Tag Baton Rouge

How To Gently Stretch The Hip Flexors

Nick Ortego Leave a comment

In this post:

  • a relaxing way to gently stretch the hip flexor muscles– the psoas, illiacus, and rectus femoris–without compressing the hip joint.


Author: Nick Ortego is the owner of N 2 Action, a wellness studio in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, offering personal training, health coaching, yoga, and assisted stretching.
Also find more on the Nick Ortego Fitness YouTube Channel

Transcript:
Hey it’s Nick Ortego here. I’m gonna
show you how to do nice easy gentle hip
flexor stretch using a table. You
can do this on the edge of your bed as
well.
It’s gonna be in the Thomas Test
positions. That’s a way that we
trainers sometimes use to look at
whether you need to stretch your hip
flexors. Just sit on the edge of
the table or a bed, pull your knees up.
Make sure your butt’s really close to
the edge so that you can hang one leg
off like this. And from here you want to
pull your knee toward your chest such
that your lower back flattens out. Then
you’re looking at the leg that’s hanging.
The weight of the leg is gonna give you
a gentle hip flexor stretch. Also if you
want to test it: if your leg’s not hanging
at parallel with the floor, if it’s a
little higher than parallel with the
floor, that’s an indicator that your hip
flexors are tight and needs some
stretching. Also if your shin is hanging
like this more than like this. It’s not
really vertical, if it’s kind of 20
degrees or so away from vertical it’s an
indicator that your two-joint hip
flexors (ie your rectus femoris and your
quad) is tight and could use some
stretching. Then you just hang the
other side off and breathe in a slow
gentle way allow your abdomen to expand
on the inhale see the abdomen is expanding
on the inhale and retracting on the
exhale
On that kind of stretch it’s pretty
gentle you can go for a longer duration
You can go for like two three even up to
five minutes and it won’t be a problem
Another way that you can intensify it a
little bit as if you take ankle weights
put an ankle weight on the leg you’re
trying to stretch. This is a three pound
ankle weight. I wouldn’t go above like a
five pound ankle weight. Then just
let that leg hang so the weight of the
leg plus the weight of the ankle weight
is helping you stretch your hip flexors.
Give that try and if you got any benefit
from this video leave a comment below. If you like to get more content that’s
not available on the blog or the regular
YouTube channel, then click the link
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3 Things About Yoga That You May Not Know

Nick Ortego 12 Comments
  1. Breathing is primary.

Breathing is the most fundamental movement we do. We do it so much that we barely notice it. It is the one physiological function that happens automatically and involuntarily that we can also consciously control. We can change our breathing rate and depth voluntarily. How we breathe affects everything else we do.

In yoga, there are breathing techniques that energize as well as calm the body and mind. Every movement is coordinated with an inhale or an exhale. Even when sitting apparently motionless in a posture, there are subtle movements that occur with each breath, and the breathing is used as tool to get deeper into the posture physically and mentally.

Video Transcript:
One of the first things to remember with
yoga practice is that breathing is
primary. Yoga is primarily breathing
exercise, so that the depth we attain in
any given posture becomes irrelevant if
we stop breathing or if we stop paying
attention to the breath. So that's one of
the tools that we use in yoga to
cultivate intense present moment
awareness is attention to the breath. The
breath, breathing is the most fundamental
movement that we do even if we're
totally inactive the rest of the time. Or
the entire time for 24 hours even if
we're on bed rest, we're still breathing
all day every day, 24 hours a day, it's
the one movement that supports every
other movement that we perform. So it
makes sense to pay attention to it, tune
in to it. To cultivate the ability to
control it and to breathe better, more
effectively. You can also use the breath
as a way to stabilize our mood, emotions.
  1. It is ALL about the process.

The philosophical side of yoga teaches us to engage in the practice with a focus on the process and detachment from the outcomes. This does not mean we are careless or apathetic; it is merely a humble acceptance that many things are beyond our control. Our culture is very results-oriented and most of us learn very early to reach for, cling to, and grasp at the things we desire. Yoga teaches us to let go of our focus on the fruits of our efforts, and use that energy to fully engage in the process.

This is very liberating because the attitude and actions we take are within our control. Through yoga practice we become free of worry about the results and become more efficient in every action. Most of us have had some experience of being “in the zone” where we were totally immersed in what we were doing. Everything seemed effortless as if it was flowing through us.

