Hand weight exercises can get your shoulders to where you want them to be.
If you’re curious as to how that works, keep reading.
Shoulder organization is essentially making sure your bones and ligaments are in proper alignment so you can have the strongest shoulders possible.
You can lift weights and get stronger, but if your shoulders aren’t organized properly, you’re only strengthening your muscles and possibly hurting your neck.
The good news is, it doesn’t take a lot of weight. In the free class Mat with Hand Weights, class we begin by using just 2lb weights. You can read more, or you can take the class yourself to experience how hand weight exercises can help you to improve your shoulder organization.
Mat with Hand Weights
Having strong shoulders is going to help prevent you from getting injured
There’s nothing wrong with strong muscles - in fact, they’re encouraged! But even though strong muscles are great, it’s having strong shoulders that is going to help prevent you from getting injured - at times injured seriously. (Say perhaps, a torn rotator cuff - sound familiar?)
How is it that you can get stronger shoulders from 2 lb hand weight exercises?
It’s awesome how these unassuming little hand weights have the ability to strengthen your shoulders so much. If you’ve ever done hand weight exercises before, you know to never underestimate the power of 2lb hand weights. Sure, they start off light, but somehow as the minutes tick by these seemingly light dumbbells get heavier with every pulse.
The endurance required to hold two pounds for an extended period of time is much different than just lifting a 2lb weight.
If you’re holding 2 lb hand weights next to your body, they feel light, and like you could hold them for an hour.
Those same hand weights held at arm’s length away from your body is a whole different feeling. The endurance required to hold two pounds for an extended period of time is much different than just lifting a 2lb weight.
Your body feels weight through sensory nerves which send messages to your brain that you need to organize the shoulders. Your brain then reacts to that sensation.
Mat with Hand Weights
Mat with Hand Weights, the free class on Fitstreams, is a great place to start learning about hand weight exercises and strengthening your shoulders. It begins with a series of arm movements while holding the 2lb weights.
Gradually, as the class progresses, you begin adding a new movement for each round. By the end of a round, your arms will be begging for a rest.
Your arms will be begging for a rest.
After you complete the standing arm series, we take the hand weights down to the mat and incorporate them into Pilates exercises. The added weight challenges shoulder and rib cage organization.
As you progress, you may want to move up to 3- or 4-pound weights but it is not necessary.
Mat with Hand Weights considers performing the arm exercises safely and effectively substantially more important than increasing weight.
If you are new to Pilates, no matter how much upper body strength you have, we recommend you consider mastering Safe Moves Head, Neck and Shoulders before taking this level 2 class. You want to ensure that you are preparing the areas you are going to work on properly before adding weights and focusing on shoulder organization.
Safe Moves: Head, Neck & Shoulders
In Head, Neck and Shoulders we work to maintain the 34 or so muscles in our neck and shoulders and the 20+ joints in the neck.
Once you feel comfortable that your head, neck and shoulders are in a good spot, go ahead and grab your weights and join us for Mat with Hand Weights in the Pilates Mat Program under Level 2. We’ll meet you on the mat.