Resistance Band Movements You Need To Try

Includes a time efficient warm-up for First Responder/Tactical.

Key Takeaway

Tactical/First Responders often overlook the warm up portion of a training session. We’re busy people and sometimes it feels like we need to get to the main lift of the day and get out. This is a mistake. Spending 5-10 minutes just doing some global movements before moving on to your warm up sets will do wonders for your longevity in this game.

This article will provide a few movements you probably haven’t seen. Please, try them before you dismiss their effectiveness.

Vasso Strap

During my hip replacement rehab I was constantly being put in a nylon strap, told to spin 270 degrees, and then usually do some kind of single leg motion.

When the physical therapist demonstrated the movement I thought it was going to be easy and it looked kind of useless. Then I tried it, almost fell over, couldn’t maintain the position, and broke into an odd sweat…OK…maybe there is something here.

Most gyms don’t have a long nylon strap to use with their cable stack, so I recommend attaching two small bands together like in the video below. Loop it over your shoulder like a backpack, turn until the band is wrapped around your body and coming off of your hip closest to the direction where the band is anchored (270 degrees). Keep your inside leg down and attempt to do a single leg RDL, lunge variation, cossack squat, etc. If this is confusing here is the RDL:

Although this doesn’t look much different than a typical single leg RDL, a few things are happening:

1. You’re being pulled laterally by the bands

   1. Forces you to engage your abs, glutes, feet, adductors, and more to keep you from falling over.

2. The bands are trying to unwind you.

   1. This forces all of the small and large muscles around your hip to engage and turn on. Think deep rotators. People often have mobility limitations simply because they don’t know how to engage certain muscles. This makes you use them.

Full Warm Up

Here is an example of how you could stack these movements together into a comprehensive warm up or even part of a recovery session. This should take you 5-10 minutes, depending on how many times you run through it:

1) Forward, Backward, and Lateral Bear Crawl- 8-10 Reps Each Direction

2) Vasso Strap Single Leg RDL- 8-10 Reps Each Side

3) Vasso Strap Reverse Lunge- 8-10 Reps Each Side

4) Vasso Strap Cossack Squat- 8-10 Reps Each Side

5) Box Jumps and/or Plyo Push Up- 5 Reps

Video demos are below, but the idea here is to keep moving through this at brisk pace. This will hit the entire body, regardless of the focus of your session. Of course this doesn’t include warm-up sets of your lifts, or specific running warm ups, but this can just be your overall start for the day.

When you use the band, you typically need two for it to reach all the way around your body. Again, put it on like a backpack, then spin around until the band is coming off of the hip of your working leg.

On all of these movements, you’ll need to grip the ground with your feet, contract your abs and glutes, and really try to control your body as the band pulls and spins you. The session ends with some jump work to continue to fire up your nervous system for your training session. This would also be phenomenal as a pre-shift warm up for any first responder.

1) Forward, Backward, and Lateral Bear Crawl- 8-10 Reps Each Direction

2) Vasso Strap Single Leg RDL- 8-10 Reps Each Side

3) Vasso Strap Reverse Lunge- 8-10 Reps Each Side

4) Vasso Strap Cossack Squat- 8-10 Reps Each Side

5) Box Jumps and/or Plyo Push Up- 5 Reps

Closing

Although many of these are unconventional, give them a shot prior to your training session, or even incorporate them in between your main sets of a compound movement.

For example, if you’re doing heavy trap bar deadlifts you could do your heavy set, rest a minute, do 5 reps of the single leg RDL Vasso, Rest a minute, then go back to your heavy lift.

This strategy helps remind your body how to fire up those stabilizers and in turn cleans up your form for your big lifts. Safer form usually means you not feeling beat up the next day and being able to perform when called upon.

Also, if you have strong enough bands, don’t be afraid to incorporate some of these as main accessory work. You’ll be surprised on how it feels using a heavy band on the cossack squat variation versus traditional loading methods.

Comments, questions, please reach out.