Every once in awhile, my brain digs deep into the depths of my training history and pulls out some old info, protocols, or exercises.
If you've been reading my log (ahem*), you know I've been incorporating some more athletic movements. Man, it feels good to move again. After 20 years of powerlifting, (and I'm "only" 37 years old), it gets harder and harder to move well. I can distinctly remember 5-10 years ago feeling great almost all the time. Sure my body would get sore, or even tight, but now... I notice every little thing that feels off.
I still coach some youngsters too, so not only do I WANT to be able to move and not hurt, but I NEED to be able to move... run, sprint, jump, accelerate, slow down, land, cut, change directions, hop, get up, get down and everything in between. My kids play sports and that's important for me as well to be able to play WITH them. (Besides, I'm helping coach the girls' softball team this year... eek!)
When I was training the other day, I was trying to rummage through my brain to find some good hip extension movements. As my eyes flashed across the room to the smith machine, I thought of kneeling squats. I pulled them out of my memory bank about a year ago with some of my clients, but we used a heavy medball (not only did that work their glutes and hips, but fried their low back because of the nature of the front-loaded med ball.)
The current generation of fitness folks might see this exercise and equate it with the insta-fit girls who are trying to build a booty. But this is actually something I got from Louie Simmons waaaay back.
So I busted out this oldie and paired it with some kneeling jumps too. Louie used to have athletes who would do kneeling jumps with a loaded bar on their back.... I'm not quite there yet.
As teammate Dani LaMartina mentioned, this is also a great tool for mastering the tall kneeling position. Got someone with a foot or ankle injury that can't squat? Kneeling squats can still work the hip/hamstring and leave the lower joint out of it.
Thinking outside the box is always necessary in this field. If you're constantly locked in to only one concept, you'll end up burned out or broken.