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What's up guys? Hey, Jared Baxter and here, Doctor of Physical Therapy, toninton.com. And today is all about mobility, and specifically, I wanted to share with you six of my favorite exercises to help keep you mobile, flexible, and pain-free. So let's get into them right now.
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All right, you guys. So when we talk about flexibility, when we talk about mobility, and when we even talk about strength training in the body, there's one principle that holds true for every one of us, and that is that your body will actually adapt and react to stresses that are placed on it. Now, when I say that, I mean that muscles and tendons can actually elongate; they can actually become longer in response to that stimulus. If I train a muscle, if I grab some weights, and if I lift those weights, or if I do some bodyweight exercises, your muscle is going to get stronger in response to that stimulus that we place upon it. Now, unfortunately, the same thing happens on the other end, and I think that that's what maybe a few more of us become subject to, is that a lack of stimulus, or a lack of stretching, or a lack of getting into that end range for a certain muscle or for a certain joint will actually cause that area to tighten. So the muscles shrink, and the joint capsules shrink, and the tendons—all of those connective tissues that kind of hold us together, that make our joints move—actually will kind of bind down on themselves in response to a lack of stimulus. Basically, this is a use it or lose it principle. It happens with our muscles; if we don't, if we don't use our muscles, we lose them; they atrophy, they become weaker. Same thing applies to our joints. If we're not taking our joints regularly into their end ranges of motion, your joints actually bind down, and they get tight. Most, you know, 50, 60, 70-year-olds aren't as mobile, aren't as flexible, don't have as much range of motion as they did when they were kind of 20, 30, 40 years old. And this is one of the main reasons why we just don't get out of what our comfort zone is; we don't get out of what's comfortable, and we don't spend time at these end ranges of motion. And so a lot of what I prescribe to people are stretches to help to get back into what we would consider this normal range of motion. And so those are the things that I wanted to share with you guys today. What we're going to do is I'm going to show you six of my favorite stretches, just things that you guys can do every single day to maintain mobility, to maintain range of motion, and therefore remain, remain functional, and therefore remain pain-free. What we're going to do, we're going to start basically top down; I'm going to run you guys through all of them. Let's do it right now.
These first three stretches that I want to show you are going to be geared towards basically your neck and your upper back. The main problems that I see that arise in these areas actually come from poor posture. So many of us spend so much time, you know, looking at our phones, looking at a tablet, working on a laptop—these activities where our gaze is directed downward. Now, in normal posture, my ear should be right over my shoulder. If I were to sit up straight and tall, you guys can see that's a good alignment right there. As soon as I bring my phone out, as soon as I start to text on my phone, or as soon as I especially work on my laptop, you see my shoulders round forward; my head comes forward. That can be a cause for a lot of neck pain; that can be a lot of cause for even headaches, upper back pain, muscle knots—just kind of a myriad of problems that arise from that. So again, these first three stretches are geared towards your neck and upper back, getting out of that kind of forward head, rounded shoulders posture into this end range of motion where we should normally be. And so your first one is going to be kind of for your upper neck, and we would do what we call chin tucks. Now, chin tucks is probably one of my most recommended exercises for people just because it is, you know, so functional and so easy to do. Also, basically, if I were to kind of jet my chin forward like this, the goal with the chin tuck is to tuck my chin straight back this way. And so from here, and then I'm just going to tuck my chin straight back into my, in kind of into my throat, and then right back down. I call it the double chin exercise; the more of those double chins you can get underneath your chin right here, the better the exercise. You'll notice it's not a head nod; I'm not bringing my chin down towards my chest; it's just basically I'm trying to pull my chin straight back. If you're doing it correctly, you should feel that stretch right at the base of your neck. And what I recommend to people is you're going to hold that for about a three to five-second count, and then come back forward, and then three to five-second count, and then right back forward, just like that. The goal is to bring the ear back over the shoulder with the chin tuck.
