Breaking down President Obama’s hotel workout in Poland
While in Poland to meet with the president-elect of Ukraine, President Barack Obama got in a workout at his hotel, a Marriott in Warsaw.
He worked out while other hotel patrons were using the facility and, naturally, his workout was photographed and filmed and the footage soon made its way to media outlets.
It’s a rare, candid chance to see the president doing his part to support First Lady Michelle Obama’s “Let’s Move” campaign, which promotes at least 60 minutes of activity a day for children and 30 for adults.
The video and pictures were especially intriguing to yours truly, a Certified Strength and Conditioning Specialist. What type of exercises were the president’s go-to in the gym? How was his form on the exercises he was performing? For a fitness nerd, this was the holy grail.
The overall verdict? Obama certainly has some good intentions, but his workout execution needs refinement. Let’s break it down.
(The likely reason for his longing look at the dumbbell rack at the beginning of the video? Because the dumbbells are listed in kilograms instead of pounds. Even if you know that a kilogram is roughly 2.2 pounds, it still takes a couple seconds to do the conversion.)
The yawn and shoulder presses
The most popular part of the workout will undoubtedly be the yawn as the president sits down to shoulder press. But that yawn deserves no scorn. Think of the lack of sleep a U.S. president gets on a regular basis, and if you’ve ever worked out at a hotel gym, you know they aren’t the most cheerful of places.
We applaud the president for using heavier weights on the shoulder press than he is in other parts of the video, however, hs range of motion leaves something to be desired. Ideally, Obama should be lowering the dumbbells to his ear level between each rep and also not performing the exercise sitting on a bench set up like that. By standing up to shoulder press, you recruit more muscles in your core to help stabilize yourself throughout the movement.
The leg exercises
The walking lunge-to-curl-to-shoulder press can be a great exercise, but like with the shoulder press, the first thing we noticed was that the president isn’t using a full range of motion with his legs. In a lunge, the knee of the rear leg should gently touch the floor. It’s clear that Obama’s shortening the ROM considerably; he’d get much more benefit by dropping his knee further and by extending his elbows and shoulders as much as possible at the top of the movement.
The step-ups he performed didn’t look incredibly challenging. Heavier dumbbells would make it more challenging in a hurry. It’s also not necessary to lift the back leg up like a pitcher at the top of the movement either. It doesn’t look like Obama would mind too much if it was ditched from the exercise.
More shoulders
We don’t have the benefit of seeing his whole workout, so it’s entirely possible the president performed other exercises as well. But one thing is clear, the man loves to do shoulder exercises. In addition to the dumbbell shoulder press and the combination lift, he also did sets of lateral and rear shoulder raises. When working out, unless you have an incredibly specific and necessary reason, don’t focus on one body part over another. Pay equal attention to your entire body.
If you do perform shoulder raises in a workout, make sure to only use your shoulders and keep the rest of your body still to avoid “cheating” on the movement.
The exercise to throw out
If I had the ability to completely overhaul Obama’s workout, I’d throw in some reverse lunges and goblet squats in lieu of the lower body exercises and focus on the basics like pushups and rows for his upper body. But if there was just one change that could be made? It’d be to ditch this half-curl-and-tricep-extension looking movement.
Curls are much more effective when standing straight up, and dumbbell tricep extensions are some of the most useless arm exercises around as they don’t let you use much weight and are only a one-joint exercise. When in doubt – and crunched for time like the president undoubtedly is – always use compound movements; exercises that require two or more joints to move.
But give the president credit – while in a hotel halfway across the globe, he made the point to get up and get moving when he could have been doing something sedentary. When it comes to physical activity, doing something is better than doing nothing at all, and isn’t it nice to see a politician putting words into action? Lifting weights probably beats jogging around the White House with Vice President Joe Biden.
Original post found at: http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/the-turnstile/breaking-down-president-obama-s-polish-hotel-workout-195340987.htmlP.S. I think we should all follow the President’s example. In spite of his busy schedule, he still finds the time to exercise. Yes. It’s that important ! !
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