the first FFT skill), then rise to toes with stable neutral ankle (not bowing outward at the side, taught in the second skill). Remind them that when they land from a jump they use the same neutral ankle.
Next, have everyone to leap sideways at once, off one leg onto the other foot, landing softly with good knee bending and neutral ankle. On landing, the knee is already above the foot, not bent inward. Foot is neutral, not flattened inward (pronated) or turning outward like a sprain (inversion and supination).
Leap back to starting place onto the other foot. On landing, the knee is already above the foot. Repeat leaping sideways from foot to foot. With each landing, watch the knee of the landing leg. Make sure the knee doesn't sway inward of foot.
Improve by jumping increasingly fast, and far, for longer periods of time.
Each new Functional Training exercise shows how to teach your groups (or self) how to prevent common musculoskeletal problems during the team season or operational theater. Learn this one to be ready for the fourth one coming next, needed for cutting, changing direction, lateral movement, more.
Trainers, Drill Instructors, readers, send in your stories of how you use these in your program.
--- Read success stories of these methods and send your own. See if your answers are already here by clicking labels, links in posts, archives, and The Fitness Fixer Index. Subscribe to The Fitness Fixer, click "updates via e-mail" upper right. For personal medical questions - Replies to Medical Questions. Limited Class space for personal feedback. Top students may earn certification throughDrBookspan.com/Academy. Get more in Dr. Bookspan's Books.
Here is Friday Fast Fitness - another contest! Do you know what constitutes ability in balance as a lifestyle? Tell us!
On the urging of reader Mr. Georges Nakhlé, I started the Academy of Functional Exercise Medicine (AFEM) to train people in healthier, functional, more common-sense exercise and lifestyle. We teach classes, certify top students, and are creating better methods of instruction.
One of our courses is Balance. Mr. Nakhlé, who runs the AFEM office in Lebanon asked me, "Which test tells whether a person has good balance or not?"
Readers - Your Challenge:
Write your ideas for different needed levels of balance
Write specific balance skills or training drills
Give examples that are needed for real daily life - functional balance testing, rather than isolated clinical measures.
Here Is What To Know:
Standardized tests exist, but don't predict how someone can function (move doing real things) in real life without falls, sprains, and other injuries of poor balance. A single test, such as the standard, "Can you stand on one foot for 5 seconds" may give a low basic measure, but a single test doesn't cover range needed throughout real life. That means we need several simple tests to rank ability.
Examples:
Basic low level balance needed for safe healthy life:
"Can you step over a pile of clothes and toys on the floor, without spilling a cup of water"
"Can you descend narrow basement stairs holding a laundry basket in both hands without holding the railing?"
"Can you put on hosiery and shoes standing up?"
"Can you rise from your chair and the floor without using your hands?"
Average:
"Can you leap over a puddle or hole in the street and land lightly on the other foot?"
"Can you safely climb a stepladder without hands and change an overhead light bulb without holding on?"
High:
"Can you walk though a rushing rocky stream and rescue a child on a rock?"
Your ideas here…
Last contest time running out - How well do you know human movement?
Subscribe to The Fitness Fixer, free. Click "updates via e-mail"(under trumpet) upper right. Before asking questions, see if your answers are already here by clicking labels under posts, links in posts, archives at right, and The Fitness Fixer Index. Read success stories of these methods and send your own. For personal medical questions - Replies to Medical Questions. Limited Class spaces for personal feedback. Top students may apply for certification throughDrBookspan.com/Academy. Learn more in Dr. Bookspan's Books.
Reader Success With Functional Fitness Training - Stronger Ankles, Better Balance
Thursday, October 01, 2009
Jolie Bookspan, M.Ed, PhD, FAWM
Here is a good start to October. I had invited readers to send in names for my group Functional Fitness Training program (tentatively named FFT) and success stories using it. Reader Paul J sent in both. He wrote:
"I don't think I can come up with a better name than FFT.
