Benefits of Rebounding

4. CHANGES BODY SHAPE

Rebound Fitness trampoline workouts utilise all the fundamental movement patterns needed to stimulate all of our limbs, joints and muscles in a very healthy and balanced way. These functional movement patterns and exercises performed on the professional rebounder can consist of squats, lunges, twists, bends, pushes and gait patterns including postural exercise that force every muscle in the body to continually contract simultaneously and then relax. This results in our joints and muscles working and moving together a we do in everyday life and whilst playing sport, resulting in a more functional full body workout. This makes us becoming stronger, leaner and more flexible.

Rebounding also strengthens the pelvic floor muscles and deep abdominal muscles (the muscles that help give us a flat tummy!). Increasing the muscle tone and volume will result in making our skin appear smoother, and younger. The human body has roughly 56 – 80 trillion cells. As you are bouncing on the rebounder every single cell is under additional stress because of gravity’s additional force on the body. At the top of the bounce, each cell is weightless and is “floating”. At the bottom of the bounce, each cell feels the increased pressure from the increase in G-force – there is a gentle “squeeze” on each cell. The cells have to adapt to being placed in this environment and therefore become stronger. Since the cells are the body’s living building blocks any positive change to the cells cascades up to the tissues, organs and systemic functions giving increased overall health and well-being.

5. STRENGTHEN CORE

We have been conditioned and brain washed to train our core muscles lying on our backs doing variations of an abdominal crunch or curl exercise. This is in fact dysfunctional with limited benefits, targeting only external superficial muscles rather than important deeper core muscles. Probably the only time of day we need to do this type of sit up movement is when we get out of bed in the morning!

A better and more functional way to train our core muscles is in the vertical position, which is how these muscles are used most of the time, to stabilise our spine so it can cope with normal “life activities”, improving our posture and keeping us upright.

Exercising on an unstable surface, such as a low impact rebounder, provides a very healthy and constant balance challenge forcing the involuntary contraction (meaning we don’t have to think about it!) of the very important ‘deeper core muscles’ that surround and protect our joints and organs. Stimulating these important muscles in this way can protect us from injury, strengthen the spine, improve posture and are responsible for giving a flatter belly in appearance.

7. INCREASE BONE DENSITY

As we get older, we lose bone mass and mineral content from our bones which means they become frail and porous leading to osteoporosis and other degenerative skeletal conditions. Osteoporosis affects over three million people in the UK and over 200 million worldwide. The cell in the body that is bone forming is known as “osteoblast”. Rebounding causes osteoblastic activity thereby stimulating bone growth and restoring bone density.

NASA discovered that astronauts who went off to the moon lost 15% of their bone density in just 14 days because there was no gravitational pull to positively stress their bones – rebounding was the solution. In the NASA Report published in the Journal of Applied Physiology 49(5): 881-887, 1980 they state:

“. . . for similar levels of heart rate and oxygen consumption,the magnitude of the bio mechanical stimuli is greater with jumping on a trampoline than with running, a finding that might help identify acceleration parameters needed for the design of remedial procedures to avert deconditioning in persons exposed to weightlessness.”

Rebounding can be used both as a preventative measure, and as relief for those already suffering from these conditions.

8. IMPROVED SPORTING PERFORMANCE

Following a well-designed exercise programme performed on a high quality and very low impact rebounder, can have a carry over on to the playing filed and give you that vital edge over your opponent. By mimicking movement patterns used in our chosen sport or fitness activity whist on an unstable surface such as a swiss ball or rebounder, you can increase muscles stimulation, improve balance and increase joint stability by making them more difficult to perform than when done on a rigid surface.

The effects of unstable surfaces on strength and performance is quite easy to measure by doing some pre and post exercise testing. Also, biomechanical laboratories, sports science departments in universities and hospitals are equipped with electromyography machines, which use skin-mounted electrodes to measure electrical signals sent to your muscles through your nerves. By measuring the intensity of these signals, we can get a pretty clear idea of how strongly a particular exercise engages the muscles being tested.

Training our muscles in an unstable environment is even more important if our chosen sport involves moving on or over an unstable or undulating surface such as skiing, cross country running, and football as these sports require high levels of balance co-ordination and joint stability. By incorporating exercises on equipment such as a rebounder with an unstable surface will train the muscles and joints in a similar way to how they are used in these activities making them ‘sport specific exercises’.

In all sports to perform at our best we need good postural strength. By exercising on a rebounder we stimulate all our stabilising muscles involuntary, which hold our joints in an optimum position and intern improve our posture. Good proper postural alignment allows us to work more efficiently with less fatigue and strain on your body’s ligaments and muscles.

If we add in the benefits that can be gained in the way of rebounding for injury prevention as well as being a brilliant rehabilitation device all in all I think rebounding has its place in helping our sporting performance!

Racing to a new running PB? Read our blog on how Rebounding can help to improve your Running

9. EXERCISE FOR ALL

Rebounding, or mini trampoline exercise, is great fun and suitable for all ages, genders and fitness levels. You are in control of how hard you work by how hard you push into the mat surface through your legs. This controls the intensity of your workout and allows you to increase your fitness levels gradually. In the beginning 5 minutes might be sufficient for you to work up a sweat and you can gradually increase the time of your workout, and the more you push into the mat of the rebounder the harder you will work

So whether you are a complete beginner or elite athlete you can tailor your rebounding programme to suit your requirements. The Rebound Fitness team have produced a whole mixed genre of exciting mini trampoline workouts available in our Bounce & Burn membership for everyone to enjoy and benefit from.

We have designed fantastic rebound workouts specifically for weight loss and burning 100s of calories, sports and fitness based workouts and holistic detoxifying rebounding sessions. We also have themed workouts that incorporate combat and martial arts moves, dance based workouts, children’s rebound and extreme bootcamp HIIT style sessions.

Our sporting workouts include squats, lunges, twists, jumps, pushing patterns and sprints are performed between bursts of jogging and bouncing, all on the low impact surface of the rebounder. You can also complete HIIT rebound and sport specific workouts, performing explosive plyometric exercises combined with athletic strength and conditioning moves such as squat jumps and upper body exercises. For extra resistance use our specially designed weighted gloves or resistance bands that clip on to our rebounders securely.