What’s arm care?

I am leading an arm care class at Diamond Pro Fit in Raleigh, NC. Some parents have asked me what this class consists of and other parents/ coaches have inquired why does their young athletes would need to take such a class. Well, I can share some information from a solid web site on this topic: stop sports injuries.org. ” Injuries to the elbow and shoulder in children is becoming a epidemic. Thousands of children are seen each year complaining of throwing elbow and shoulder pain.” The word epidemic should be frightening to every parent of a young softball or baseball player. The word epidemic is not only used in this article but other articles concerning research of youth elbow and shoulder injuries. I myself had two pitchers in my family, one pitched over hand and the other a flame throwing windmill pitcher. I battled shoulder problems from the time I was 16 until the pain forced me into retirement after a shortened professional career.

The science of injury prevention has come along way since then, leagues and states have mandated pitch counts for safety but many have chosen to circumvent those rules playing on multiple travel ball teams. This particular arm care class is educational as well as functional. We not only perform the exercises with precise detail, we learn and discuss the meaning of such terms as volume, recovery, dynamic warmup and activation. Each athlete goes through a functional movement screen, which I happen to have a certification in. We as coaches must is acknowledge that each athlete moves differently, is made uniquely and are not little adults, they are growing children. We utilize several tools in the class taught at DFP. We talk about the movements the athlete mustmake when throwing the ball properly. We perform movements that are required in an elite throwing motion; such as, rotation, weight transfer, posture, tilting of the pelvis, a proper hinge, arm paths, scapula retraction. And make it simple. We educate and execute a solid shoulder warmup routine that can be done at any field with a fence. We use J Bands and they are fantastic. We preform a med ball routine that prepares the thrower for all the rotations he or she is going to do over the course of a game. We utilize what I call the Mc Coy leg routine, prepared for overhand throwers by a qualified strength and conditioning specialist who was a former baseball player as well as my son in law. We have a fire up the scaps routine given to me by the best physical therapist for baseball in North America. We use plyo balls and throwing drills derived by Driveline. These throwing drills are solid and I have performed hundreds of reps before teaching the athletes in the class. The weighted balls are a tool just like the J bands and the medicine balls. All balls have weight, a baseball is 5 ounces, a softball is 7 ounces, a football weighs 16ounces and a wiffle ball is less than an ounce, in case you were wondering.

This arm care class teaches the athletes why we do an exercise and how often, how many repetitions and at what intensity level. We have days for recovery. We talk strength, mobility, stability and execute exercises that promote each of these important facets in elite throwing. We talk sleep, nutrition, hydration. We also state over and over, “listen to your arm”. It is a requirement to for throwers to take recovery days and we learn movements that enhance recovery. In my opinion, we have the best recovery movement out there. This shoulder movement can be done anywhere, no gym needed. This class includes soft tissue work done on Perform Better foam rollers and TriggerPoint deep tissue massage balls. These are investments every athlete should make and put in their baseball bags. We utilize resistance bands in our recovery work as well. The bands are great for leg workouts and well as the scapula wall crawls. In closing, learning a proper warm up routine is crucial. Taking time to recover is a must. The throwing motion is a toe nail to finger nail movement and we must learn the proper sequence of movements and how each body part plays an important role. Strength,, range of motion and direction all play a role in arm care as well.