If you're involved in the sport of baseball, one thing that you should be taking seriously is your shoulder strength. Baseball workouts are a great way to improve shoulder strength, which will not only help you swing the bat faster, hitting the ball further when you do, but also help keep you injury free as well.
Shoulder strengthening exercises won't take all that long to do therefore are an easy add to the baseball workouts you're already doing.
The shoulders can become quite taxed when playing multiple games or having numerous training sessions, so it's important that you do devote some time to generating and developing this muscle in the upper body.
Let's look at some of the top shoulder strengthening exercises to do.
Shoulder Press
The first exercise is the compound movement that should be added to any shoulder workout. This one will target all heads of the shoulder muscle very well and help you hoist more weight overall, therefore developing maximum power.
When doing the shoulder press exercise, press the weight up over the head but make sure that you never lock the elbows into position. This will help you avoid placing excess strain on the arms, leading to injury.
Pause at the top and then lower back down in a smooth and controlled movement pattern. Aim for 10-12 reps and do two to three sets per workout.
Lateral Raise
The second exercise to add to your shoulder workouts is the lateral raise. Lateral raises are great for hitting the side deltoid in isolation, so can help bring up any strength deficiencies you may have. This exercise will place the body in a slightly weaker position, so don't get discouraged if you have to lift a lighter weight while doing it.
Perform 12-15 reps each set, doing two sets per workout.
Front Raise
Finally, the front raise is the last exercise to add to your shoulder workout. This one will target the front deltoid, which is the one that is more likely to cause pain throughout your training. Most people are also even weaker in this deltoid compared to the lateral deltoid, so again, use a light weight when first starting to assess your strength level. Going to heavy at first could seriously stress the muscle, potentially causing great damage or strain.
Perform 12-15 reps per set of this exercise as well, doing two sets so that both components of the shoulder muscle are well balanced.
So there you have the main exercises to include in your shoulder workout. Do these two to three times per week and you'll reduce your risk of injury while improving your hitting speed.
Showing posts with label Workouts. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Workouts. Show all posts
Tuesday, 11 September 2012
Thursday, 6 September 2012
Improve Your Sprinting Ability on the Baseball Field With These 3 Baseball Workouts
If you're gearing up for a season of baseball, one thing that you will want to be paying attention to is your sprinting ability. One incredibly important element for success is being able to have a fast start as soon as you hit the ball so that you can make it to first base without getting an out.
Being able to generate maximum force and get to top speed then is clearly going to be the absolute most important skill you need to possess. Fortunately, with your baseball workouts you can do just that.
Let's take a quick peek at how you should formulate your sprint baseball workouts to see optimal progress.
Know Your Sprint Time
The first thing to consider is your sprint time. When looking at the sport of baseball, you aren't going to be sprinting for long at all. Likely just 10-15 seconds until you get to first base, so you'll want your baseball workouts to be the same.
These aren't going to be long sprints but you must go max out.
If you want to really intensify them, consider doing them on a hill for added challenge.
Make Sure You're Rested Sufficiently
The second thing that you should consider is how much rest you should take between intervals. Since you are looking to run at a top speed capacity here and you will have more than sufficient rest times between sprints when actually out on the baseball diamond (in most cases), you don't really need to set a time limit for this.
Aim for 1-2 minutes, but if you do need to rest longer, so be it. It's more important that you're well rested than going again but only being able to sprint to maximum capacity.
Perform Enough Repeats
Finally, the last thing that you need to make sure you're doing is performing enough repeats. Since the sprints are shorter themselves, you want to be performing enough of them to get good results from the session.
Aim for at least eight sprints, if not moving up to the 10-12 range. This will ensure that you are able to see quick performance improvements from your baseball workouts, leading to optimal playing gains.
Also make sure to keep these sessions limited to about twice per week as well. This will ensure that you aren't going to risk overtraining and start seeing decreases in performance because of it.
If you can start doing these sprint baseball workouts regularly, you can feel confident that you will notice a big difference when you get out onto the field.
Being able to generate maximum force and get to top speed then is clearly going to be the absolute most important skill you need to possess. Fortunately, with your baseball workouts you can do just that.
Let's take a quick peek at how you should formulate your sprint baseball workouts to see optimal progress.
Know Your Sprint Time
The first thing to consider is your sprint time. When looking at the sport of baseball, you aren't going to be sprinting for long at all. Likely just 10-15 seconds until you get to first base, so you'll want your baseball workouts to be the same.
These aren't going to be long sprints but you must go max out.
If you want to really intensify them, consider doing them on a hill for added challenge.
Make Sure You're Rested Sufficiently
The second thing that you should consider is how much rest you should take between intervals. Since you are looking to run at a top speed capacity here and you will have more than sufficient rest times between sprints when actually out on the baseball diamond (in most cases), you don't really need to set a time limit for this.
Aim for 1-2 minutes, but if you do need to rest longer, so be it. It's more important that you're well rested than going again but only being able to sprint to maximum capacity.
Perform Enough Repeats
Finally, the last thing that you need to make sure you're doing is performing enough repeats. Since the sprints are shorter themselves, you want to be performing enough of them to get good results from the session.
Aim for at least eight sprints, if not moving up to the 10-12 range. This will ensure that you are able to see quick performance improvements from your baseball workouts, leading to optimal playing gains.
Also make sure to keep these sessions limited to about twice per week as well. This will ensure that you aren't going to risk overtraining and start seeing decreases in performance because of it.
If you can start doing these sprint baseball workouts regularly, you can feel confident that you will notice a big difference when you get out onto the field.
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