Injury Prevention Through Better Flexibility and Balance
Before every Bootique workout in any of our San Diego locations, whether it’s cardio dance, outdoor bootcamp or personal training, our trainers lead a comprehensive warm up, which is changed up every month to ensure the exercises are efficient and always working your body in the right way. Although the warm up is a fun way to get your mind in the zone for a great workout, it’s also of crucial importance for injury prevention. If you don’t ease your muscles into vigorous activity with a bit of solid cardio, you may be putting yourself at risk for muscle strain or sprain.
In addition to always ensuring you do a proper warm up, regularly practicing exercises designed to increase your flexibility and balance is another way to protect yourself from injuries while exercising. Increasing these two factors will also gradually give you the ability to work out even harder! Just think: If your balance is solid, you can do deep lunges without having to pause because you fell over or had to re-center. If you’re able to become more flexible, you can lift your leg higher on exercises like a single-leg deadlift, equating to a larger range of motion and a deeper stretch each time.
Just like increasing your endurance or coordination, upping your flexibility and balance takes time and practice. Shoot for executing these exercises one to two times per week for best results, and see how you improve. Here are a few of Bootique’s top tips to help you along!
1. Build strength in stabilizer muscles. The key to a good sense of balance is strong stabilizer muscles throughout your body, especially in your core and your legs. These muscles can be strengthened by regularly executing simple exercises like squats. If you’re not sure about what proper squat form looks like, any Bootique trainer would be happy to show you! Remember, good form is crucial to avoiding injury as well.
2. Try simple balance exercises. You can practice basic exercises like these these throughout your day to improve your balance: Next time you’re brushing your teeth, or waiting for your food in the microwave at work, try balancing on one leg for 30 seconds at a time, without holding on to anything. The more often you do it, the more you’ll improve!
3. Learn basic stretches to target your tightest muscles. At Bootique, we offer regular stretching clinics and yoga classes in San Diego to help you recover and repair your muscles, and to increase your flexibility. Our classes are guided by trained professionals who can help you discover the stretches that are best for your body, so that you can become more flexible. The more flexibility you attain, the lower your chances of injury will be!
If you’re starting at square one with improving your flexibility or balance, we’d love to assist! In addition to our outdoor boot camp and dance cardio fitness classes in Mission Valley, Hillcrest, Mission Bay and La Jolla, we also offer personal training in San Diego. This one-on-one attention from our knowledgeable, friendly trainers will ensure that your workouts are catered to the specific needs of your body. Contact us today to learn more about getting fit with Bootique San Diego!
