The Quarterback’s Secret Weapon
by Bruce Hymanson, PT, Creator of Bodyblade 

It is not uncommon to see professional athletes, especially quarterbacks warming up on the sidelines with a Bodyblade® before or during a game, and it’s no coincidence.

Most—if not all—sports require speed, accuracy, controlled balance, precision and strength. Football requires that you become proficient in these areas, while taking on the external forces from another human being carrying high loads of mass with acceleration into vulnerable areas of the body—or in laymen’s terms, a 250-pound man running into you.

Once the accelerated forces exceed the body’s ability to react, you are simply a passenger, unable to defend yourself against such forces. It is important to incorporate training that helps the body stay connected from the very deep center to the most superficial muscles in the body. Staying connected within your own body helps you to adjust quickly to external forces within your control and adjust the muscular system to lengthen and shorten muscle where needed to balance the joints and protect against injury. This involves the ability to be rotated and flexed or laterally extended and lifted completely off your feet before landing hard on your back with 500 pounds of pressure on your chest.

Staying connected requires exquisite feedback between the muscles, joint capsules and ligaments in the body in the shortest time possible. Lifting weights is also important because it allows you to withstand the dynamic and ballistic characteristics of the game. Combining weight lifting and Bodyblade is absolutely mandatory to minimize the risk of injury and maximize speed and performance. Incorporating Bodyblade training will not only build muscle endurance, strength and coordination, but it will also balance the joints and minimize micro trauma from poorly-timed movement and deceleration of movement.

It is essential for quarterbacks to maintain the most precise balance of muscle in their throwing arm, as well as maintaining the connection of the hips and trunk (both upper and lower) with the back extensors. This allows for measurable accuracy of power development and equal intensity of slowing and stopping those forces before they cause harm to the deep soft tissue of the shoulder. We use Bodyblade to keep the rotator cuff muscles communicating well within themselves and with the larger muscles around the shoulder to protect the joint.

Additional benefits include better blood flow; a more rapid set of contractions; and maximal recruitment of muscle to insure the shoulder joint communicates with the lower hip and extremities and provides the appropriate tension in the muscle to maintain the proper balance from front to back, top to bottom and side to side.