Russell Martin, the hard-nosed catcher for the Los Angeles Dodgers, has taken up yoga.
That’s right, the native of Chelsea, Que., best known for his dogged blue-collar work ethic and play-through-all-pain intensity, has made yoga an integral part of his off-season workout regimen for the first time this winter.
“I’ve never felt better,” he said.
Fear not baseball fans, the soon-to-be 26-year-old isn’t planning to trade in the tools of ignorance behind the plate to pursue the ultimate goal of unifying the body, mind and spirit into oneness.
Rather, the two-time all-star is searching for new ways to keep his body healthy and strong throughout the 2009 season, eager to avoid the late-month swoons he’s experienced in each of his first three big-league seasons.
“Last year, I remember all the way through spring training and the beginning of the season even, my body was tight,” Martin recalled last weekend at Baseball Canada’s annual awards banquet. “When you’re a baseball player, you have to feel loose and that’s kind of like prehabilitation, that’s what my dad calls it.
“That was my main goal, to do some yoga, still do my explosive movement type stuff, because that’s all it is in baseball, reaction-type stuff, and flexibility. All those things, with a consistent work plan during the season, instead of seeing my numbers drop towards the end, hopefully I’ll see more of a stability and a consistency. That’s what I’m looking for.”
The off-season adjustments represent a new way of thinking for Martin, who used to be adamant about playing virtually every day - not the best idea given the gruelling physical and mental demands of catching - and about grinding through all his aches and pains.
Whereas he once would shun various treatments, he’s open to them now, partly because the youthful feeling of invincibility is starting to ebb from him. The fact that he’s a career .298 hitter through the first four months of the season but bats .262 after that no doubt helped sway him, too.
Russell Martin is in the best shape of his life.
Tripon
Posted: January 29, 2009 at 09:15 PM |
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1. Rough CarriganTracy used to do something similar with Lo Duca - days not catching were sometimes spent at first or left field - and the only year with the Dodgers where he was productive late in the season was the year he had spent a month on the dl early in the year.
What use could American children possibly have for foreign tomfoolery like Yoga when we have our own rich cultural tradition of "dodgeball" to keep our kids healthy and fit? Don't mess with success I always say!
not likely
"It looks like you're trying to write an 'athlete in the best shape of his life article' Would you like help?"
[] gaining
[] losing
____ pounds during a grueling
[] summer
[] winter
of
[] weight training
[] aerobics
[] yoga
[] pilates
[] farm labor
[] ranching
[] triathlon training
[] mixed martial arts
[] rodeo clowning
[] Navy SEAL BUD/S training
[] no-holds-barred pit fighting
[] experimental North Korean steroids
[] Other (please specify ________________)
,(Athlete Name _____________) is in the best shape of his life."
Yoga is great. As is gymnastics. Weightlifting. Boxing. Judo. Aikido. Etc.
The problem is not the lack of yoga. It is the general lack of physical activity.
...and make sure they get their daily vegetables by providing ketchup with lunch.
Why? So I could spend more time in high school sneaking off behind the bleachers and playing hackeysack with a bunch of stoners? That totally beat the #### out of being humiliated every day in PE.
I'm pretty confident that I got more physical stimulation in drama class.
I'm pretty confident that I got more physical stimulation in drama class."
Ouch, it's the schools fault though. Athletic training should be a daily "subject" in our public schools. If properly implemented, of course. Unfortunately, most schools lack the funds to have the weight-training facilities/gyms my school had, but a lack of funds shouldn't stop the idea.
More often that not, PE is a teaching spot to stick a football or baseball coach who isn't particularly interested in the classroom parts of his job. My high school gym class experience was >75% pickup basketball.
California public schools, baby. We barely had the equipment to play badminton - and I went to a solidly middle-class suburban school.
Mine was pretty much basketball all the time. Which I sucked utterly at.
Thing is, you don't actually need some expensive gym to do it properly. With apparatus that allows bodyweight training, the use of partners, much can be done.
In any case, it isn't so much weight training, or yoga, or gymnastics, or ballet, or dance, or boxing. It is getting the time, and getting the kids, and the stoners, interested, so they won't sneak off and go hang out behind the bleachers.
Taiji, baby. Taiji. A martial art with meditative qualities unsurpassed, hand to hand, sword play, staff fighting, great great stuff.
I'll be the first to admit that I hated PE and that at least half the blame is mine. But if my high school history teacher could inspire me to find the Gilded Age interesting, then surely a gym teacher could have inspired me to find some physical activity interesting.
That is for old people.
</joke>
I agree with you.
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