Serratus Anterior Activation Progressions

Serratus Anterior Activation Progressions is a series of exercises designed to improve strength and activation in the Serratus Anterior muscle, which is located on the side of the rib cage and is responsible for assisting in rotation, abduction, and protraction of the shoulder blade. Through a series of resisted and un-resisted drills, these progressions can help improve posture and shoulder stability to improve performance in any upper body movement or exercise.

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This is Brent coming at you with our

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progressions video. I'm excited about this video because it's one of our first

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collaborative videos.

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I have to get my friend Rob Fluegel a shout out. He's one of the faculty for

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the Maitland Manual Therapy courses that I had gone through a few months ago and

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he came through one of my workshops, which was awesome. One of the

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advancements and exercise selection courses. We started talking about how to

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progress this particular exercise, being serratus anterior activation, and here's

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what we kind of came up with. It started with some stuff he knew. We took some of

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the overactive synergist stuff that I've talked about in previous videos, and what

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we came up with I think is an exercise you guys are going to love, especially

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for some of your more advanced individuals with a history of upper body

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dysfunction. All of my athletic trainers with overhead athletes. All of my

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physical therapists looking to progress their individuals outside of that rehab,

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kind of acute rehab program, and of course all of my personal trainers who

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are working on postural dysfunction with their clients.

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I'm going to have my friend Yvette come out. She's going to show the Sahrmann technique

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that this kind of all started from

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first. I'm gonna have you go ahead and put your forearms against the wall,

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parallel, just wider than shoulder width.

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All right now what we're going to do is we're going to use the friction from the

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wall to resist upward rotation of the scapula, to start activating the serratus

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anterior. Now the hard part is of course, keeping tucked under, and drawn in.

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So let's go ahead and see that she's going to slide her arms against the

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wall. It's actually her body weight against the wall that's creating some

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friction.

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Good, let's see that again.

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Alright so this is not a bad exercise. I do have my little issues with it. I think

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it kind of limits how much flexion we can get. Of course, if we limit flexion,

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we're not getting all the upward rotation we can. From my math, from my

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refinements of the upper body dysfunction model,

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I think the subscapularis has a propensity to get overactive for

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serratus anterior, the way levator scapulae has a propensity to get overactive

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to stabilize the scapula. Of course, we have pec minor as well, so I

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would like to find methods of reciprocally inhibiting those muscles and I think we

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can do that fairly effectively on this exercise. As well as the friction against

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the wall, to me, is kind of bothersome.

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It usually doesn't end up being very even. You'll find people kind of get stuck

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at different points in the wall as you kind of go up the wall, higher and higher.

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Some people's arms will come away from the wall and there will be less friction.

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It's just not very even resistance throughout. So first things first, let's

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figure out how to fix the friction thing, because I think that we can work on the

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reciprocal inhibition thing, and get this completely straightened out, and we can

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show you guys some really hard progressions.

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So all we're going to do is we're going to have Yvette put a foam roll against

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the wall, and then she's going to start with her hands against that.

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Now this alone is a progression, guys, it takes a lot more to stabilize this foam roll

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against the wall than it does to have the forearms against the wall, but as I

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mentioned before this is progressions from our other video. If you guys want to

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go back to serratus anterior activation you guys will see some of the beginning

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exercises I use. I'm going to Yvette to draw in glutes tight, tuck under.

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All right the biggest cue you're going to have to give here is people want to

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start with the foam roll in the middle of their forearm. You need to make

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sure they start with the form roll on their hands, and probably their hands a

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little higher than they normally would to start, otherwise you will run out of

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foam roll. Drawing in, now go ahead and push up.

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You guys can see we have nice,

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smooth flexion. We have all the upward rotation we can get because of that Yvette

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can actually lean forward. Her face doesn't get in the way of the wall.

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All right, back down.

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Go ahead and this time I want you to really concentrate as you're lifting your

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arms.

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I want you to depress your scapula.

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So depressing her scapula reciprocally inhibits her levator scapulae. It

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happens a lot easier when we have a foam roll, because it's nice and smooth start,

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we don't get that initial elevation. Let's go ahead and come back down.

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There's also not as much resistance on the way back down, which I appreciate,

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because the pec minor is definitely one of those muscles that has a propensity to

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get really overactive for an inhibited serratus anterior. The way we

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had it done before, there was a lot of friction pulling the arms back down.

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Remember, downward rotation and depression is what the pec minor does

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and we're already protracting to get more serratus anterior activity. So that

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just pulling the arms down might reinforce that overactivity of the pec

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minor.

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Let's see one more before I make this even tougher. Now the kind of

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paradoxical, weird muscle, that comes into play a lot with serratus anterior

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inhibition is the subscapularis will often try to take over to stabilize the

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the shoulder and the scapulothoracic shoulder girdle stability. It doesn't

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work out very well obviously for the human body, and creates a lot of postural

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dysfunction so we need to find a way to inhibit that muscle as well. All

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we have to do is external rotation, so what we're going to have Yvette do is she's

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actually going to take a very weak,

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this is a light, light, light, fit loop. She's going to put it around her

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forearms.

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This is a little tricky to get set up on your own, just so you know guys.

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It'll take a little bit of practice.

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Now, what I've done is if she

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has a fit loop around her forearms, and I cue her to make sure that she stays

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parallel here, as in elbows don't flare out, and hands can't collapse inward. She

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has to then work to keep an external rotation of the shoulders which is going

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to reciprocally inhibit subscapularis, and ensures that this stays totally

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serratus anterior. We don't have subscapularis coming in to try to

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stabilize the shoulder.

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So let's go ahead and try this. How does that feel?

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All right this time, I want to try to not elevate. All the way out.

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This is actually a pretty good progression right here. This is very

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challenging for Yvette.

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I can see her having a real hard time maintaining external rotation, so I would

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probably let her work on this.

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I'm going to go ahead take this a little further, just so you guys see the other

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option.

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So if I take this foam roll from her, I can go a little further. I can go a little

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further by using a stability ball.

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Guys, this is tough. This is super, super, tough. Right, so she's got to now keep

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parallel here, and so keep those wrists pressing outward, elbows stay tucked in.

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Draw in,

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now try to press up, keeping the scapulae depressed.

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Keep your wrists straight. Like I said, this might be a step beyond where I would

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have Yvette go if she was training with me, but I wanted to show you guys this

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progression.

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You can make this incredibly tough, just by backing somebody's feet up.

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Go ahead and back your feet up a little bit. That creates more resistance under the

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ball. Go ahead and push up. It makes it harder and harder to maintain that

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scapular stability, that scapular depression, maintain tucked under, and

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maintained external rotation.

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How are you feeling? Starting to feel it in your serratus anterior? I remember the

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first time I did this particular variation, I got to 8, which maybe not

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all that impressive. It took me a little while to get to 3 sets of 20 within

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a warm-up circuit.

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I think you guys are going to find this incredibly challenging. I think you guys

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are going to get some great results.

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Pay very, very, careful attention to your cues on this exercise, guys. Make sure

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that people aren't dragging down their arms, recruiting a lot of pec minor. You're

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keeping scapulae depressed and of course, forearms parallel, pressing out with

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their wrists to keep external rotators activated.

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Make sure you keep them drawn in and tucked under. If somebody can do all of

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this, I think you guys will find that the strengthening that you get, the

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reinforcement of the mobility you guys have been working on, will stick around

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a lot longer.

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Serratus Anterior Activation Progressions

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Serratus Anterior Activation Progressions

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