These 5 Exercises That Help Strengthen Your Wrists & Prevent Injury!
What do Roger Federer and a surgeon have in common? Well, 2 things: first off both are performing at the highest levels and secondly, wrist strength and health is paramount to success. Believe it or not, almost 40% of orthopedic surgeons have reported they suffer from hand and wrist injuries. The good news is that we can train to not only prevent wrist injuries, but also train to enhance our performance as well. These exercises will give you an edge in the operating room!
5 KEY EXERCISES & HOW TO DO THEM: Consistency is king! Think about making these 5 exercises a daily habit! Most of these exercises can be done anywhere. Doing these exercises multiple times a week throughout the day will have a massive impact in keeping you operating at your best! Just like an elite athlete, you need to keep your body in tip top condition!
Assisted Shoulder External rotation: This may not seem like a wrist specific exercise, however, our shoulder complex is often chronically internally rotated. This compresses the brachial plexus which can cause pain and dysfunction in the wrist and hand.
Use a resistance band and anchor it to a low position, ie a door frame. Twist the band towards your body. Slip the hand inside of the twisted band and stand upright with the arm relaxed and fully extended. From this position allow the band to rotate the arm away from the body while making shoulder circles. Keep the movement slow and controlled while relaxing the hand and forearm.
PERFORM 10-15 reps on each side.
Wrist Pronation & Supination:
Use a hammer or offset weighted object. Hold the long axis away from the weighted side in your hand. Start from a neutral position with your arm bent at your elbow. Slowly rotate the object away from your body for about 2 seconds without moving the upper arm or torso. Slowly rotate the object back towards your body. Come back to neutral in between each rep.
PERFORM 15-20 reps on each side.
Brachial Plexus Glide: We talked about the brachial plexus and possible impingement above. This exercise aims to combat nerve entrapment and restore proper innervation down the chain. Without proper innervation up the chain, we cannot expect to have elite control of our wrist and hands!
Start in a seated or standing position. Bring your arm up in front of your face with the elbow at 90 degrees and hand open like a karate chop. Pivot from the shoulder to bring your arm out to your side and extend your arm straight out with the blade of your hand pointing towards the ground. Bring your wrist into extension by pointing your fingers behind you. You may bring your arm further behind you for more of a stretch. The stretch should not be too intense.
PERFORM 10-15 reps on each side.
Wrist CARs: Proper function of any joint starts with proper mobility or range of motion that joint. This exercise aims to train both range of motion and motor control of your wrist. The better the range of motion the easier it will be to control the ranges of motion.
Start with your arm by your side and elbow bent at 90 degrees. With the hand open in a chop position, flex the wrist towards your body. Rotate the wrist towards your body and slowly into extension, then start rotating the wrist away from the body and slowly back into flexion. Keep the forearm facing up at all times and keep it still, movement comes from the wrist. Try to draw as large of a circle with your hand as possible. Reverse direction. Start by immobilizing the forearm with the opposite hand.
PERFORM 10-15 reps on each side.
Upside Down Kettlebell Lunges: Training the wrist and upper extremity is an absolute must! However, in the operating room although our hand and wrist controls the precision of our movement it is still attached to the rest of our body. This exercise aims to strengthen our wrist coupled with our hips and core.
Start by using a kettlebell of light weight. Hold the kettlebell upside down so that the large side of the weight is facing the ceiling. Your goal is to maintain this position. Step forward with one leg into a lunge position. Step forward and rise up on that front leg into a high knee position, and stay balanced. Continue by alternating legs or if space is limited, perform a reverse lunge by staying on 1 leg at a time.
PERFORM 7-10 reps on each side.
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Chris is a strength coach & performance director to many world class athletes and olympians. Chris was a former professional triathlete and collegiate swimmer. Chris leads a team of strength, running, triathlon coaches and PT’s. Chris’s team offers training services both in person and remotely. Find more here https://www.kinesisecosystm.com/coaches or on instagram @kinesisintegrated.
The opinions expressed in the article are not affiliated with any institution, company or product. The article should not be interpreted as medical advice.
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