Optimize your off-season baseball/softball training

Make sure your off-season baseball/softball training is preparing you to be ON this season!

Incorporating simple stretches and exercises into your warm up is an important part of preparing for the activities at hand. Warm ups should be geared to increase your heart rate and respiratory rate, along with wake up the nervous system to allow for enhanced mobility, flexibility, and coordination.

We have all heard the saying “you should practice like you play”, so we try and make our practices high intensity and game-like. Well, how do we get ourselves ready for practicing like this? The same idea goes for warming up… focusing on good stretching and dynamic movements that apply to our sport will better prepare us for performing on the field.

• Lunge walk with trunk twist: step forward into a lunge position while twisting trunk and upper body towards the forward leg; continue lunge walking forward, alternating legs.
• Inside/Outside Taps: step forward and tap the inside of one foot with the opposite hand, then repeat using the opposite foot and hand; on the return, do this same concept using one foot and tapping the outside of it with the same side hand.
• Skipping (normal, high, long): skip with a normal pattern; skip as high as possible; skip with long strides for distance.
• Carioca run: start in a sideways stance, jogging sideways, alternating lead leg in front and lead leg in back.
• Arm crossover stretch: grab your left arm and pull it across your body as you twist to the right; repeat on the opposite side.
• Arm circles: move the arms in various sized circles (small, medium, and large) at different angles (in front of the body or out to the side).

Sara Loeffelholz, PT, DPT