maratoolShoulder Circles
How to do the shoulder circles
- With shoulders relaxed and arms resting loosely at your sides (or in your lap if you're seated), gently roll your shoulders forward, up, back, and down.
- Reverse direction. You can do this exercise alternating shoulders or both at the same time.
Muscles worked
The muscles under tension are the deltoids, which raise and rotate the upper arm at the shoulder joint.
A stretch loads them at the far end of the range they normally work in, so the position you hold is itself the resistance.
Other muscle groups are involved too: the traps anchor the shoulder blade against the load.
How this movement works
Force comes toward the body — you draw a limb, or your own bodyweight, in against whatever resists it. What changes between sessions is how far into the position you can get and hold, not how much is loading it.
It is filed under stretching, so the target is range of motion rather than force — a position you can settle into and breathe in, held long enough for the tissue to give.
What you need
These train the shoulders too, using equipment this one does not:
- Shoulder Press - With Bandsband
- Side Lateral Raisedumbbell
- Single-Arm Linear Jammerbarbell
- Smith Machine One-Arm Upright Rowmachine
- Smith Machine Rear Deltoid Rowsmith machine
Difficulty
Listed at beginner level: the pattern is simple enough to pick up without coaching, and a position that goes wrong mid-set is obvious enough to correct on the next repetition.
Of the 141 shoulders exercises in this database, 74 are listed at beginner level.
Photos: free-exercise-db — public domain (Unlicense) Full attribution →
ⓘ Informational only — not a substitute for professional fitness or medical advice.