Exercise number two is going to be basically neck extension and upper back extension. Again, our spines are built to move, and we need to get them into end ranges, but so much of what we do is in front of us, meaning eyes level and down below us, meaning we're kind of down here in front of us. Rarely do we get back into this position right here. Can be the cause for a lot of pain. So let's show you some ways that you can do that safely. What I like to do is grab a towel, and what you're going to do is just kind of put that right around your neck. Try to keep it a little bit lower on your neck, and then what you can do is actually just extend backwards. So you'll see that as I hold that towel in place, I can bias my neck, so that's going to be your cervical spine holding right here, looking back. Go just as far as you can. I tell people, I want you to go to the point where it's painful, but not into pain. You're right here; you're holding tight. If that's painful, that's where you're going to stop. Hold it for about a three to five-second count, come right back down, and then hopefully what you notice as you continue to do this, you can get back further and further and further. Now, if we wanted to move that down, if we wanted to make it kind of a neck and upper back exercise—you're seated in a chair; you can actually extend backwards over the back of that chair. Well, the, the change that you're going to make is with your hands; we're holding right here. Now, as my neck kind of gets back to that end range, what I'm going to do is follow it with my hands, and so you'll see that that, that angle stays relative. So I'm going to hold this towel at the same angle throughout that whole motion. So neck goes back, and now I can actually extend over that chair; I can get my upper back involved. Again, it's not a position that our upper backs are used to getting into, but it's a position that our upper backs need to get into. Can be a source for a lot of pain in your upper back; it can be the source of a lot of kind of muscle knots through your neck and shoulders. If you get into that position, if you get that upper back moving, can really help those areas. So we're right here; we're extending; we're coming back up over the chair. Hold for about a three to five-second count, and then come right back down. Up and back over the chair, about a three to five-second count, and then come right back down.
Stretch number three is going to be a doorway stretch, because so much of what we do is right here. Not only do we need to extend backwards, but we also need to stretch through right here. Again, it's that principle of an adaptive shortening. If we spend a lot of time right here, the, the chest gets tight, the anterior shoulder gets tight; shoulders start to roll in and forward. It's just not a natural position to be in; that's when pain starts to happen. So in order to get out of this position, we need to basically stretch all through here to get opened up, to be able to get our shoulders back so that our head and our ear can go right over our shoulders. And so that's where these doorway stretches come in. What you're going to do is come up to a doorway; you put your hands up a little bit higher on the doorway so that your forearms are on either side of the door frame, and then keep your head up high, keep your shoulders back, and then just step into that doorway. You're going to lean into the doorway just until a comfortable stretch is felt through just that front of the chest, in front of the shoulders. You're going to hold that for about 20 seconds, and then you're going to come out of the doorway. Now, with that one, I like to repeat that three times, so you're looking at about 60 seconds of stretching on the doorway. Again, just a comfortable stretch through the chest and shoulders should be really good for you.
Finally, let's see what we can do about the mobility in our lower backs and our hips. And again, a lot of these exercises come from just spending as much time seated as we do. When I sit, you can see that my back kind of rounds a little bit, so it's curving this direction; my hips are flexed, and so my hip flexors get tight, and then my hamstrings are also in this shortened position as my knees are bent. And so to combat the effects of that position, we basically need to get into the opposite position in all those areas. Let me show you how to stretch out your lower back, your hip flexors, and your hamstrings. And so the lower back stretch that I like is going to be what we call in yoga a cobra pose. You're going to come right here, lay on your stomach, and you'll see that I'm kind of propped up on my elbows right now. And for a lot of you, this may be an adequate stretch; this is that you should feel a good stretch in your lower back; you should feel it just as you're trying to extend backwards. And what I tell people is spend about 10 seconds right there, and then come down, and then give it like a two to three-second break, and then come right back up, and then you're going to spend 10 seconds there. Now, for those of you who might be a little more mobile than this, we can take this to the next level with what we would call, again, the cobra pose. All of a sudden my hands are down on the ground, and you'll see that I can push up onto my hands to introduce even more of an arch in my back. Again, it's the opposite direction of seated, of flexing forward. And so about a 10-second hold right there, and then come down; you can relax, kind of give those structures a break for about two to three seconds, and then come right back up, and then we're going to hold that again for about a 10-second hold. You'd repeat that about 10 times. Now, one thing that I need to mention with this stretch, if you do have a problem like a spondylolisthesis or stenosis or degenerative disc disease, this is not the best position for you to be in; this is actually really going to hurt a lot more than it's going to do good. And so if you have one of those conditions and need to stretch your back out, the ones that I typically recommend are going to be either a single knee to chest—you're going to grab one knee, and you're going to pull it into your chest until you feel a good stretch in your back—or we can take it a step further and do a double knee to chest. If you grab both of your knees, pull them right into your chest until the stretch is felt in your lower back; that is going to be a much better, a much more effective stretch for you if you do have those conditions.
