I was doing Ball slams (for the first time)as part of a CrossPit inspired workout today and almost injured myself, twice.
I used a leather med ball and slammed it onto a hard rubber mat on a concrete floor. Several times the damn ball came right back at my knees instead of bouncing straight up. The first time it caught me, I had my knee locked, but learned my lesson after that.
My knee is actually a little sore as a result.
Am I doing something wrong, or is this just something I have to be careful about?
I had a client almost bust his nose with a Med Ball, for some reason he didn't think a rubber med ball would bounce much, as he went to pick it up after he slammed it.
A girl I knew who started doing CF put herself into the hospital for a day. The med ball was like a heavy basketball (12lbs if I recall). She slammed it, bounced back, hit here in the jaw, broke her jaw, knocked her cold, fell back and broke her tail bone.
canuck34: I'm not really sure why it was locked, I guess I was bending more at the waste then knees when performing the slam because my legs were still sore from the previous day's max box squat workout. After that I paid more attention and was bending my knees.
Most of the time I could get the ball to pop back up into my hands about 6 inches off the ground and get a good rhythm going. Every once in a while though, the ball would be out of shape and hit in a way that made it shoot out at a weird angle.
I haven't spent any money on my gym for a while, I think I may look into a non-bouncy ball (and some heavier balls too). Any suggestions where I can find one?
p2I - what kind of ball was she using? The D-balls used for Slam Ball would never bounce up that high or with that degree of velocity. You can slam the hell out of a D-Ball and you're going to get a couple inches bounce, maybe.
Titando - Yeah, your legs defintely should not be straight when the ball hits the ground. It's an explosive squat - not a bend-over. ;)
Ring Girl, she wasn't using a dball. My point is Darwin works in the gym. A person w/ some common sense would look at the CF WOD, recognize a move they don't know how to perform, look it up on the website, and figure it out. This lady was like "all med balls are the same. I will now perform slamball......." Burned hand learns best I suppose.