While we often stress to athletes to maintain ‘active shoulders’ and ‘press their shoulders into their ears’ during the top position of any press, we sometimes neglect to deal with the extreme arching of the back known as lordosis, or swayback.

Sometimes, the athlete does this to compensate for a heavy load and he turns the shoulder press into a standing bench press, while really stressing his spine and potentially causing injury. It can also be caused by a weak mid-line or just extreme flexibility. Most of the time, the problem is corrected by cuing the athlete to tighten the abs or ‘lock the ribs down’ but Invictus Coach Mark Riebel finds that adding a cue of tightening the glutes also helps to achieve the proper upright position. More specifically, he tells his athletes to think of ‘pinching a coin between your cheeks’ or ‘fending off a bully attempting to give you a wedgie.’

WOD 10.07.09
So Cal Regionals WOD#3
2k Row
6rds:
20BJ
10WB