Yoga is about practicing this approach to life on and off the mat. Modern sport and exercise psychology tells us that process-oriented individuals perform better more consistently than results oriented individuals, and ancient yogic philosophy agrees.

  1. Cobra and Upward Facing Dog are not the same.

Although they look similar, they are different. In cobra, the hips and thighs remain on the floor. The arms typically do not extend fully in this posture. In upward facing dog, the hips and thighs are lifted off of the floor. The arms are straight. In both postures the shoulders are kept maximum distance from the ears and the toes and feet are pointed with the tops of the toes resting on the mat.

Author: Nick Ortego is the owner of N 2 Action, a wellness studio in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, offering personal training, health coaching, yoga, and assisted stretching.

How To Make Parallettes With PVC

Nick Ortego Leave a comment

In this post:


Author: Nick Ortego is the owner of N 2 Action, a wellness studio in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, offering personal training, health coaching, yoga, and assisted stretching.
Also find more on the Nick Ortego Fitness YouTube Channel

Transcript:
Hey it’s Nick Ortego here. I’m going to
show you how to use PVC to make
parallettes for gymnastic strength
training. One thing you’re going to need
is one of these PVC cutters. The way it works
is like a ratchet. See the way to open it
up, put it on a piece of PVC. It’s
just a matter of doing that. I don’t want
to cut this one because I would mess up
my parallette that I’ve already made. So
once you mark the PVC pipes. These
pipes that I’ve used are 1 and 1/2 inch
diameter pipes. I’ve cut 4
24 inch pieces, that’s this part. I’ve got
4 of these pieces right here. Where
there’s a T both sides, so there are
four outlets for the pipe. I’ve got eight of
these little end caps. And then four of
these 90 degree pieces right here.
Basically what you do is put it together
like this there’s a 24 inch piece at the
bottom, the 4 outlet connector on one
side, There’s an 8 inch piece right here
and then the elbow make two of those and then,
put them together like this. Once they’re
together, you really want to do just put
a little gravity by pushing down, pushing
all the directions. You can get these
little, not necessary but helpful, these
little end caps and press those on as
well. The pieces fit together like
that. I like this design a lot better.
I’ve seen some where it’s lacking this
bottom piece and it’s only a T on each
side where I have these so there’s no
solidification of the base of the
parallette and those seem a little
unstable to me. So I really like this
design where there’s a 24 inch piece in
the bottom and the top of the parallette.
So make those give that a try you can
make two of them with the amount of
material that I mentioned earlier and
there are a ton of upper body and core
exercises that you can do with these
parallettes and I will have those videos
coming up. Got any benefit from this
video leave a comment below. If you’d
like to get more content that’s not
available on the blog or the regular
YouTube channel, then click the link
that’s connected to this video you’ll
have a chance to sign up for the Run
Better Now VIP club. Thank you.

How To Do Pushups With Parallettes

Nick Ortego Leave a comment

In this post:


Author: Nick Ortego is the owner of N 2 Action, a wellness studio in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, offering personal training, health coaching, yoga, and assisted stretching.
Also find more on the Nick Ortego Fitness YouTube Channel

Transcript:
Hey it’s Nick Ortego here. I’m gonna
show you how to use parallettes. These
are parallettes that I’ve made
myself with PVC. they’re roughly nine or
10 inches high, made them with one and a half-inch PVC pipes. I’ve got another video showing
you how to make these that I will link
to in the description of this video. I’ll
teach you how to do push-ups with these parallettes. What
you want to do is place them parallel
with each other like this. Your width can
vary from right at shoulder width to a
little wider. From there place your hands
on the bars, go into the top of a push-up
position. Be sure that your your hips,
shoulders and knees are lined up. So you
don’t want your hips to sag like this and
you don’t want your hips higher than the
line between the shoulders and knees.
Just like that, take a big breath in on
the way down and then exhale and push up.
This allows you to get a greater range
of motion going into some shoulder
extension here. Just be sure that you can
move your shoulder blades back with your
arms. Be sure that you have the range of
motion so that you’re not trying to push
the elbows back while the shoulder goes
forward. So it should look like this
where the shoulder blade comes back as
well, and not like this where the
shoulder blade goes forward and the
elbow goes back like this. Here’s the
critical point my shoulder blades go
back. If I don’t have the flexibility to
do that my shoulder blades start to roll
forward which is not good for the
shoulder mechanics. So really work on
your pectoral muscle flexibility. If
going with the full push up position
a little too hard now you can go from
the knees and that looks like this.
Breathe in on the way down, exhale on the
way up and just be sure you have the
range of motion. Be sure that you’re
you’re using the shoulder blades coming
back to extend your range of motion and
not going into kind of a hunched forward
and shoulder blade rolling forward when
your elbows go back elbows back. But the
shoulders go back as well really
stretching the pecs out. You got any
benefit from this video? Then leave a comment below. If you’d like to
get content not available on the
blog or the regular YouTube channel, you
can click the link that is connected to
this video you will have a chance to
sign up for the Run Better Now VIP
Club.

