I have a question for you.
Do your wrists ever feel sore after taking a yoga class?
If the answer is yes,
Then please do stick around.
I'm going to share with you some great exercises to stretch and strengthen your wrist.
Avoid wrist pain.
So one of my physical goals this year is to build more strength in my wrist.
So that I'm able to safely play around with a few more arm balances like these ones.
So typically in everyday life,
We don't bear a lot of weight on our hands or on our wrists.
So if you're new to yoga,
You might find that your wrists feel a little weak or maybe even a little bit sore after doing a yoga practice.
This is why it's super important to warm up your wrists properly beforehand.
Now,
The level of warm up will really depend on your yoga practice.
So if you're doing something like restorative yoga or maybe a slow hatha flow,
Then you might not even need to specifically warm up the wrists as just doing the poses themselves will provide a natural warm up for the body.
However,
If you're doing a more intensive practice like ashtanga,
For example,
Which is more physically demanding,
Lots of planks,
Chaturangas,
Arm balances,
Then you definitely,
Definitely want to take some time to warm up the wrists properly beforehand.
So I'm going to share with you right now some of the exercises that I'm currently working on to stretch and strengthen my way.
Begin with some non-weight-bearing wrist stretches.
So straighten your arms out in front of you.
I'm going to turn around so that you can see me.
Your fingers pointing towards the ground.
Now imagine the backs of your hands pressing up against a wall.
And you should start to feel a little bit of a stretch down the back of your hand and the top of your forearm.
If you want to intensify,
Curl your fingers into a little ball.
And you should feel the stretch get a bit stronger.
Let's hold here for a couple of breaths.
This is wrist flexion.
So now we're going to move into wrist extension.
Turn the knuckles up towards the ceiling.
And then if you want to go deeper here,
Spread the fingers out wide and you're pressing your palms up against that imaginary wall.
This time you'll feel the stretch down your palm and down the bottom of your forearm.
Hold here for a couple of breaths.
And then release.
Let's interlace our hands.
And take a few wrist circles in one direction.
And then the other direction.
Now we're going to stretch out the fingers.
I really love this one.
So just pressing down on your fingers.
One by one.
It should feel really nice.
Make sure you don't push too hard.
You never want to go to the point of strain or pain.
Perfect.
Let's go to all fours.
Hands shoulder width apart and your knees hip width distance apart.
Shoulders stacked over your wrists or slightly behind if that's more comfortable.
And then your hips stacked over your knees.
Now spread your fingers out nice and wide.
We just want to bring awareness into the hands to start with.
Making sure that the weight is evenly distributed across both hands.
What tends to happen sometimes is that we'll put more of the weight onto the edge of our hand and the thumb will tend to curl up like this and the fingers will lift.
You'll get a bit of a hollow.
Space underneath her hands.
So you want to actively press all 10 finger pads and 10 knuckles into the earth.
Sometimes it can help if you press the thumb and the index finger into the ground,
That sort of levels up a little bit.
And press your hands into the earth.
Bringing attention into your arms,
Shoulders as well.
Now here try to claw your fingers into the ground.
This is what we often call spider hands or tiger hands.
And it's the position that we take to do arm balances like a handstand because it helps us maintain balance.
Now when we do this motion of clawing into the ground,
What this does is it stretches and strengthens all of the muscles in our forearm.
So just give this a go,
See what it feels like.
And then release.
From here.
10,
One palm backwards so that your fingers are pointing towards your knees.
And this can feel a little bit uncomfortable at first.
So take your time.
It's too intense you can also do a similar version seated so not putting any pressure on the hand check out the box in the top right hand corner And then shift your weight backwards slightly.
Maybe lift the heel of your hand to stretch out your fingers as well.
And hold.
And if it feels comfortable,
Maybe you gently rock forwards and backwards.
And then do the same on the other side.
So return to your tabletop.
This time it's your other hand that turns around.
And then gently drawing your weight backwards.
Again,
Perhaps the heel of your hand lifts slightly off the ground to stretch out your fingers.
Gently rocking forwards and backwards.
Release.
From here,
Bring one palm to face up.
You're pressing the back of your hand on the floor.
And again,
Draw your weight backwards.
Hold it for a moment.
Return to tabletop and do the same on the other side.
Take a break here.
Walk your hands towards your body.
On your heels.
Maybe you give yourself a little massage.
Your forearms and your hands.
Now for some wrist strengthening exercises.
So straighten out your arms in front of you.
Like this.
And imagine you're grabbing onto a jam jar and you're trying to open it.
So you're doing this turning motion in one direction like this.
And then you're trying to close the jam jar.
So change direction.
Perfect.
Okay,
Now make a fist with your hands,
Squeeze nice and tight,
And then release.
Spread your fingers out wide.
These are fist pumps.
Let's take maybe 10 reps of these.
And you can always increase the reps as you get a bit stronger.
Okay,
And really shake it out.
And flat on the floor.
Spread your fingers out wide and your fingers remain glued to the floor.
You're just going to lift the heel of your hand up.
So lift,
Lower.
Lift.
Lower again maybe doing about 10 reps in total increasing over time.
Now come up onto your fingertips.
And then shift your weight forward so your shoulders are over your wrist.
Just hold it here.
If you want to intensify,
Perhaps you walk your knees backwards so you're in tabletop.
Maybe even go to plank.
When you get really strong.
Just hold here for a little while.
Perhaps you lower down one palm and then the other and then come back onto your fingertips.
Like this.
Okay now make a fist with your hand like this.
So that the knuckle of your thumb is pointing forward.
And then draw your hips towards your heels.
What we're doing is we're stretching this side.
Of the wrist and then lean forwards.
So you're rocking the knuckle of the thumb forwards,
Stretching that part of the wrist.
And then just do this a few times.
Looking backwards.
And forwards.
Okay,
I'll come back to tabletop.
Turn your fingers inwards.
Let me show you from here.
Shoulders over wrists,
Fingers pointing towards one another.
And turn one palm upwards like this.
And what you're gonna do is you're gonna bend your elbow out towards the side as you lower down.
Now be careful with this one.
Go nice and slow.
Perhaps you just start with five reps with this one.
It's quite intense.
Make sure that you've got even weight across both hands.
And then we're going to switch around.
One palm down,
The other palm up,
And again.
About five reps.
Okay.
And there you have it.
These are my exercises to stretch and strengthen the wrists.
When you're finished,
Perhaps you just give your forearm a bit of a rub.
Your palm.
What I like to do as well is just.
.
.
Squeeze the fingers and then pull.
So squeeze and pull.
It feels really nice.
And in no time we'll have a really nice strong wrist I hope you found this video helpful.
Have a wonderful,
Wonderful day.
