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Hi, David Weck here. Today, we're going to be doing an exercise called the "Russian Twist" with the RMT Club. The RMT Club is fantastic for this exercise because it puts our hands on the center line which increases our range of motion and it also, because of the length of it, creates a leverage that makes it more challenging to cheat and you can really tell when the form is on and when it is off.
So here's how we begin. We begin with both heels on the ground and the back nice and flat. We don't want to be rounded into this, we want to really use the hip flexors to pull your hips into flexion and keep that lower back nice and flat. I'm going to hold it, you can either hold it with the split grip or hands together, I'm going to be hands together on this. And we're not going to rotating the navel. So we keep the navel straight ahead, the rotation is with the thoracic spine, and we can do this sudden deceleration [Rotational Movement Training]. You want to keep your lower body nice and steady, straight ahead, without a lot of rocking through the lower body. We can hit the ground and we can sudden decelerate before the ground. We'll do both here, at the performance center.
Another variation is we lift one foot in the air and we do the same movement pattern in the air with that one foot. And then of course, we can lift both feet but generally we don't find ourselves doing that too often because very few people can really master that form. So if both feet are in the air what will end up happening is you'll often get this counter rotation that we don't want. We want you to really anchor the lower body. And it's getting plenty of work there too. If you're strong enough, you can put both feet in the air, but make sure your feet aren't doing that.
Now, with regard to form and technique, we want to do the opposite hand on top as well. It's going to feel different, believe it or not, and that's going to help us with our Non-Dominant Side Training, to really balance out the body. And in terms of the form, you really want to keep those arms extended. So you don't want to be flopping the club like this. You want to hold that club there and really get that form. So, unlike a medicine ball, which is right here, we're on the centerline and we can really get that leverage effect to really make it an incredible exercise for the core and for the hip flexors.
So that is our Russian Twist using the RMT Club.