"Some ideas….let's see,
"Simple Training Big Benefits. (The toe balance training is great; I suppose a success story is in order.) Bookspan's Basic Training. Bookspan's Body Basics. Basic Fitness Training Basic Functional Fitness Jolie's Joint Jewels (That has a nice ring to it, it might be good for something like a list.) Functional Physical Training.
"Well, what do you think, any keepers?"
Readers - votes? The "Basic Functional Fitness" name has the advantage (as does "Bookspan Functional Fitness") of the initials BFF, young person lingo for "Best Friend Forever."
Paul J. continued with his success story:
"I have been doing your toe balance training and have noticed some interesting things. Before I learned your toe balance training I would usually stand on one foot to put my sock on and had decent balance from martial arts, but felt my ankles were weak. I even bought a BOSU and it may have helped, but you have to be on it, to get a benefit from it. I remember the first time I tried your technique and how quickly my right foot tried to roll out.
"Thanks to your simple do-anywhere training my ankles are stronger and my balance is much better. The other day stepping out of the tub I had such an odd sense of stability when standing on just my right foot, I looked at my ankle. My general balance has improved too. I have a folding bike with 20” wheels and for the past 3 years hands free was a very bad idea, just the other day it was quite easy. All though to some this may still be a bad idea, it was done in a nice low traffic neighborhood.
"May your favorite physiologist have a fun Friday afternoon. : ) "
--- Read and contribute your own success stories of these methods. Before asking questions, see if your answers are already here - click labels under posts, links in posts, archives at right, and the Fitness Fixer Index. For answers to personal medical questions - Replies to Medical Questions. Subscribe to The Fitness Fixer, free. Click "updates via e-mail"(under trumpet) upper right. See Dr. Bookspan's Books, take a Class, get certifiedDrBookspan.com/Academy.
What magic secret exercise or machine or supplement makes you fitter?
Fitness Fixer reader Jilly wrote in to ask:
" I am a 65 yr old woman and have no strength in my upper body; I cannot push myself up even by 1 inch but just lie floundering on the floor! How do I start rectifying this to be able to do even a straightforward push up?"
How to get better? Just like anything else, Try. Practice. The body responds. Work and you improve. Money should be that easy.
Remember that Olympic athletes are sore for days after workouts. They fall and fail thousands of times, get back up and work more. Like learning a language - start with nothing, and the more you work, the better you become.
Click the arrow to watch this short video that reminds what practice can achieve:
Retrain your body to move in natural ways, not just in one up/down or side-side motion of gym exercises. Use daily life as your built-in all day strengthener. That is the difference between "doing exercise" then going back to weak unhealthy life, and real healthy living. That is what Fitness Fixer is for.
Have a real life and enjoy the quick gains. Proceed safely, and have fun. Send in your success stories. Stay inspired.
--- Read and contribute your own success stories of these methods. Questions come in by the hundreds. I make posts from fun ones. Before asking more, see if your answers are already here - click labels under posts, links in posts, archives at right, and the Fitness Fixer Index. For answers to personal medical questions - Replies to Medical Questions. Subscribe to The Fitness Fixer, free. Click "updates via e-mail"(under trumpet) upper right. See Dr. Bookspan's Books, take a Class, get certifiedDrBookspan.com/Academy.
Fast Friday - Oblique Core Strength and Balance on the Ball
Friday, March 20, 2009
Jolie Bookspan, M.Ed, PhD, FAWM
Here is Friday Fast Fitness - develop strong side abdominal and back muscles, and train balance at the same time:
Put both hands on the floor and step one foot up onto an exercise ball of any size
Step the other foot up to the ball and turn sideways. Hold straight (upper photo). Hold and feel all abdominal and back muscles working strongly to hold yourself straight.
Work up to raising one arm.
Don't let body sag (lower photo). The idea is to train your muscles to be able to hold straight against the resistance of your own body weight during daily life when walking and everything you do. If your muscles don't have the strength or endurance to hold you, then you will sag onto your joints.
At first, you may need help to steady the ball. Practice until you can steady it with your own muscles, balance, and stability.
Instead of sitting on an exercise ball, remember that you might already sit much of the day. Get up and use an exercise ball for more functional, active, and healthful things.