How To Use The Pelvic Clock To Strengthen Your Core

Nick Ortego Leave a comment

In this post:


Author: Nick Ortego is the owner of N 2 Action, a wellness studio in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, offering personal training, health coaching, yoga, and assisted stretching.
Also find more on the Nick Ortego Fitness YouTube Channel

Video Transcript:
Hey it’s Nick Ortego here. I’m going to
show you how to use this little device.
It’s called the pelvic clock and it’s
made to do pelvic motions in a nice easy
gentle restorative way. But I’m going to
show you how to use it to really work
the abdominal muscles with some
intensity. So what you do is you place
the pelvic clock right underneath your
sacrum. That’s the bone that’s at the
base of the spine. It’s part of the
pelvis. You can see this part is shaped
like a sacrum and the 12 o’clock marking
is gonna go top, six o’clock goes at the
bottom. So just lie down on my back like
this and then lift the hips up find the
proper placing. Then just to get a
feel for it, tilt the pelvis around a
little bit: 12 o’clock, 6 o’clock, 9 o’clock, then I’m
going to lift my knees up now. There’s a
lot of freedom of motion at the pelvis.
For this exercise what we’re gonna do is
tilt the pelvis into the 12 o’clock
position, so there’s a little bit of a
posterior pelvic tilt that will activate
my abdominal muscles. I’m gonna keep the
pelvis in that posterior tilt as I let
one foot touch the ground and come back
up and then the other foot touch the
ground. And come back up if that’s really
easy I’m gonna extend the foot out.
The best way to breathe here: let’s
take a nice inhale and then exhale let
the air seep out when the foot is as far
out as you can get it. We want to be
mindful of is that you keep the pelvis
and a posterior tilt that keeps the
abdominals engaged. As I extend my leg
out but pelvis is gonna want
to tilt this way, anterior tilt. It’s
gonna want to go to the six o’clock
position on the pelvic clock and my job
is to keep it tilted back in the 12
o’clock position as I alternate
extending legs out. Breathe in, breathe
out. Farther I extend my leg the more
work I’m gonna give the abdominals. What
I want to be sure that’s happening is
that my abs are holding the pelvis is
place in that posterior tilt even as my
leg goes out. If I start to tilt the
other way, like that, that’s an indicator
to not push my leg out so far. Try a few
repetitions on each side first.
Give that try and maybe even work up to
20 or 30 repetitions. starting with maybe
six to eight on each side. If you got
any benefit from this video, leave a
comment below. If you’d like to get more
content that’s not available on the blog
or the regular YouTube channel, then click
the link that’s connected to this video
you’ll have a chance to sign up for the Run Better Now VIP club.

Reverse Crunch Core Exercise With Ball

Nick Ortego Leave a comment

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Author: Nick Ortego is the owner of N 2 Action, a wellness studio in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, offering personal training, health coaching, yoga, and assisted stretching.
Also find more on the Nick Ortego Fitness YouTube Channel

Video Transcript:
Hey it’s Nick Ortego here. I’m gonna
show you how to use this ball to do an
abdominal exercise. It’s called the
reverse crunch it’s mainly the rectus
abdominus and some of the oblique
muscles. What I like about the reverse
crunches it hits all those muscles. It
gets you moving the pelvis rather than
the thoracic spine. So many people are
already stuck in a position for too many
hours of thoracic flexion, whether
they’re sitting and driving or sitting
at work, doing desk work. So I always like
to avoid reinforcing that for a lot of
people when I can. This is what I like to
do. Pop the legs up on the ball and then
press the heels into the ball. Squeeze the ball between the heels and
the butt like this. So that you can
actually pick up the ball. Arms down
by the sides.
Take a breath in. Exhale and then curl
the pelvis under. What the ball does is
it locks the legs in place. This keeps you
from doing a leg swing where you’re
accomplishing the movement by the
momentum of the hip flexors. Give that a
try it will activate the hamstring, which
can potentially shut the hip flexors off
a little bit more getting you to work on
the ABS a lot more with that reverse
crunch movement. If you got any benefit
from this, leave a comment below. And if
you’d like to get more content that’s
not available on the blog or the regular
youtube channel then click the link
that’s connected to this video you’ll have
a chance to sign up for the Run Better
Now VIP club.