Okay, the hip flexor stretch that I like right here, kind of the front of the hips; we need to get those stretched out; we need to get those mobile. Don't do these up on a bed; do these down on a floor where it's safe. For the purposes of this video, I'm going to show you up here on the bed. What you're going to do is get into this tall kneeling position, so my right leg's forward, my left leg is down on the ground, and the goal is to get a stretch right here through the front of that hip. Now, to do that, what I want to do is lean my body forward onto that right leg. What I don't want is a big arch in your back; a lot of times people will really like arch their back, and hopefully you can kind of see that on the camera, and they'll say, yeah, I don't really feel anything here. The hip flexor that we're after actually attaches to your spine; you need to keep your spine relatively straight in order to maximally stretch that hip flexor. So what I tell people is, now I want you to contract that left glute, so I want you to get into a neutral position first. Step is to squeeze that left glute, keep it contracted, and now lean forward into that position, and you'll see that I'm actually, I'm only able to go that far before I feel a really big stretch in the front of that hip flexor. You're going to hang out there for about 20 seconds, 15–20 seconds, and then back out of it. Contract the glute again, come on again; I'm just shifting my weight forward onto my right foot; left leg is, is the one that I'm trying to stretch out. About 15–20 seconds, come out of it; you'll do that three times, and then you're going to repeat that on the other leg also. So I demonstrated my left leg; obviously, you'd want to do that on the right leg also.
Okay, hamstring stretches is going to be my last one, number six. We've got to get the hamstrings mobile. The version of the hamstring stretch that I like, that I prefer—there's actually two of them that I'll show you guys. First one is going to be up on a chair. If I wanted to stretch that left hamstring out, all I need to do is prop my foot up onto something, and now you'll notice my back—I want to keep my back nice and straight—and as I lean forward there, I mean, that's as far as I can go, and that's a really good stretch to the back of that hamstring. You're going to hold that for about a 15 to 20-second count and come back out of it. Really straight, good posture with my back as I lean forward again; big stretch on my hamstring. The difference again—so here, if I round my back, look how much further I can go, but really it's not as big a stretch. Keep your back straight, lean forward, hold it for 15 to 20 seconds, repeat that one three times. And lastly, one more variation on the hamstring stretch at home; you're going to get a belt or a towel or a sheet or a rope, just something that doesn't stretch. This one's going to go around my foot. If I'm stretching out that left hamstring, I'm going to lay down flat, and then you'll see that in this position my back is very safe, and it's very protected, and then I can pull on this strap just until I get a good comfortable stretch through the back of the leg. That one I'm going to hold for 15 to 20 seconds, and then lay off of it a little bit, kind of back off of the stretch, hold it up here again about 15 to 20 seconds; I'll repeat that three times, and then obviously I'm going to do that on both sides also.
All right, you guys. So there you have them, six of my favorite exercises to increase your mobility, hopefully increase your function, and decrease your pain. I hope you guys enjoyed this video. If you did, go ahead and hit that thumbs up button for me down below. Thank you so much for doing that in advance. Also, if you haven't done so already, I hope you take this chance to subscribe to Tone and Titan here on YouTube. I'd love to help you out with future videos. If you guys have any questions or comments or even ideas for future videos, I'd love to hear from you. Go ahead and leave me a comment down below, and we'll see you next time, right back here on Tone and [Music] Titan. You