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Don’t Feed The Fire: Modifying Strength To Increase Flexibility

This is something I have been thinking about as I continue to treat a lot more gymnasts who come to me with injury or performance issues. I'm always trying to break down the problem to help the athlete, but also find the "spark" that created…
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Gymnastics, Please Stop These Stretches (Part 3)

In the first part of this article series I covered pushing passive hyper extension for the back hip of splits, then in the second part I covered skin the cats / hyper flexion stretches. Also, before you dig in more, remember you can download…
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Gymnastics, Please Stop Doing These Stretches (Part 2)

In the first part of this article, I went over why pushing hip hyperextension and back leg split flexibility stretching makes me really concerned. In this article, I want to go over two types of commonly used passive shoulder stretches I fear…
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Gymnastics, Please Stop Doing These Stretches (Part 1)

I try my best to not be on the offensive side of the coin when it comes to my writing. However, lately I have seen a ton of flexibility drills that I feel are not only dangerous, they likely are causing large performance drops in gymnasts.…
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Rehab Tips For Clinicians To Treat Gymnasts with Extension Based LBP – Part 3: Intermediate Phase

Over the last few weeks I have been trying to offer some of my thoughts around how I approach the rehabilitation program of a gymnast with extension based back pain. In part 1 I went over calming down acute hypersensitivity and addressing issues…
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From Clinic To Practice #4: Gymnast With Chronic Hamstring Injury and “Tightness”; Due To Core Control Issues

I recently evaluated an optional gymnast who was struggling in the last year with pretty intense high hamstring pain and "tightness" limiting her splits, leaps, sprinting for Yurchenko's, and inbar skills. As it turned out, I felt her hamstring…
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Stretching Lats vs Shoulder Joint – Movement Tweak #1

Here is the first short video of an ongoing series I will be putting out called Movement Tweaks. In this video, I go over why unfortunately I think many gymnasts "go to" stretches for their lat muscles may not be the most effective. Unfortunately, I…
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Why I Don’t Use Ankle Weights With My Gymnasts

To start, I'm aware this is another controversial topic in gymnastics. I have spent quite a long time organizing my thoughts and how to present them in a positive, constructive article. As a younger coach, I used to do a ton of ankle weight…
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Elastic Band ASSISTED Hip Drills For Better Angles and Control

Elastic band drills are all over gymnastics mainly being used as added resistance to hip motion. In the right scenario I think the resistance can be useful. However, I have noticed many gymnasts I work with show huge passive hip motion, but…
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Mobility Exercise’s To Boost Shoulder Health In Male Gymnasts (Part 1)

Although I do spend more time in women's gymnastics, I want to start offering more information to help take care of the male gymnasts out there. Growing up and training, I had my fair share of injuries and wished that I had some ways to proactively…