Medicine Ball Exercises & Workouts | Build Strong Core & Explosive Muscles
Why are Medicine Ball Exercises so effective?
Visit any sports training facility and what do you see? Medicine balls, stability balls and newer effective strength training equipment are becoming more common as they are proven to build functional fitness desired by many fitness professionals.
And Coaches agree.
Medicine Ball which comes in various sizes and colors has a long history in therapeutic science and has been used by military as early as 1800 A.D.
And now athletic training incorporates medicine ball exercises to build strength {especially core} and build explosiveness, which are must have qualities if you want to be a competitive athletes.
Here the 3 best Medicine ball exercises
1. Medicine Ball Core and Trunk Exercise
2. Upper Body Medicine ball exercise
3. Lower body Medicine ball exercise
1. Medicine Ball Core Exercise
Medicine Ball held in your hands can be added to crunches or sit ups, but I want to give you a newer exercise called Medicine Ball Knee crunch.
Execution Steps
1. Place a heavy medicine ball between your knees and hold the ball in place.
2. From this lying down position with ball between your knees perform either a crunch or situp.
A heavier ball requires more core involvement and I suggest you use one.
Variations:
Medicine ball knee raises to shoulders: You can do a medicine ball knee raise to shoulders wherein you lie on the floor with medicine ball between your legs. You then raise your bent knees to either right or left shoulder and build excellent core and trunk muscle strength.
Medicine Ball Jackknife: Also you can do the Swiss ball jackknife exercise shown here with feet placed on a medicine ball making this difficult exercise more difficult to perform.
2. Upper Body Medicine ball exercise
You can perform pushups with hands on the medicine ball and make them very effective shoulder and core muscle builders.
And you can add medicine ball throws or swings to build explosive speed.
Medicine ball throws {overhand}
Grab hold of a medicine ball behind the neck and throw it forward towards a wall
Medicine ball throws {slams}
You can throw the ball on to the ground and slam it hard.
3. Lower body Medicine ball exercise
You can do regular lower body exercises like squats and one leg squats holding the medicine ball in front of you to build core and leg stability.
And you can add exercises like medicine ball knee jumps or ankle jumps where you hold the medicine ball either in between your knees or ankles respectively and perform jumps.
Also check out the core training articles
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