Dr. Terry Weyman is the clinic...
Dr. Terry Weyman is the clinic director of the Chiropractic Sports Institute. He has been involved with action sports for over 20 years and provides sport chiropractic care and strength and conditioning for athletes at his Westlake, California office.
Trackside medicine is intended to provide a general medical guideline and is not intended to replace the clinical judgment of a doctor or take the place of the medical doctor's diagnostic or treatment recommendations. These articles will always err on the conservative side for safety purposes.
If you go to any reputable motocross riding coach for advice, chances are one of the first things they will remind you of is the fact that your body follows your head. This little truism applies to just about any movement that the human body makes, and yet most riders barely give it a second thought. Recently, Dr. Terry Weyman gave us a tip relating to training the eyes for optimal performance in body movements, and as soon as we heard it we knew it had to go to print. Check out the following for a critical yet completely overlooked training function that can make you a better, safer and faster rider with less than a minute of effort per week.
"We often forget to train our eyes for our sport, yet they are extremely instrumental in initiating all quick body movements. Your head follows your eyes and, consequently, your body follows your head. By training the eyes, it's possible for traditional sports athletes to improve rapid physical movements such as darting through a hole in a team's defense, finding a receiver faster or making that quick hockey shot. This training of the eyes will also help reaction time for motocross, as it will allow many of the high-speed movements on the bike to become easier, as well as improving your reaction time."
"Here is a simple drill that I have found to be incredibly effective in improving fast eye movements: Stand 5-10 feet away from a wall, and have a partner stand behind you with a red laser pointer. Your partner will then move the pointer on the wall in front of you in quick patterns, all around, so that the red dot is constantly moving. Follow the dot with your eyes as best as you can. Do NOT move your head!"
"Make a game of it to see if your partner can move the dot faster or in a pattern that you can't keep up with. Complete this simple drill for 10-20 seconds at a time, two to three times a week. Doing so will cause your eye reaction speed to increase, along with your on-the-bike performance!"