Send in your photos of your fun successes using the ball in ways that train function. Exercise ball success story already in progress from Robert Davis. See his first story - Fixed Injuries, Got Strong, With Functional Exercise.
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Read success stories of these methods and send your own. Questions come in by the hundreds. I make posts from selected ones. See if your answers are already here by clicking labels under posts, links in posts, and archives at right.
Subscribe to The Fitness Fixer, free. Click "updates via e-mail"(under trumpet) upper right.
Fast Fitness - Hip Stretch and Spine Stability Training When Stretching Legs
Friday, January 16, 2009
Jolie Bookspan, M.Ed, PhD, FAWM
Here is Fast Friday Fitness - Retrain your standing leg stretches to hold your spine and hip in healthful position, get more stretch to the front of the hip, use your back muscles, practice balance, and learn functional stretching - the way your body needs to move in real life in a healthy way.
When you raise one leg to stretch when standing:
Keep your standing leg straight. Don't bend at the knee and hip, as pictured.
Don't round your back or let your pelvis and hip round under you, as pictured.
Stand straight. Relaxed. Don't force or strain. Breathe.
When stretching, remember function. Why practice a position that is rounded, tight, and detrimental to how you move in real life when you lift your legs. It would look silly and unhealthy to stand up that way. Why stretch that way?
Get functional stretch by lengthening your body enough to be able to straighten out. That is the purpose of the stretch.
Use the new length and your brain to stand straight. Transfer the positioning to real life when you are standing and lift one leg to take stairs, kick, dance, play sports, climb over things, and other life activities. Standing without being so tight that you round your body forward, or just round from habit, is healthier, better looking, burns more calories, and stops many sources of chronic aches and pains.
Send me your photos of fixing this stretch. Doing is the best learning. I will post the photos in a reader success story.
Questions come in by the hundreds. I make posts from selected ones. See if your answers are already here by clicking labels below posts, and links and archives. Read success stories of these methods and send your own.
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Photos are still not loading. We didn't expect the problem to persist this long. I have been working extra to write posts not relying on images to explain concepts and techniques. Click the October link to see the photo of the board that loaded before this problem began:
Take the board you made, or make one now.
Hold a pushup position with feet on the floor and both hands on the board.
Balance the board and hold your pushup position. Then try pushups. Then try deliberately tilting the board to each direction while you hold your body stable. If you built the chutes with clay strips (or other creative ideas) use your hands to rock the board to direct the marble while holding your body stable in plank (pushup position). Work up to doing push ups that way.
Hold neutral spine instead of letting your lower back arch and sag:
Want more? Prop feet up on a bench or wall or other height, and both hands on the board. Want lots more? Use one device for your arms, and one for your feet.
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Questions come in by the hundreds. I make posts from selected ones. See if your answers are already here by clicking links and archives. Read success stories of these methods and send your own.
Have The Fitness Fixer e-mailed to you, free. Click "updates via e-mail" - Health Expert Updates (trumpet icon) upper right column.
Fast Fitness - Make Your Own Balance, Agility, and Leg and Ankle Retrainer
Friday, October 24, 2008
Jolie Bookspan, M.Ed, PhD, FAWM
Here is Friday Fast Fitness - how to make your own device to get a high tech workout that retrains important motor skills, balance, and lower limb proprioception. Proprioception means to know where and how your body is moving.
Put a sturdy board on a rock or hard, fairly round object like a solid ball.
Step up on the board and balance. Do a variety of movements that mimic your sport, like tennis and golf swings, martial arts punches and kicks. Do daily life movements like reaching cabinets, and bending like squats and lunges. Try all the same on one leg.
For intensive training, place lengths of inexpensive putty or child's reusable clay to make chutes (channels) on the board. Control the motions of the board with your feet to direct the marble to the center target.
Good for kids and adults of most ages.
Be careful and use your brain. Remember the board can move suddenly and slide. That is the whole idea. Control movements with your strength and balance to prevent uncontrolled falls. Start with supervision and near a safety wall, not the stairs or the china closet. Know ahead of time how to fall safely.
