Medicine Ball Training

Medicine Ball Training is a great way to improve your performance whatever your chosen sport, but you do have to remember safety first, and there are a few basics which you must master in order to really maximize your efforts and minimize the risk of injury.

Throwing a Medicine Ball

This is going to sound really silly, but many people simply don’t know how to throw a ball properly, never mind a medicine ball. I know what you’re going to say, it’s one of the first things we teach our toddlers when they start playing in the garden – throwing and catching, but learning how to do it properly takes a little more technique than your average 3 year old can hope for.

Throwing a ball requires lots of different movements (I always have to complicate things don’t I?) It does though, it needs shifting, rotating, bending, balancing, all important movements which any sports person needs to perfect. If you can transfer your momentum from the front to the rear, or back again quickly and without losing balance, it can really help your technique for many different sports – just going off the beaten track a little, I knew a badminton player that ran everywhere backwards – he got some funny looks but it certainly helped his agility around the court (and he crashed into a few people too). What’s that got to do with medicine ball training – absolutely nothing!

Throwing a medicine ball requires many different movements – incorporating speed, flexibility, strength, coordination and balance – you can quickly improve your performance in all of these areas, and you can easily measure your improvement too.

Remember safety first – you should not use a medicine ball which is too heavy for throwing exercises, this can simply cause injury – you’re better off doing a few more reps with a lighter ball than trying to exhaust yourself launching a 30 pounder, or worse still, trying to catch it .