Improve your balance with these exercises

What you need to know:

  • While you exercise, you may focus on improving your strength or losing weight.
  • However, another benefit you may not think about is how exercise improves your balance.

According to prevention.com, the muscles we use to stand tall weaken gradually after we hit 30. This is also when the length of our stride shortens, the pace of our steps slows and vision, critical to coordination, becomes fuzzier. Nonetheless, you can maintain your balance if you stay active.
Balance training exercises strengthen core muscles and improve stability, making you lighter on your feet. “As we age, having good balance and a strong core helps to prevent falls and injuries. Balance training can help anyone at any age,” Elly Barangi, a fitness trainer, explains.

Skipping
“Skipping requires one to use the whole body to execute the exercise,” Ben Zabinga, a fitness coach, recommends. Besides that, your legs have to support you as you hit the ground. Barangi adds that yoga and Tai Chi are great for balance training as they help with increasing ankle flexibility, among other things.
While a stumble could easily turn into a fall for one with weak knees, it is not so for one whose legs are tough. “To get tough legs, there is need to strengthen your quads and squats are a great way to do that. For one that has never done them, starting small is advisable to prevent excessive strain,” Zabinga advises.
To do squats, stand with your feet wide apart (hip wide), bend your knees and hips slowly lowering yourself as one about to sit on a chair behind them but stop at a point where the thighs are parallel to the floor. For better results, keep your abdomen tight, arms and back straight and your knees right above your feet. Do that in a set of five for 10 minutes with consistency.

Heel to toe walk
“Start with 20 steps forward, heel to toe then walk backwards with in the reverse (toe to heel). You can increase the number of times as times goes by,” Barangi advises. That said, ordinary walking is also a viable exercise as it exercises one’s muscles hence bettering one’s ability to balance.

Ballet
The precision with which these dancers execute their moves goes a long way in bettering one’s balance. “The mystery behind this dance is that unlike one that has never done it, these dancers use more muscle groups, even for a small task such as walking across a flat floor,” Zabinga says. That means that as one trains they strengthen the ability of their nervous system to coordinate muscle groups to maintain balance.

One-legged stand
Barangi says this helps one maintain their balance and mobility, increases lower body strength and preserves muscle tone. “Stand on one foot for 20 to 30 seconds. Keep your back straight and your knees slightly bent. Eventually, place the palms of your hands on a wall for support. One could also stand with their weight on one leg and raising the other leg to the side or behind them or putting their heel right in front of their toe as one walking a tightrope.
Barangi also proposes other ways to balance such as standing up and sitting down on a chair without using one’s hands for support.

One could also walk while alternating knee lifts with each step.
Zabinga says with these workouts, all the major muscle groups are at work, thus engaging the nervous system that drives the body into motion. Exercise activates the nervous system that entails organs such as the brain that are responsible for body balance.