0:04 This is Brent of the Brookbush 0:05 Institute. In this video we're doing our 0:07 variation of a very common exercise, 0:10 which is activation for the external 0:13 rotators of the shoulder which have a 0:14 propensity to become underactive in 0:16 those with shoulder or upper body 0:18 dysfunction. I'm going to have my friend, 0:20 Brian, come out. He's going to help me 0:21 demonstrate. Now, the common exercise we 0:24 like to use, because it's bilateral, it 0:27 doesn't take a lot of equipment, and it 0:29 just happens to be very convenient is 0:32 chest out, thumbs out. So, if Brian 0:35 takes this band here and he just 0:39 does one of these things, you guys can 0:42 kind of see that's bilateral 0:45 external rotation. Now on top of this, we 0:47 just have to figure out how we 0:49 optimize this. At the Brookbush 0:51 Institute, the first thing we think about 0:52 when we do our activation exercises is 0:54 what are our overactive synergists? So, 0:57 anytime we have an inhibited group of 0:59 muscles, in this case, the external 1:01 rotators being the infraspinatus and 1:02 teres minor, we have muscles that are 1:04 going to try to take over that job. In 1:07 the case of the external rotators, the 1:10 supraspinatus and posterior delt start 1:13 trying to do the job of the 1:14 infraspinatus and teres minor. We have 1:16 to start thinking, how do I reciprocally 1:19 inhibit my overactive synergists? Well, 1:23 the supraspinatus is easy. My 1:24 supraspinatus is an abductor. So what am 1:27 I going to do to reciprocally 1:28 inhibit? Adduct a little bit. I'm just 1:31 going to squeeze the elbows into the 1:33 ribcage. As far as my posterior delt, my 1:37 posterior delt does extension. So to 1:39 reciprocally inhibit, I'm going to do a 1:41 little bit of flexion. So if he, rather 1:44 than gets back here, hugging back on the 1:48 side of his rib cage, goes to the front 1:49 of his rib cage and just hugs the front, 1:51 kind of like where this little angle 1:55 is right here, or the little corner of 1:56 your ribs stick out. If he keeps his 1:59 elbows touching there, we should be good 2:01 for reciprocally inhibiting his supraspinatus and posterior delt. And I think what 2:07 Brian's about to find out is as soon as 2:09 he goes back to try to externally rotate, 2:11 this isn't going to feel as easy as it 2:13 did the first time you did it. So, go 2:15 ahead and give that a 2:16 shot. Deep breath. A little harder? Yeah. 2:23 Yeah, you guys will find that people 2:25 can do all sorts of weight when they 2:27 bring their arms back, because 2:29 they're using those big posterior delts 2:31 to try to get a lot of force in 2:33 external rotation, and then all of a 2:35 sudden you reciprocally inhibit those 2:36 overactive synergists, and they don't 2:39 have nearly as much strength as they 2:40 used to. And, generally speaking, they'll 2:43 start feeling it where they're supposed 2:44 to. Remember, your infraspinatus and teres 2:47 minor are kind of on the back of your 2:48 scapula here. I can actually feel, 2:51 palpating is infraspinatus, I can 2:53 feel it just go "szoof" puff up. 2:57 Yeah, it does. It actually makes that 2:59 sound. He's going to have jacked infraspinatus. 3:02 You think you can get 12 to 20 3:05 repetitions? That was at least 10 right there. 3:07 That was 10? Good, because I want you a 3:09 little slower on the tempo. So, remember, 3:13 guys, your tempo for these activation 3:15 exercises are either 4-2-2, being a 4 3:19 second eccentric. Or, if you 3:22 wanted to concentrate on range of motion, 3:23 you can go 2, 4 second hold, 2, 3, 4 3:27 and then a 2 second eccentric. Now, 3:30 we're going to even take this up another 3:32 notch, because this dysfunction of the 3:36 shoulder and the upper body is often 3:39 very related to cervical dysfunction as 3:42 well. We have a couple muscles of 3:44 the scapula, being our upper trap and our 3:46 levator scapulae that connect our 3:47 cervical spine and our upper body 3:50 dysfunction real quick. I'm going to go 3:52 ahead and place Brian up against this 3:54 wall here. And now on top of all of the 3:59 