Weekly Excercise #1

Our oldest Little Track Star expertly demonstrating this weeks move! 

This is where I, Track Coach, (though I am adorable too) will be posting a weekly exercise or stretch meant to help improve your running or training. Each one may not apply to everyone, but if something sounds good to you, give it a whirl. Then let me know if it helped or if you have already tried something similar and what the results were. Plus if just have some awesome training tips, feel free to comment with those here too. I am always looking for new great ways to make my highschooler's cry, I mean, better.

So for our first week of exercises I figured we could start out nice and light. We can wait to get into the real heavy stuff in the weeks to come. I have had ankle troubles all my life with multiple breaks and strains on each ankle. Because the amount of rehab I have had to go through with my ankles, I have had to find quick simple ways to strengthen my ankles without spending endless amounts of time with bands and such. So if you have ever had ankle problems or feel you could you a little more balance (which everybody could use), this exercise is for you.  Notice my lovely assistant below, adorable wife, just fresh from a run (she wanted me to put that!) as she will be demonstrating today's moves.

One legged standing- So grab yourself a pillow and throw it on the floor. Stand on said pillow with one foot on the pillow and the other in the air... For the first 30 seconds of this exercise, you are going to look straight ahead. if you have trouble balancing on one ankle or the other, this is where you will stay for a while until you are able to balance continually for 30 seconds on each ankle. Don't fret if this takes you a few weeks to get down, sometimes if you are new to these types of exercises or have had a recent ankle injury, this could take time.

 Once you have mastered the one legged standing while looking straight ahead, it is time to kick it up a notch. This time, look straight up in the air. Again, you need to practice this one until you are able to balance continually for 30 seconds on each foot. (You will certainly feel the exercise working with the small corrections that your foot makes while you try to keep your balance.)

Finally, when you have mastered looking straight up in the air and you are feeling like this simple looking up in the air is child's play, it's time to really kick it into gear. Now while you are balancing on one foot, look straight up into the air and close your eyes. This will take away all your visual references and you will need to completely rely on your balance. (Adorable wife was having trouble with this one!)

This is also a good exercise to test yourself to see how good you are with your balance. Try it with friends or your spouse and make a contest out of it! Let me know who wins!!!