Shoulder Stability - Kettlebell Overhead Walking

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Video Transcription:
Welcome back to Foundation Physical Therapy’s KZbin Channel today we’re going to attack the farmers carry. I’m going to show you some variations with the farmers carry. So we all know of the farmers carry as being a kettlebell here right. Have it at your side you want to maintain a tall spine. Put this arm out to the side. You can also try it with both arms down at your side that’s a little more advanced. When you’re doing a famers carry with this arm out to the side here you want to engage your core. You should engage your core before you even pick up the kettlebell. You want to get shoulders back. You don’t want to do a shrug. I see a lot of people shrugging up to do this and that’s going to give you some neck issues. Really what you want to do is cue your scapular stabilizers or the guys in your upper back that help your shoulder blade remain stable. Pull those in, put your arm out then you’re going to walk. Now when you’re walking you don’t want to teeter back and forth. If you can’t control this weight and maintain a nice straight line here then go to a lighter weight. So that being said that’s kind of your standard farmers carry. You would walk for a distance that’s challenging to get a workout. Now the big thing as far as grip goes you don’t want to hang this kettle bell in your grip like this. What you want to do is get a nice strong grip, hold it and maintain that strong grip. Farmers carry is just as much a grip activity as a core stabilization activity as it is a postural activity. So nice strong grip at all times. Now progressions for the farmers carry. First thing you can do is go to more of a neutral grip. Now again what I see a lot is when people do a neutral carry like this, what happens is they tend to let that wrist drop back. That’s not the right way to do it. When I do a farmer’s carry or when I have a neutral grip with the kettle bell I still want my hand to be in this positon and the kettlebell will rest against my forearm. I don’t want to do this and stress my wrist. So I’m here I make sure that my hand is in the right positon. So I may do same distance walking right here and I want my elbow at around shoulder level 90 degrees there and then I want 90 degrees here at this elbow and I’m going to walk. From here I could go to a progression of doing an overhead press with a farmers carry. Again I can put this arm out here or bring it down. When you have it overhead this isn’t as much help as it is when its at your side so you can just keep it down here. Then big thing here is I don’t want to have a short arm. If I have a short arm while I’m doing this then I need to end up with a lighter kettlebell or I need to make sure I’m staying straight up. Here I want to stay straight up. I want to punch overhead I want that kettle bell away from me as high as I can and not tightening my neck so I may turn my head side to side to make sure my neck is not tense at all. And if you want an extra challenge then here’s what you do. You go bottoms up with the kettlebell so you start out here and again I keep the handle of the kettle bell lined up with the rest of me. I get up to shoulder level and walk there. That’s going to be a lot more stability work for my shoulder because that kettle bell is going to tend to wiggle back and forth. The other thing is its going to work my grip a lot because it’s going to want to rotate. So that’s a lot more challenging so I recommend dropping the weight for that and then getting really good at it then challenge yourself as you go, you don’t need a lot of weight. This kettle bell looks huge its really only 18 pounds. So its good for this demonstration because I can handle it very easily and I can really make sure I show what good stability should look like. Then from there you ca n still go to your overhead carry. I always try to do that with 2 hands to get it into positon then I try and hold it straight over head the same rules apply I punch it away from me keep a crushing grip or a nice strong grip, the whole time the neck should be able to move around I shouldn’t be shrugging. So, that’s just a quick kettle bell progression you can do to work your grip, shoulder stability and just take the boredom out of farmer’s carry sometimes. So, try it out see what you think. So at Foundation again remind you that movement is a gift that should be cultivated. If this exercise is helpful to you or this video is helpful to you please subscribe or if you know somebody that might be interested in it or it might help them out then share it!