Mobility and flexibility can be hugely important components of a personal fitness routine, and ones which are frequently overlooked in favor of chasing strength gains. In a recent video, YouTube's Geek Climber comes to the realization that in order for him to be able to make any more progress in his calisthenics workouts, he first needs to invest some time and effort in alleviating his stiff, immobile muscles.
© The Geek Climber - YouTubeYouTube's Geek Climber spent 80 days following Calimove's mobility training program in order to improve his muscle stiffness and ability to learn calisthenics.
Taking his inspiration from the Calimove channel, he commits to 80 days of mobility exercises which will help to sufficiently loosen up his shoulders, hips, and wrists (among other areas). Prior to starting, he measures his mobility in five moves: the standing toe touch, the archer squat side bend, the sitting leg raise, the stick shoulder extension, and the easy bridge.
He then began following Calimove's mobility program, and filmed himself throughout to ensure that he was demonstrating the correct form in each movement.
"After training mobility for some time, I discovered that mobility training was the perfect active rest day for me," he says."I don't know why, but my muscles seemed to recover faster from intense workouts like one-armed pullups or weight training when the rest day was mobility training instead of completely doing nothing."
After 80 days, he retests his five mobility criteria, and finds that his performance in each has improved. He is now able to get his entire palm on the floor during the standing toe touch, he can fold much more comfortably and further into the archer squat side bend, can lift his legs higher in the sitting leg raise, can achieve nearly 90-degrees in the stick shoulder extension, and is fully able to perform the more advanced version of the back bridge, which he couldn't at the start.
"This proves that if you are a beginner at something, all you have to do is put in the work, and you will see results," he says.
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