>>MARK: Hi!
If you are watching for the first time, I'm Mark Perry the creator of BuiltLean.com
which is your simple, efficient and science-based guide to fitness.
A few years ago I put up a video on YouTube about
5 exercises to help improve hunchback posture
and it now has over 500,000 views.
There's one exercise that I wish I included that I've since learned, and I think
it's the most effective exercise of all.
Before I tell you this exercise,
I'm gonna give you a quick overview of what hunchback posture is:
Hunchback posture is when the upper back rounds excessively,
which creates very high tension in the muscles in your upper back, kinda like when you pull
a rubber band apart.
This high tension forces
not to be able to contract properly and also
creates a lot of tightness in what's supposed to be a mobile area in the body.
Here are the muscles just to give you a quick visual
the top muscle is the trapezius.
This can get very tight and overstretched.
We take that away, and you're left with the lat muscle and the rhomboids.
If you take those away and keep on going down, and you'll see al these muscles alongside
your spine
which are collectively referred to as your erector spinae or spinae muscles.
If you peel them all the way you'll see all these little muscles alongside
your vertebral column.
So as you can see there are a lot of muscles
they're all along the upper back that can get super tight
and you can feel very stiff.
And do you think a foam roller or upper back foam roller is really gonna help
you relieve the tension in the muscles?
I don't think so.
However there is a tool, that I have right here
which is called a rad-roller
that I think can really help relieve the tension in your upper back
and help improve your hunchback posture
and I'm going to show you how to use it,
and how I use it with my friends and family and clients
a rad roller is like two rubber balls stuck together,
and there are three different intensities, there's
a green, the green's soft and a blue, kinda medium hard,
and then you got the black which is stiff.
How it works, is I wanna start out
lying on the ground with your knees up
and I want you to put the rad roller in the middle of your back so that it's
straddling your spine.
You're gonna lie back comfortably, so your head is neutral and lying on the ground
you're going to slowly move up one or two inches
and then you're going to relax and hold that spot
for about 5-10 seconds.
You're gonna continue doing this all the way up
until you're at the top of your shoulder blades.
To make this more intense, and as you progress,
when you are holding it on that spot,
for 5 to 10 seconds, you can lift your arms up over your head
and then back down again.
You can even start doing snow angels just with your arms,
to make it even more intense and to really take into the muscle more effectively.
You can also drop down your knees as well.
Finally, the most advanced way to do this and what I'd recommend you work up to,
is to cross your arms over your chest, almost like you are hiding yourself,
lift up your hips,
and then start rolling all across your thoracic spine which is that
upper back area we're trying to loosen up.
And get more mobile.
And there're a few more tips I wanna mention as you're doing this.
The first, is to breath deeply through your belly.
If you don't breath deeply it's not gonna help relieve the tension in your back so
breathing, again, through the belly, into your belly is extremely important.
The second tip is to keep your ribcage down when
you are flexing your arms over your head.
And this is important because you are not
using your lower back, and flaring your ribs for keeping your lower back in place
and trying to get the mobility and that flexibility from your upper back.
Third, is to keep your head neutral,
you wanna try to avoid bending your head back when you're on the ground,
you wanna try to keep it it neutral in line with your spine
and also it makes it feel a bit more intense.
Fourth,
is that, this may be very intense and pretty painful first time you do it
and my brother joked that is should be renamed
the torture roller instead of the rad roller, and it's the first time he tried it,
it can be very intense but the cool thing is
the more you do it, the easier it's gonna be,
you might notice some pretty dramatic improvements within only a week.
The fifth tip is you try to wear tight fitting clothing, or tucking your shirt
because if you don't, the clothing is gonna bunch
up as you roll up and down your back.
Now there is, there are alternatives to ride roller,
one kinda budget option is to
just basically tape two lacrosse balls together, and this is sometimes called
a peanut.
I learned this from Kelly Starrett of MobilityWOD, I watch all their videos
which is really helpful.
The problem with lacrosse balls, is that they're very hard
and the rad roller for me it's just, it's softer,
and it helps dig into the muscle more effectively in my opinion.
So this feels like it's kinda, mushing the muscle, versus kinda massaging it.
That's my opinion again, this is more the budget option.
The rad roller's around 25 bucks, this may be around 10 bucks.
It's also important to mention, if you do not change your lifestyle habits in your posture,
then the rad roller's not gonna help you very much, right?
So, focus on your posture when you're sitting at a desk, even think about the pillow you're
using when you're sleep.
That can certainly affect your posture.
When you are looking at your posture, all these little things that you don't really
think about
can all affect your posture and so, addressing your posture
and combined with using a rad roller, with some of the other exercises I mentioned
can really help make a significant difference I think in as little as a week for sure.
I also recommend you do it 2-3 times a day, even more a day, the more times you use it,
I think the more effectively help relieve tension, you don't want to use it
too much or
it can start lead to some bruising.
I think minimum, you want to do it once a day, that's personally what I do,
and I have my friends and family and clients do so.
I hope you enjoyed this video, I encourage you
share this video with your friends and family,
also I encourage you to subscribe to this channel, and check out BuiltLean.com
I have hundreds of articles that are research based and medically reviewed
to help you reach your potential,
so thanks again for watching, and hope to see you again soon.