Work Your Posterior

Dead lifts are great  to incorporate into your workout. In the video you’ll see my friend Eileen performing a reaching  Romanian dead lift and a traditional Romain dead lift. She also demonstrates this move double leg and single leg. As you can imagine, single leg is more challenging.

See the video here:  Dead lift

Dead lifts are great because they work your hamstrings, glutes and back. What mom doesn’t need a little work on her glutes?

Your Hamstrings and Glutes Need Your Attention!

Many women do quad dominate work like squats and forget about focusing on the hamstrings. This causes muscle imbalance which can lead to injury. For example, imagine you’re at the park enjoying the day when all of a sudden your toddler starts running towards the road. You take off to catch him before he reaches the pavement, your front thigh muscles (the quadriceps) are lifting your legs as fast as they can, but your hamstrings can’t keep up and do their job of decelerating the thigh. All of a sudden you blow out a hammie and luckily your toddler stopped all on his own just before getting to the road. It’s a good thing because you are in severe pain from that torn hamstring! Knee injuries and back injuries are also possible scenarios of a quadriceps-hamstring muscles imbalance.

If you are doing hamstring and glute work like Romanian dead lifts, you’ll have more balanced, toned muscles and prevent injury.

Fine Tune The Movement

Here are some tips on how to execute this move:

1. Start with feet hip width apart and toes pointed forward.

2. Think about your weight being balanced on three points of the foot – 1 -head of the first metatarsal which is the ball of your big toe, 2 -head of your 5th metatarsal, or your pinky toe, and 3- heel

3.  Keep your knees a little soft and  the same angle the entire move. You are not bending and straightening the knees.

4.  Squeeze your shoulder blades down and together to engage your lats. Even in the down position your back should not be rounded and squeezing the blades will help prevent that.

4. Push your hips back as you tilt forward.

5. Keep your head/neck straight and only your eyes look up. If you look up with your entire head and neck, you will lose some of the glute and hamstring’s ability to fire.

6. When you feel a stretch behind the legs in your hamstrings, push the hips forward to return to the start position.