--- Questions come in by the hundreds. I make posts from selected ones. See if your answers are already here by clicking links and archives. Read success stories of these methods and send your own.
Have The Fitness Fixer e-mailed to you, free. Click updates via e-mail - Health Expert Updates (trumpet icon) upper right column.
Fast Fitness - Balance and Ankle Stability in the Dark
Friday, August 22, 2008
Jolie Bookspan, M.Ed, PhD, FAWM
Here is Friday Fast Fitness - quickly improve balance and ankle proprioception - the ability of the ankle and foot to correct positioning, reducing sprain and fall potential.
This one helps balance for daily life, and also helps footing in darkness, which can be encountered on stairs, curbs, and late hikes.
Stand on one foot.
Balance on that foot with eyes closed. Switch feet.
Extend length of balance time with frequent practice.
Balance and proprioception are key to preventing and fixing ankle, foot, and balance trouble.
Obviously, don't do this near the stairs or the breakables. Use common sense to get started safely.
Here is Friday Fast Fitness - rows to strengthen the upper body, practice balance and neutral spine, and avoid lower disc injury from bad forward bending.
Readers have been writing in, excited about doing handstands for the first time or improving the handstand they do to get whole body functional fun exercise. My student Danielle demonstrates:
Shift your weight to stand on one hand. Grasp a hand weight in the other hand
Do rows, and any variety of arm free-weight movements that you want to improve.
There is no need to bend over forward to do rows. It does not train functional posture, and unequally squeezes lower discs outward, which adds to degeneration and herniation forces that are common during bad daily sitting and unhealthy bending. You don't need more unhealthy things while exercising.
Here is Friday Fast Fitness - learn to lift up to a full handstand, for shoulder, arm, and wrist strength, balance, agility, skill, and fun.
Previous posts showed how to step up to an easy handstand by putting one foot up high behind you on a wall or surface. Here is how to learn swinging up to full handstand:
Stand close to a secure surface.
Plop both hands on the floor about a foot from the wall and swing one leg upward
Use momentum of putting hands down and swinging leg up, to swing the other leg upward to the wall.
Click the arrow to run the short movie. Three of my students demonstrate three stages of learning this handstand:
Mr. Sosaku at right holds the finished stance.
Helen, center shows swinging up straight, bringing both feet to the wall.
Kimberly shows the beginning - placing hands and getting the idea of lifting legs upward.
Let your feet come to the wall and straighten your body, so that you do not curl your back against the wall. Work to increase strength and balance, so that you need the wall less and less, eventually holding straight handstand without the wall. Note the hand weight on the floor. Future posts will show weightlifting with one arm while in handstand on the other.
Students Balances, Listens, Fixes Father's Back Pain
Tuesday, June 03, 2008
Jolie Bookspan, M.Ed, PhD, FAWM
My student Ginger sent the photo at right taken on her recent camping trip. Don't try this at home. It takes balance training, concentration, and a few changes to standard back bend technique.
Ginger is distributing the stretch along the spine so that no one area is compressed at an unfavorable angle, and is contributing most of the leg extension from the hip, not lower spine. More safe back extension stretch and strengthening methods will come in future posts.
Ginger is a good student who makes good use of my classes. Last week, while visiting her parents, she was out walking with her father. She told me that her father said that his back hurt from the walking. She looked, and saw that her father was standing and walking with too much inward curve to the lower back - hyperlordosis (swayback). Standing with the lower spine overarched is a slouch that compresses the spine unevenly downward, pinching the joints and soft tissue at the back of the lower vertebrae. Overarching is a large hidden cause of lower back ache during walking and running. This slouch is not fixed in the bone, it is a posture that is easily corrected. It does not require strengthening the back or core muscles, just using the ones you have. In moments, Ginger showed her father what I taught in class - how to change a slouching overarch to neutral spine. Ginger's father said the ache disappeared right there, and that was all there was to it.
The article Innovation in Abdominal Muscles gives an overview, and the comments give a link to another post with a short movie showing the concept.
