Land Like A Dancer

As many of you know I have an extensive dance background and I will be the first to give you a list of the injuries and general aches and pains that came from 20 years of ballet training. That being said there are many aspects of body awareness and mechanics that we do practice thoroughly in ballet that actually did have a positive effect on the efficiency of my movement patterns. One of these being the way we are trained to use our feet and legs to jump and more importantly land.

I came across a study done at NYU Langone’s Harkness Center for Dance Injuries on the biomechanics of jump landing comparing athletes to dancers. This was done to learn more about injuries of the of anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) in both groups. Overall they see less ACL injuries in dancers compared to other athletes most likely due to technique of landing from a jump that we learn from a young age. This is just one aspect of dance training that could potentially be adapted to help other athletes lessen the likelihood of this type of injury. That being said there are many aspects of other sports that dancers could adapt to lessen the negative effect of ballet on hips, ankles and many other commonly injured areas for dancers.

I know first hand that the fundamental movements we use in Crossfit have helped me to strengthen and balance my movement patterns in a way that injuries I thought would be with me for life are no longer an issue. We all want to be healthy and move in the most efficient way possible why not steal a page from someone else’s play book?

Take a look at the video below and form your own opinion!

-Twinkle Toes

Friday:

Warm Up: barbell flow

Skill: EMOM 7 min 2 hang power cleans

Workout: hurricane 25 min cap
3 rounds
800m run
21 power cleans 135/95

Coaching points: Pace the run so you can come in the door and bang off 7 cleans right away. Try to think about 3 sets of 7 for each round or break up as needed. That being said if you are doing more than 6 sets per round, the bar is to heavy my friends. 

Saturday:

Warm Up: elbow prep pec stretch scap stability

Skill: EMOM 20 min pick one of each and pick a number from 3-13

A. bent over row/strict pull up/ring row
B. pike push up/ring push up/handstand push up
C. push-up/dip/ring dip
D. hollow rock/v-snap/transition drill/muscle up
E. 30 sec plank hold/GHD sit-up/K2E-T2B

Workout: Russian Rampage 15 min AMRAP

300m row
30 sec rest
30 box jump overs 24/20
30 sec rest
30 russian kb swings 53/35
30 sec rest
30 russian twists 20/12
30 sec rest

Have a great weekend!