Nick Luciano explains how incorporating ViPR into workout preparation can increase your activity and access a range of motion.

 

The body performs better and has less chance of injury if it’s properly prepared for activity. More fitness professionals and athletes are including ViPR in their movement preparation process because it offers Loaded Movement Training. For the movement prep process, we want weak link activation, mobilization, integration, and sequencing. We want to move through ranges of motion while adding progressive speed and directional changes. All throughout this process, the body is warming up from the inside out.

ViPR is used in three ways in the movement prep: supporting, driving and loading. Firstly, it can support movement. ViPR in the on end position, for example, can act as an additional point of stability, providing somatosensory feedback so the individual can move with stability and confidence. Next, in the drive movement, in the same on end position, the individual can tilt ViPR in the opposite direction of the desired hip direction. Considering the use of ground reaction force, we’re not just driving movement through the hips, but also getting movement to the feet, ankles, hips, and spine.

 

We can have a primary focus and not pay as much attention to the relative motion elsewhere, or we can add complexity to the movement by manipulating the tool to drive specific movement and communication through all the joints. To progressively load the triplanar movement, we can continue with tilts or we can add more load and sequencing with lifting, shifting or holding ViPR in a carry.

Using ViPR as a support can help with the weak link activation and the start of mobilization as the body goes through more range. You can orientate the body and movement to drive forces through specific lines of tissue. Using ViPR to drive movement greatly contributes to body mobility, joints, and tissue. Driving movement with ViPR happens in a number of ways. One way to generate momentum with ViPR is to let the body relax and bring it into greater range. Another way is to counterbalance the external load with the body. Since this is not static, the load is constantly changing with speed and weight; therefore, the body must constantly change with orientation and tension.

 

Another way to use ViPR is as a source to draw focus and action away while distracting the attention from the intended body movement. This allows the body to react to the movement, rather than subconsciously hindering it.

Finally, using ViPR to load movement prepares the nervous system and tissue for proper sequencing and rhythmical movements. This allows ViPR to cause intermittent activation of tissue necessary to accelerate and decelerate the load.

As long as the intensity is low, a systemic process of Loaded Movement Training like this one described with ViPR adequately prepares the body for activity by activating, mobilizing, integrating, and sequencing.