Today I’m going to share a quick functional training routine that can help you improve balance, power, flexibility, and strength.
Basic Balance
Functional training uses basic movement patterns to improve your performance in sports and everyday life. So we’re going to start with basic balance exercise. We stand on one leg, just hold your it up at 90 degrees parallel to the floor and see if you can hold out for 30 seconds. This improves stability and strength in your ankle, knee, hip. It also improves your sense of balance so that you can get through life a lot better. Then you do the other side.
If you have a hard time doing this, you can hold on to something. You can put something close by if you need to hold on for balance. And as it gets easy you can use a mattress. Look straight ahead. I’m using all these small muscles in my ankle and knee. You work out so many different things. It’s just a simple exercise, and I’ve worked so many different things. And we find as you get older and do these balance exercises, it can increase brain function. Let’s see if you can do that for 30 seconds.
Importance of Squats
Then squats are one of the most important things you can do this anywhere, just grab onto a railing or under a cabinet. Something to hold onto, and then you just put your knees directly over your ankles. Use slow, deliberate movements and come up, not all the way, go down to your parallel with the ground, come up very slowly. The slower you go, the more concentrated the exercise and the more it works your muscles. Just go down the slow, hold it, come up slow.
And as you get that, and if it gets easy, you can then go to a single leg. As I bring my right foot up and most of the pressure goes to the weight on my left side. Look straight ahead. Now I am going to bring my left toe up. So you do the double like the regular squat, and you do 15, 20, if that gets too easy, you can do ten on each side, 10, 15, 20.
And then this is another variation even more advanced. Again my knees right over my ankle. You want to avoid putting your knee in front of your foot as it puts too much pressure on your knee. So you can do 10, 15, 20 of those on each side as you advance. But initially, you can you just keep the two-legged one, look straight ahead go slow. You can feel the power in your quads and your thigh and your glutes.
All right. And then you could do for your thighs you can just do regular toe raises where you are coming up like this. You can stand out of step for more of a range of motion where your heels drop down and come up like this. You can do 10 to 15 of those. If that gets too easy for you, so you can do 10 of those, and when you can be one-legged, you can do ten each side. That, of course, strengthens calf muscle and then we can do ropes.
Benefits of Bands
So these bands are great because you can bring them anywhere. They’re great for traveling from your suitcase and put them on the door. Close the door. This will work your biceps. You flatten your shoulders, your upper back, and your shoulder blades. Relax. And if you let it all the way out and bring your shoulder blades back and then pull like that, it helps strengthen muscles in between your shoulder blades and improve your posture. Go nice and slow. And go back first and then pull. It’s great free exercise, and then you can do go up higher. This works out your shoulders, your arms and again they’ll improve your posture. You can do 10, 15 of those.
And also turn around and work your chest. So you do one at the time. This works your triceps your chest muscles, or you can work both at the same time. You can do 10 to 15 to 20 of those. So you know I like to mix it up, and you can do these pull parts. Well, I’m going the door it’s pulling like this. This strengthens your upper back muscles, your back, your arms also improve your posture. Come down a little bit down here, solid weight. So most of us are on the computer or you know banging full day like this, you know texting on the phone. So to get that posture back or strengthening your back muscles with all these exercises.
Okay, and you can do it at the top. Now when you do, you want to make sure like someone’s not on the other side of the door where you just open it as you’re in the middle of doing it and get bonked in the head. You can do some pull balance. Sit on an exercise ball or stick down like this. And then the triceps two at a time or one at a time or I like to do a combination, and if you slow the movement, you slow down, and you can get a much better resistance, much better attention. So you don’t need to go lifting a lot of weight. Something as simple as bags can do the trick if you do right, you focus on what you’re doing. Focus on the muscle, really slow deliberate movements, and you can even count four seconds down, four seconds up.
Doing Your Biceps
All right. I think that’s it for the door. And then biceps you can step on the band with this. So you can do step on one foot or if you want to add a step. And go nice and slow. You can do one or two at a time. So if I slow it down it increases the resistance again. Go slow, focus on the bicep muscle, and go down very slow. You can really feel it. Okay.
Whole Body Exercise
So another exercise. This is a great functional training exercise. Now, it pretty much involves your whole body, because we’re going to be lifting like this. Line up like this and push up like that. All right. So we’re working our legs, thighs, glutes and then chest, shoulders, arm, you are working your whole body with just this one exercise.
You can be 10, 15, 20 depends on how you feel. You know, it gets longer the more time to do it but you can start with five, and I’ll slow it down here. So notice when I am picking it up you know flat back, squat down, Squatting down, flat back this is close to my body. You can use a weighted ball. I am using a 10-point ball. But if you don’t have a weighted ball at home or in the hotel, you can use other objects, such as a book, bottled water or your six-month-old baby.
Okay, so that’s it. It’s a great one. And then I’ll show you one more body weight exercise, which is a plank. Get into a push-up position, suck it in all the way, tight your belly, tighten your bum muscles also, keep everything straight. Now you just hold it for 10, 20, 30 second or even more. This works your core, your abdomen, your glutes, your back, your arms, your chest, legs and it works your entire back, your neck, shoulders.
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