Sandbag Reverse Lunge Exercise

Nick Ortego Leave a comment

In this post:


Author: Nick Ortego is the owner of N 2 Action, a wellness studio in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, offering personal training, health coaching, yoga, and assisted stretching.
Also find more on the Nick Ortego Fitness YouTube Channel

Video Transcript:
Hey it’s Nick Ortego here. I’m going to
show you how to do a reverse lunge with
the sandbag. This is an ultimate sandbag.
It comes with some inner bags that you
can fill up with sand at different
amounts. You choose the amounts.
I have about 20 pounds in here just to
kind of show you how to use it. What I
like about this one is that it’s got
handles on it, but it’s also got these
flaps on the outside edge. So that if you
want to get grip work, if you want to
get that grip strength, any work that
comes with sandbags you can get that. Or
you could have the built-in handles that
give you an easier grip so they can
overload the other muscles. We’re
going to start with just finding a place
to hold the sandbag while you do a
reverse lunge. The way I like to hold it is
like this. Front of my chest in the
elbow crease. From there go down until
the knee almost touches or barely
touches the ground. Then come up. In the
bottom position what you want to see is this
knee can go a little bit forward but you
want to keep the heel grounded. And you
don’t want it to go too far forward. What
you want is the knee barely going
forward the heel is grounded. The leg
that’s in front, that’s where you’re
gonna put most of the weight. This is my
right leg that’s doing most of the work.
I’m gonna step back with my left foot
keep the right heel really grounded and
come up. That way I can do one set on one
leg and then switch over the other leg.
Or I can alternate legs doing the left
leg forward, right leg forward in that
manner. It’s an exercise you want to do
higher repetitions.
It’s not something you want to overload
with like less than eight reps. If
you found any benefit from this video
leave a comment below.
If you’d like to get more access to
content not available on the blog or the
regular YouTube channel, then click the
link connected to this video and you’ll have
a chance to sign up for the Run Better Now
VIP club.

Sandbag Rotational Lunge Exercise

Nick Ortego Leave a comment

In this post:


Author: Nick Ortego is the owner of N 2 Action, a wellness studio in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, offering personal training, health coaching, yoga, and assisted stretching.
Also find more on the Nick Ortego Fitness YouTube Channel

Video Transcript:
Hey it’s Nick Ortego here. I’m going to
show you how to do a reverse lunge with
rotation with a sandbag. This is the
ultimate sandbag it’s called. What I like
about it is that it does have handles in
case you want to grab it with your hands
an overhand position or neutral grip
with the palms facing each other. It’s
also got flaps on the outside, where
you can get the grip work that
you customarily get with a sandbag
training. It comes with inner bags that you
fill up with sand so you can remove
or put back in these inner bags to
adjust the weight. This one has three
inner bags only have one in there right
now. It’s a 20-pound bag. I made two
40-pound bags and a 20-pound bag that
can be pulled in and out to make it
anywhere between 20 and 100 pounds in
20 pound increments. This is just a
little 20 pound bag. When you do the
rotational lunge, pick whatever handle
you like. I’m going for a little grip
work so I’ve got the outside flaps. Hold
it right in front of your body and then
step back with one leg. I’m gonna step
back with my right leg at the same time
I’m rotating my torso to the left. And
from there, I’m letting the back knee, my
right knee in this case, barely touch the
ground or almost touch the ground.
Then I’m coming up. I can do all the reps
on one way and then switch
or I can alternate legs. You want to be sure
that in the bottom position your knee
isn’t way forward. It’s almost directly
over the ankle and come up just keep
your alignment. Have fun with, great
for conditioning, great for that counter
rotation of the torso and the pelvis
when you’re running, If you got any
benefit from this video, leave a comment
below. If you’d like to get content not
available on the blog or the regular
YouTube channel, then click the link
that’s connected to this video you’ll
have a chance to sign up for the Run
Better Now VIP club.

