Stiff leg windmills

Hi,

I'm trying to progress through the manna progression and the stiff leg windmills is causing me grief. When I do the exercise my shoulder sounds like it's grinding and feels horrible. I know my arm's not perfectly vertical the whole time but if I slip even slightly it pops or grinds. The left is worse than the right. I don't have a video available yet (I'm hoping to be able to film it tomorrow) but in the mean time is there anything I can do to make it easier or a different exercise to get more mobility through the shoulders? 

Thanks,

Steph

Hi Stephanie,

I strongly reccomend to consult a physio or other medical professional about this. If you are experiencing any pain, stop immediately. First rule when it comes to training is never train through pain. 

The Thoracic Bridge course and Handstand One have excellent exercises in order to improve your shoulder mobility  

Pauline is right, if you have pain, stop right away. If you dont have pain, try warming up with German armswings, xiaopengs (from HBP) and Table Rocks (from FL) before you hit the SLW.

It doesn't hurt really but it certainly isn't the kind of feeling I'm willing to push through. Thanks for the suggested exercises I've got the thoracic bridge and handstand courses so I'll work through those and the other mobility exercises you mentioned. Looks like I'll be focusing on my shoulders for the next little while.

On 3/10/2017 at 8:28 AM, Stephanie Hedger said:

It doesn't hurt really but it certainly isn't the kind of feeling I'm willing to push through. Thanks for the suggested exercises I've got the thoracic bridge and handstand courses so I'll work through those and the other mobility exercises you mentioned. Looks like I'll be focusing on my shoulders for the next little while.

How much weight are you using out of curiousity?

1 hour ago, Matthew Tucker said:

How much weight are you using out of curiousity?

When I first tried it I was using about a 1L water bottle but I realised that was horrible and made the problem much worse so I'm currently not using anything. I have noticed improvements already with these suggestions. One other thing I've started doing is practising parts of the motion in front of the mirror. I have had shoulder issues since high school and this exercise (and a few others) has just shown I made them stronger but apparently not healthier. I'm so excited by this whole course.

11 hours ago, Stephanie Hedger said:

When I first tried it I was using about a 1L water bottle but I realised that was horrible and made the problem much worse so I'm currently not using anything. I have noticed improvements already with these suggestions. One other thing I've started doing is practising parts of the motion in front of the mirror. I have had shoulder issues since high school and this exercise (and a few others) has just shown I made them stronger but apparently not healthier. I'm so excited by this whole course.

Ah perfect. I know i had noticed some issues myself from using to heavy of a weight for the windmill, and it helped my shoulders a lot when i reduced it. Sounds like you already worked out the same! Otherwise, agreed with the details given by Mats and Pauline.

Generally I wonder how to determine the weight one should use.

I started with 0.5 kg for the first few sessions. First time used 1kg had some grinding, which after using to 0.5 kg for a while totally disappeared.

Recently I use 2.5kg which feels also very good, no grinding, no pain. Just some effort.

After just a week of focusing on mobility I can almost pass this exercise on the right side with a 2kg weight and about 1/2 the sets on the left with nothing. Considering I couldn't get through the first set last week on either side this is awesome. I think the ROM was ok-ish but strength was apparently completely missing through that motion. I wish I'd had this program 15 years ago it might have saved me a lot of pain. 

@Stephanie Hedger That's great news! It's awesome to hear that you are being consistent in your training. I'm looking forward to seeing a video of your progress in the future.