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The Squats with Ball Against Wall (with burst resistant stability ball) exercise is part of the Strength Exercise program for the Exercise for Better Bones Beginner level.
Squats with Ball Against Wall Benefits
The squats with ball against wall benefits include stronger quadriceps and buttocks as well are strengthening the hip bones.
Squats with Ball Against Wall
If you’ve never done these and you’re not feeling really strong in your thighs, you want to start the wall ball squats with two sturdy chairs on either side of you.
You need just a flat wall, the size of a doorway is plenty big. If you are going to do this on a door, you want the door to be opening this way, not away from you.
You want to have a stability ball, ideally a ball for your size, but with this exercise the size of the stability ball doesn’t count, or doesn’t matter quite so much.
Squats with Ball Against Wall • Step by Step
The roundest part of the ball is going to sit in the roundest part of your low back.
- You’re going to place the ball up against the wall and rest the small of your back into the ball. At this point, I feel like the ball’s pushing me away from the wall.
- I’m going to step a half-a-foot length forward. Stepping a half-a-foot length forward allows me to rest into stability ball.
- The ball’s going to be taking some of my body weight.
- This is for individuals that are struggling with getting up and down from a chair with good form without the use of a ball, so the ball actually helps you to gain that control and that confidence.
- It’s nice to have either a stool or a chair right underneath you because, should you have a hard time coming back up, you know you could always rest there if need be.
- You take a nice breath in, and exhaling, keeping your tummy tight, you’re going to sit down towards the stool and then press back into the floor as you come back up.
- Take a breath in, lower tummy and pelvic floor gently tightens as you go down, exhaling until you come back up.
Squats with Ball Against Wall • Postural Alignment
If you have a tendency of rounding your shoulders, which a lot of my clients do, you can use the ball in this exercise to your advantage.
When you go down, you want to be thinking about squeezing the ball between your shoulder blades. That way, if you feel contact with the ball, you know you’re keeping good form in your upper body, and then press to come back up. One more time, breath in. Good.
The objective isn’t actually to sit on the bench that’s underneath you, but just feel it underneath you, know that you’ve gone to that full squat distance, and then come back out of it.
Squats with Ball Against Wall • Managing Knee Pain
One more point, here in squats with ball against wall, is if you have any knee pain when you’re doing this, allow yourself to just go deep enough into the squat that you stay pain-free.
Even if it’s just one or two inches to start, your body will thank you for not going into the pain, and gradually you’ll be able to go deeper and deeper into your squats.
Burst Resistant Exercise Ball
It is critical to your safety that you use a burst resistant stability (or exercise) ball for this exercise since you will leaning into the ball for support. Fortunately, I have prepared a blog article for you on how to Use a Burst Resistant Exercise Ball.
Safe Wall Ball Squats
If you are concerned about your bone health and osteoporosis, follow my guidelines on Safe Squat if You Have Osteoporosis.
Osteoporosis Exercise Plan
Visit my Osteoporosis Exercise Plan page for more information on this topic.
Comments
August 30, 2016 at 7:27pm
Shirley Buchanan
I am 79 years of age and would like a DVD of your exercises that would last for 30 minutes. I find it easier to exercise while watching someone take me through the exercises on DVD. I am presently watching "Moving with Mike" DVD with exercises for elderly people. I can only do the first DVD, as the other two are too difficult. I will keep doing his exercises unless you have one especially for women with osteoporosis. Thank you.