Mobility and Hope
Module 2 | Mobility - Moving is breathing and breathing is life. To stop moving is to cease connection. To cease connection is to lose hope.
Mobility is often either neglected altogether or gravely misinterpreted. Just like warm ups in general, mobility is frequently considered a whimsical after thought. In reality it is the infrastructure that makes all other expressions of movement possible.
Likewise, warm ups teach us the paramount skill of assessing how prepared we are for each day’s work. If we concede to “just do some stretching and yoga and stuff”, then there is no focus. There is no intention. We’ve learned nothing and have moved no closer to our chosen objective.
Words like “functional” and “sport specific” are highly weaponized. I first heard the word “weaponized specificity” from Zack Telander on YouTube and it has stuck ever since. Some people are selling nonsense. Some people, both with and without producing great results, still feel the need to crap on other programs to make theirs seem more important.
These terms and tactics lack honesty and integrity, as if someone just woke up one day, struck with a lightning bolt of perfect ideas. As I can recall, I’ve made three major mistakes in training “mobility” over the years.
Confusing the requirement of mobility with the development of it.
Succumbing to an ad-hoc compilation of minimalist tactics that eventually fail.
Missing the point that good mobility training is strength training.
Requirement vs. Development:
I like Olympic weightlifting, it’s an extremely high caliber exhibit of athleticism and power. It’s rare to find something you like even though you’re not very good at it. The first block of Olympic weightlifting training I committed to produced decent recreational numbers, however it also highlighted mobility (specifically in my hips, ankles, and spine) as a limiting factor.
At a later time, even within what I would consider my “modern” era of training, and fancying myself pretty well versed and smarter than previous versions of myself, I got stuck on the idea that “volume corrects.” My error was that volume without attention is simply an exercise in exhaustion. More overhead presses weren’t going to help my thoracic spine and scapular issues any more than a thousand squats — so long as the gross volume became a distraction from detail and quality of movement.
Olympic lifts don’t build mobility, they require it. You don’t get to skip to the ending without accepting consequences. Mobility requires specific, focused attention and training sessions just like any other (and perhaps even more than any other) energy system.
Around the 1-year anniversary of earning my BJJ black belt I suffered the most significant injury of my career — a MCL and medial meniscus tear in my right knee.
Grappling and fitness are pretty tightly woven into my identity after decades invested in each. It was a major existential confrontation when I couldn’t walk unassisted for at least a month. I literally had to rebuild myself from the ground up. I had to crawl before I could walk and walk before I could run.
Hence this program’s emphasis on mobility first.