Sand Bag Rotational Swing Exercise

Nick Ortego Leave a comment

In this post:


Author:
Nick Ortego is a health coach specializing in biohacking for runners. He integrates modern methods with the ancient wisdom of yoga to help runners get the most out of every aspect of life. He is the owner of N 2 Action, a wellness studio in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, offering personal training, health coaching, yoga, and fascial stretch therapy.
Also find more on the Nick Ortego Fitness YouTube Channel

Video Transcript:
Hey it’s Nick Ortego here. I’m going
to show you how to do a rotational swing
with the sandbag. The sandbag that I’m
using is an ultimate sandbag. It has
handles on it that make it easy to grip
but it also has flaps on the side that
are not so easy. They give you the
conventional grip strength that you get
from using a sandbag for training. So
this rotational swing, you’re gonna start
at a slow speed and pick up speed
once you hone in your technique. The key
here is to have really good posture and
keep the upper spine, the thoracic spine,
the part of your spine that’s even with
the ribcage, keep it fully extended. When
the upper spine is fully extended you
can get a really good complete rotation
When you get that complete rotation
in the upper spine you keep stress off
of the lower spine. Also your hips will
turn a little bit too. I’m going to use
the outside flaps. I wanna work on the
grip strength. Feet are about shoulder
distance apart and I’m just going to
take a breath in and swing it back this
way. And exhale. Each time I go into
rotation, I’m exhaling so it’s like this.
Keeping good posture, turning the hips
and the shoulders, minimizing the turn. By
keeping my posture good, I’m minimizing
the turn in the lumbar spine a little.
Lumbar spine is not meant for too much
rotation only a few degrees at each
segment. Upper spine is meant
for rotation. The hips, those are meant
for rotation. Holding everything tight in
the lower abdominals and bracing the
core as I’m rotating back and forth.
Great for the golf swing, great for the
counter rotation of the torso while
you’re running, great for performance,
great for a conditioning drill. If you do
that for 30 seconds to a minute non-stop
with it high power output and a lot of
speed you will increase your
conditioning in an interval fashion. If you get any
benefit from this video, leave me a
comment below. If you’d like to get
content not available on the blog or the
regular YouTube channel, then click the
link connected to this video you have a
chance to sign up for the Run Better Now
VIP club.

Diagonal Swing With Sandbag

Nick Ortego Leave a comment

In this post:


Author: Nick Ortego is the owner of N 2 Action, a wellness studio in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, offering personal training, health coaching, yoga, and assisted stretching.
Also find more on the Nick Ortego Fitness YouTube Channel

Video Transcript:
Hey it’s Nick Ortego here. I’m going
to show you how to do a diagonal swing
with the sandbag. This is the ultimate
sandbag. That’s what it’s called. What I
like about it is that it does have
handles if you want to use your grip, but
it also has flaps on the side that allow
you to get a more troublesome grip or a
type of grip that will strengthen your
grip strength the same way a
conventional sandbag. It has
interchangeable inside bags that you
fill up with your own sand and I really
like it. This exercise that I’m going to
show you is really good for rotational
power the side that you’re firing off of
it’s going to fire up the glutes, really
improve your explosive capacity with the
glutes. So the way that I start is pick out
your grip. You can have these parallel
handles, these over hand handles can also
grab the flaps on the side. That’s what I
do, flaps on the sides. I want to work on
the grip strength. You set it down on
the side of one of your feet. So I can
have my feet about shoulders distance
apart. I reach down grab it being sure to
use my hips and my legs. I don’t want to
be rounding the spine. Think about
hinging the hips with a little bit of
hip rotation. This is what the movements
going to look like from the side. From
there, I take a breath in swing it up and
back down.
On the side looks like this:
inhale, exhale, inhale, exhale, inhale,
exhale. That’s the diagonal swing with
the sandbag. Do all of your reps on one
side, and then switch over to the other
side. It’s best for high reps
conditioning type work. Got any benefit
from this exercise, leave a comment below.
If you wanted to get more content that’s
not available on the blog or the regular
YouTube channel, then click the link
connected to this video, you have a
chance to sign up for the Run Better Now
VIP Club.