If you’re a beginner at the gym, you’ve likely heard about typical gym equipment like treadmills, stationery bikes, barbells, and leg press machines. Fitness experts, however, are always introducing new and exciting tools to keep exercise varied and challenging. Not only does variety prevent us from getting bored with our exercise regimens, but it also ensures that all areas of our bodies remain strong and functional as we age. New movements help you build new muscles and learn new abilities!
One of the unsung heroes of the workout world is slide boards, which we are excited to offer to members of Adventure Fitness Athletic Club. Slide boards can provide you with an excellent cardio workout while strengthening muscles in your entire body. Slide boards are also great because they allow you to move in ways that are completely different from the typical forward momentum that most cardio exercises (like running and biking) offer.
Read on to learn more about what slide boards are, some slide board exercises you can try at our gym, and the benefits of including slide boards in your regular workouts.
What is a slide board?
A slide board is a slippery vertical mat that’s several feet long. Often made from industrial plastics, rubber, and wood, slide boards have a slick surface, grips on the bottom to hold it in place, and bumpers on each end to prevent you from sliding off the board.
When you work out on a slide board, you wear special booties that enable you to slide from one end of the board to the other, as if you were ice skating across the board. And that’s exactly what slide boards were originally intended for! The first slide boards date back to the 19th century when Dutch speed skaters would use wax-coated barn doors to practice their skating motions.
Since those humble beginnings, slide boards have become popular with hockey players, figure skaters, and many others in the fitness community. Many athletes and exercise enthusiasts use slide boards for exercise and training, and physical therapists use them, as well. Slide boards are very beneficial for people rehabilitating after a knee injury because they train and strengthen the muscles your body uses to stabilize the knees.
Slide board exercises
While slide boards were originally invented to help ice skaters, they offer benefits to anyone who wants to build muscle strength and cardiovascular fitness. By getting creative with your slide board exercises, you can strengthen your entire body, get an excellent cardio workout, and become functionally strong in all directions. Here are some slide board exercises you can try at our gym in Thornton, CO.
Forward lunges
This is an easy warmup exercise on the slide board. With one foot on the floor and the other foot on the slide board, slide your board foot forward until you reach a lunge pose. Then push yourself back to the starting position. Switch the position of your feet and repeat the exercise with the other foot.
Reverse lunges
Place one foot on the board and the other foot on the floor. Slide your board foot back until you’re in a lunge position, and then slide it back to the starting position. Switch the position of your feet and repeat the exercise with the other foot.
Slide board sprints
This slide board exercise will help you build strength in your legs. To do the slide board sprint, begin on one side of the board and place your outside foot against the bumper on the edge. With your knees bent, lift your inside foot and swing your arms across your body toward the outside leg. Push off on your outside foot to propel yourself across the board.
Put your inside foot down and swing your arms in the direction you’re moving as you slide across the board. You want to push yourself all the way across the board so that your outside foot hits the other bumper.
Now it’s time to repeat those movements, but in the other direction. Push off your outside foot, lift your inside leg, and glide across to the other side. Swing your arms toward the outside leg to help propel you back across the board to the other side.
The goal with slide board sprints is to move quickly back and forth across the board. If you’re a beginner, you may want to adjust the slide board to be shorter so that you’re going less distance with your slides.
Lunge run
The lunge run exercise on a slide board will improve your leg strength, core strength, balance, and cardiovascular fitness.
First, remember that your upper body is going to remain upright throughout this entire exercise. You’ll basically look like you’re running in place on the board, but your feet will never leave the ground and your legs will go into deep lunges with every step.
To do the lunge run, stand with your feet together on the slide board. Slide one foot backward and bend your other leg to sink into a deep lunge. Lower your back knee toward the board while you bend your front knee to 90 degrees.
Similar to how you would swing your arms when walking or running, bring your opposite arm forward to the leg that is forward so that you can use your arms to help propel the switch from one leg lunge to the other. Keep your front heel down on the ground while you sink into the lunge.
Then it’s time to lift yourself out of the lunge and repeat with the other side. Slide your back foot forward and slide your front foot backward. Sink into a lunge on the other side, swinging your back arm forward and your forward arm backward.
Move as quickly as possible with each lunge to make it a “running” lunge.
Mountain climbers
Considering our Thornton, CO, gym’s proximity to the spectacular Rocky Mountains, we would be remiss not to include the mountain climbers exercise on the slide board. This is an intense exercise for your quads and also works your core and shoulders to keep your body in a straight line as you “climb” laterally.
To perform mountain climbers on a slide board, start in a plank position (as if you were about to do a pushup) with your hands under your shoulders and your body in a straight line down to your heels.
Keeping your body in that nice straight line and your bottom down, run one knee toward your chest. Straighten that leg back out and bring the other knee toward your chest.
Alternate back and forth as quickly as you can, pulling one knee in and then the other. Try to avoid bouncing too much or letting your bottom go up toward the ceiling. Also, keep your shoulders over your hands to avoid letting your body drift backward. As you labor to keep everything aligned, you’ll get a good core workout.
In the beginning, you might need to perform mountain climbers slowly to perfect your form, and then you can build speed as you go along.
What are the benefits of exercising on a slide board?
Slide boards provide a fun aerobic workout that’s also effective and challenging. Slide boards also allow you to move your body laterally, which trains your muscles in a way they’ve likely not experienced before.
Other benefits of exercising on a slide board include:
- Low-impact movement — Slide board exercises are low-impact which eases stress on your joints while you strengthen all the muscles in your body.
- Joint strengthening — Let’s face it, lots of exercises put strain on our joints. And once our joints are injured, we are forced to take a break from exercise, which is the worst catch-22 ever for a fitness enthusiast. Slide boards reverse this issue by allowing you to strengthen the muscles around your joints while also getting a terrific whole-body workout. By building muscles around the joints, we can prevent joint injuries from happening and continue our exercise programs as we age.
- Weight loss — Working out on a slide board gets your heart pumping and lungs breathing, providing a solid calorie-burning session that helps you with your weight loss goals.
- Muscle conditioning — A slide board helps you incorporate resistance and stability workouts into your fitness routine that can target all of your muscles, especially your thighs and legs. Slide boards are also easy to use and help rehabilitate muscles after an injury or surgery.
- Endurance training — If you’re tired of running or riding a bike, using a slide board will kick your endurance training up a notch and allow you to build stamina in a completely different way, indoors.
Slide Your Way to Fitness at AFAC
At Adventure Fitness Athletic Club, our mission is to offer more variety than any other gym in Thornton, Colorado, so that our members have everything they need to reach and exceed their fitness goals. From functional trainers and jungle gyms to battle ropes and barre classes, if you want to try a new exercise adventure at our gym, AFAC has it. This diversity is what makes our gym the best in the area. For more information about Adventure Fitness Athletic Club and how to join, visit us or contact Susan at 720-849-0245 or susan@adventurefitness.club.
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