Integrating the FMS into a Team Setting
Since being introduced to Gray Cook's Functional Movement Screen nearly 5 years ago, I have always wrestled with the “how to” of implementing the corrective exercises into a team setting. With nearly 25 players on a team, an eighty-two game schedule, travel, injuries, media/community commitments, and families, it's a nearly insurmountable task to get each player to follow a corrective exercise program. Here in Minnesota we have developed a “some is better than none” approach.
During training camp all of the nearly fifty players were screened in the FMS. The results were categorized into individual player scores, and individual exercise scores. For example: we could look at one player's entire screen results for all of the movements, or we could look at the entire teams results for one movement (say the in-line lunge). This allowed us to highlight common problem areas throughout the entire team. Using this approach, we discovered that the Hurdle Step, Rotary Core Stability, and Overhead Squat were three movements that exhibited the lowest scores or imbalances throughout the entire team.
Once that had been established, the next step was to choose the best corrective strategies for each movement. Not as easy as we thought! Since each movement's corrective strategy includes soft tissue work, flexibility/stretching, mobility exercises, and strengthening/balance exercises, the amount of total work needed for all three of the movements was much longer than we thought acceptable. So we took what we thought were the most important strategies from each movement, looked for any cross-over strategies (a lot of the foam rolling was the same for all of the movements), and found ways to include them into our workouts and daily routines.
We approached the soft tissue work by creating a foam rolling/stick-work protocol that the players perform nearly daily, as part of their warm-up, or as their cool-down after practice or games. This usually only takes about 5-10 minutes to perform.
FOAM ROLL/STICK ROUTINE:
- 4-way hamstring
- I.T. band
- 3 way quad.
- Groin
- Hip ant/post.
- Glutes
- Lats
Each one is performed for 15 rolls per side. If trigger points are discovered, players will spend extra time on that area.
The flexibility exercises were a bit more difficult to incorporate into the mix. Players are notorious for not stretching enough, if at all! So we decided to “sneak” the most important stretches (hip flexor, external rotators, rectus femorus, and hamstrings) into our off-ice workouts. Our off-ice workouts are always performed as tri-sets or complexes. Using this model, we simply slid one of the stretches into the rest period at the end of a set or complex.
FLEXIBILITY/STRETCHING:
1a. RFE Squats 2x6, 4
1b. Power Step-Up 2x12
1c. TRX Supine Row 2x8, 6 (with weight vest)
1d. Box Hip Flexor Stretch 2x:30e.
2a. 1 Leg SLDL 2x6, 4e
2b. 1 Arm DBBP 2x8, 6e
2c. Tall Kneeling Cable Lift 2x10e
2d. Wall Rectus Stretch 2x:30e
Mobility is dealt with in the warm-up. After players have performed their soft tissue work, they perform a series of five or six mobility drills chosen from the corrective exercise strategies. These are not the only mobility drills performed, just a sample of one of the mobility series that we have
MOBILITY:
1. Val Slide Hip Flexion 1x8e
2. Lateral Squats 1x8e
3. Rotational Squats 1x8e
4. Toe Touch-Deep Squat 1x8
5. SB Internal Rotation 2x8 (not goalies)
6. Seated T-Spine Rotation 1x12
Strengthening and balance exercises are a bit easier to include. We address them in a similar way as the flexibility exercises; they become part of our lift. The chop and lift patterns are a huge part of our core training progression, along with planks and bridges. We progress from tall kneeling to half-kneeling, to standing, to dynamic.
STRENGTHENING/BALANCE:
2a. 1 Leg SLDL 2x6, 4e
2b. 1 Arm DBBP 2x8, 6e
2c. Tall Kneeling Cable Lift 2x10e
2d. Wall Rectus Stretch 2x:30e