If you want a whole book showing the concept, several techniques to achieve and use neutral spine, and examples of use in all daily life, try the book The Ab Revolution™ Third edition expanded. Part I of the book shows daily use without needing any exercises. Part II shows how to exercise using neutral spine to get more exercise, healthier exercise, and use abdominal muscles functionally to stop unattractive and damaging overarching.
Fast Fitness - Easy Handstand for Balance, Upper Body Strength -The Movie
Friday, May 09, 2008
Jolie Bookspan, M.Ed, PhD, FAWM
Here is Friday Fast Fitness - a quick, safer way to try a handstand. Standing on hands has many health and strength benefits and can be easily practiced in this way.
My student Dennis, Olympic medalist in wrestling, demonstrates in this short movie. Click the arrow to watch the movie:
Stand with your back about a foot in front of a wall, and crouch to put your hands on the floor (avoid slippery surface)
Put one foot high up on the wall, then lift the other foot up too
To get down, step one foot back down, then the other
Keep breathing. Smile. Relax. Send in your own photos of trying this. Be safe and have fun.
Fast Fitness - Sprain Prevention and Rehab Training
Friday, April 18, 2008
Jolie Bookspan, M.Ed, PhD, FAWM
Here is Fast Friday Fitness - feel how your own muscles work to hold ankle position, so that you can have stable ankles without artificial shoe supports or bracing, which weaken the supporting muscles from disuse:
Stand with feet parallel and look in a mirror where you can see your feet, or just look down.
Rise to toe and hold
Keep body weight over big and second toe with straight ankle position as you remain on tip-toe. Don't let your weight shift over the small toes, allowing ankle to bend outward.
Click the arrow to see this short movie of my student Diana's feet, as she first allows rolling the ankle outward when rising to toe, then at second 3 in the movie, she uses ankle, foot and leg muscles to pull to straight neutral ankle position. She prevents outward rolling as she again rises to toes three more times.
Prevent rolling outward whenever you rise on toe or push off or land from a jump or step.
Developing positioning sense in the receptors of your ankles prevents the sprain-promoting position called inversion, and gains built-in foot and ankle muscle strength and stability. Nice foot stretch too. Practice balancing on tip-toe, and rising up and down without rolling outward every day.
Here is Fast Friday Fitness - if you have been afraid to try a handstand, here is a quick easy way to have success. You will strengthen your hands, wrist, arms, shoulders, upper body, and core, practice balance, and get blood circulating.
Crouch down near a wall (avoid slippery floor)
Put one foot high up on the wall
Lift up the other foot
To add a nice stretch on the hamstrings, lift one leg away from the wall into a wide split position in the air, as below.
If you have uncontrolled glaucoma or high blood pressure, ask your care providers first.
Click here to see a quick video showing how to change sagging spine to neutral spine.
Reader Joe Blatt recently celebrated his 63rd wedding anniversary. He was a Broadway choreographer and dancer.
He demonstrates how to keep good flexibility and balance through the ordinary daily activity of standing to put on shoes and socks, and tying your shoes.
Fast Fitness - Stronger Arms and Chest, and Core, Hip, and Leg Stability With A Friend
Friday, March 14, 2008
Jolie Bookspan, M.Ed, PhD, FAWM
Here is Friday Fast Fitness - strengthen inner legs, thighs, arms, and core, while practicing neutral spine with a friend. More exercise than putting hands up on a bench or exercise ball.
My students Johanna (1) and Diana (2) demonstrate the beginning of this move. Description of how to progress follows the photos:
Partner 1 lies face up with bent knees
Partner 2 does pushups on Partner 1's knees while holding neutral spine, not letting the lower back sag and arch downward. Partner 1 gets entry-level exercise hip and core exercise by holding legs stable and does not let knees wobble. Higher-level exercise is described below the photos.
To increase core and hip stabilization training for both partners, Partner 1 tilts knees slightly to each side while Partner 2 continues pushups. Try both moving continuously side to side, and holding legs stable at an angle. Do not twist your spine.
If the above photos don't load, try:
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