Monday Mobility: The Pump aka Up & Down Dog

The pump exercise is a must for just about every human animal on the planet.

It’s essentially Yoga’s Up and Down Dog positions.

With this being such a global movement it’s easy to play around within it to explore your movements, find tension and stimulate various lines of pull.

We can emphasise: Calves Hamstrings Spinal Extension Hip extension Shoulder Flexion and Extension Chest opening Scapula movement Serratus Anterior strength Core Strength

The list goes on.

In my gym, I use it as a screen as it is such a catch all it can show up several issues to watch for. I also use it with many people who need to develop better scapula control, particularly those involved in the combat sports.

For yourself, it’s a great fit for your warm up, usually the early part. But it’s also perfect following any period of inactivity, just as your dog or cat would take a moment to stretch in an almost identical fashion to this.

I’ve shot two videos on this, a quick and dirty One Mimute Tutorial for the instagram (search the othe one minute tutorials I’ve done with the hashtag #OMT ) and a more detailed, less rushed YouTube clip.

Here’s the #OMT

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#OMT The Pump Exercise A common warm up drill, movement screen, exercise break or even just a “fidget” This is a catch all type of movement which is why I like it. As it is so global we can dial into various areas or lines of pull in the body, depending on where your body currently is and where you need it to be. There’s a full video explanation uploading to YouTube at the moment and blog going up on WG-FIT.com #wgfamily #irishfitfam #mobility #warmup #yoga #notyoga #bjj #judo #kyokushinkarate #kettlebell #kettlebellsport #girevoysport #Movement

A post shared by Dave Hedges (@dave_hedges) on Mar 11, 2019 at 4:02am PDT

And this is the more detailed YouTube version:

And finally, here is a demo of me running through some variations on our “Quick Yoga” that you can hopefully see is based on this Pump movement

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Quick Yoga had been a staple of the WG-FIT warm up sequences for years. Here’s a few variations on it, sped up 2x to fit into an Instagram post Do you have versions you like? Let’s see them #wgfamily #irishfitfam #warmup #yoga #notyoga #mobility #bjj #mma #muaythai #kyokushin #karate #kettlebellsport #girevoysport #girevoy

A post shared by Dave Hedges (@dave_hedges) on Nov 30, 2018 at 3:32am PST

As you can see this is a very versatile exercise that you can keep very simple and dial in to achieve a specific outcome. Or it’s a great drill to add complexity to for a spot of exploration or development of your movement vocabulary.

Be careful with this if you have a current shoulder injury, the Down Dog position may well be too extreme for you at the moment. If that’s the case case, get yourself assessed to see what movements you should be doing.

Regards

Dave Hedges