stuff that we just did- his 4:01 shoulders being a little bit into 4:03 flexion, keeping his scapula down and back, 4:05 good, and he's hugging his rib cage, I can now 4:09 have him head back, chin tucked, putting his 4:13 external occipital protuberance back 4:16 against this pad, helping to stimulate his 4:19 deep cervical flexors while I have him 4:23 do this. 4:26 Oh, man, we're getting good 4:27 bang for our buck on this exercise now. 4:30 We've reciprocally inhibited our 4:32 overactive synergists, we're activating 4:34 our external rotators, which we wanted to, 4:36 and we're even getting a little bit of 4:38 deep cervical flexor activation, keeping 4:42 his head back against that wall. 4:48 Is it getting hard? You've only 4:50 done about 25 reps so far. Guys, generally 4:53 we'd only do 12 to 20 reps. Now, the last 4:55 thing Brian is going to show you is 4:57 we're going to do this one arm at a time. 4:59 Occasionally, you do have somebody who 5:01 has unilateral dysfunction, right, they're 5:04 only dysfunctional on one side. It is 5:06 important that if you have dysfunction 5:09 on one side that you correct dysfunction 5:12 on that side alone. Something I find 5:14 myself repeating often lately is you 5:18 can't fix asymmetrical dysfunction with 5:22 a symmetrical intervention. So, if he only 5:25 had dysfunction on his right side, and I 5:27 only want him to do right-sided external 5:30 rotator activation, all I'm going to do 5:33 is wrap my band around some solid 5:38 object and follow all those same cues. This 5:43 one is where the towel comes in handy. 5:45 Some of you guys have probably seen 5:46 external rotator activation where they 5:48 put a towel under here. Why he has that 5:51 towel is if I have him adduct and 5:54 just hold the towel- you don't have to 5:56 squeeze the towel- just hold the 5:58 towel on the front of his rib cage, it'll 6:00 help keep his shoulder girdle where 6:02 it's supposed to be. It'll help me keep 6:04 reciprocally inhibiting those overactive 6:07 synergists, once again, being his supraspinatus 6:10 and posterior delt. 6:13 For some reason, the chest out, thumbs out 6:15 tends to keep us where we're supposed to 6:17 be, and then we go to one arm and it's a 6:18 little easy to get flailing around. How 6:23 does that feel? Good. Good, like terrible. 6:29 Yes, like it hurts so good. You guys know 6:32 the feeling. Now, with all exercises, one 6:35 thing I want to remind you guys of is 6:37 this isn't the end. Although this is 6:39 convenient, that chest out, thumbs out 6:41 exercise, especially against the wall 6:42 makes a wonderful warm-up, you can do it 6:44 with a huge group of people in a 6:47 classroom setting or a team setting, you 6:50 do have to progress exercise. There is 6:53 going to be a point in time when this 6:54 exercise is going to be too easy for 6:57 Brian. We need more than just up the 7:01 weight of the band, up the weight of the 7:02 band, up the weight of the band. Remember, 7:04 the goal with activation exercises isn't 7:06 hypertrophy. I'm not trying to get him 7:08 the most jacked infraspinatus that 7:10 anybody's ever seen. That actually sounds 7:12 a little ridiculous just saying it. 7:15 There is another video after this 7:17 called External Rotator Activation 7:20 Progressions where we show several 7:23 progressions to this exercise. You need 7:25 to check it out. Start here. Let me know 7:29 what your outcomes are. As I've said in 7:32 all the videos up to this point, if I 7:35 have Brian doing this, it's because I 7:37 found something that was indicative of 7:40 external rotator inhibition in his 7:43 assessment, whether that's arms fall on 7:45 the overhead squat or a lack of external 7:47 rotator flexibility. So, if I did my 7:51 goniometry, maybe he lacks a 7:52 little bit of external rotation. Or, 7:55 if I was going to directly test this, an 7:57 external rotator manual muscle test. Do 8:01 your assessments. Do your intervention. 8:03 Reassess. Let me know what your outcomes 8:06 are. If you have any questions, please 8:07 feel free to leave them at the bottom of 8:09 this video. 8:17 you
