Your thoracic spine is basically your mid back. It’s really important to have adequate mobility here for SO many things. If you like lifting/CrossFit, this mobility is needed for front rack position, overhead squats, any overhead pressing, handstand pushups, and so much more. If you like rock climbing, this mobility allows you to better look up while route finding or belaying and reaching for that next hold. Have kids? This will help with picking your kid up and sitting them on your shoulders. And in general, the better mobility and stability you have here, the less pressure your neck and lower back have to take on with sitting at a desk and working from home.

Specifially, this means you need adequate thoracic extension, which is the movement where the joints can bend backwards. Now, I know you’re probly imagining a full blown back bend right now. While range of motion is nice, you don’t necessarily need quite that much. Unless you’re a gymnast or cheerleader. Most of us just need enough to be able to keep your upper back / chest upright when you squat down with weight (otherwise you lean forward too much, dumping the weight and putting excessive pressure on your low back and hips), and enough to look up without cranking on our neck too much.

So how do you know if you have enough?? Pure extension is really hard to test in this area, because there’s no good way to lock out the low back from compensating. However, purely because of the mechanics, if your thoracic spine can rotate both ways with full range of motion, then you know you have enough extension! And that we can get in a position to test ONLY the thoracic spine. Watch this video as I walk you through the test! I also demonstrate what I mean when I say it’ll mess you up to not have enough. (Even better, I’ll show you next how to turn it into a drill to improve your range of motion!

Don’t have bands like the one I use in the video for the drill? I got you covered! Click here for my go-to bands. There are many benefits to having a full set, but you can do a LOT with just one that’s rated around 1`5-50 lbs and one that’s rated 50-125 lbs. (Note with COVID-19, these are backed up about a week)

Questions? Shoot them my way. Found some limitations and want to really work on your specific case to be able to move better?? I’ve got SO many tools to help you here, all of which can be done via telehealth with stuff you have at home while we’re in quarantine! Hit me up by commenting or shoot me a text at 480-751-2137.