Five At-Home Strength Workouts For Fastpitch Softball Players

Want to get stronger, but don’t have a ton of equipment? Want to build a team workout that can be easily done at players’ homes? In this article I’ll show you five at-home strength exercises for fastpitch softball players that can be performed pretty much anywhere!

At-Home Strength Exercises For Softball

First, if you want a great program to follow right away, try the one I’ve built for you. It’s called Early Work and it’s free to try.

So on our list today we have a handful of exercises, and here are their categories: 

1. Core strength 
2. Upper Body Strength (push)
3. Quad-Dominant leg exercise
4. Lateral Hip exercise
5. Rotator cuff (arm strength and injury prevention)

This is a great start for any player who wants to be productive and work toward her goals at home. Softball specific strength training is easy, but requires balance and some know-how.

NOTE: Always perform any exercise under proper supervision with good form!

#1. Core Strength – The Plank Lock-Off

Plank lock offs are easy and effective at building core stability, which is very important for all aspects of softball. A strong core helps transfer more power in hitting, throwing and sprinting. 

#2. Upper Body Strength – The Push Up Plus

Sure, push ups are basic, foundational movements and not overly interesting. But, push ups are a fantastic exercise that builds usable upper body strength and core stability.

Most softball players can’t do a single good push up (keyword: good) when they first visit our academy. Priority #1 for us as strength coaches is to get this foundational movement down, and the strength will carry over into their sport. 

The Push Up Plus is a variation in which the athlete pushes EXTRA high at the top of the push up, pushing the shoulder blades apart as far as they’ll go. This helps strengthen the serrates anterior, a key muscle involved in throwing. 

These are hard, so it’s recommended to start on a bar like shown in the video, which reduces resistance. If you don’t have some kind of bar to place in a power rack, put your hands on a desk, table, bench, etc., as long as it’s sturdy. Lower the incline over time.

#3. Quad-Dominant Leg Exercise: Sliding Lunges

The sliding lunge is a great exercise that challenges the legs and helps provide stability to the knee and hip joints. Players can add weight by holding dumbbells, and the sliders are very inexpensive and durable. 

You can grab a pair of sliders from my Amazon page via the button below. I do get a small commission should you buy, which helps me continue to put out more free content like this article. Thanks for your support! 

#4. Lateral Sliding Lunges 

Yes, these are also sliding lunges but they are VERY different than the traditional front-to-back variety shown in item #3. 

Lateral lunges are TOUGH. They build lateral hip strength that is critical in the swing and the throwing motion. Way too few softball players have strong lateral hips, and this additionally puts them at a greater risk of knee injuries like ACL tears. We target the lateral hips in my academy to help minimize injury risk where we can. I highly recommend adding lateral lunges to any softball team’s program.

Again, if you need a pair of the sliders shown in the video, you can get them below [affiliate link].

#5. The Theraband External Rotation

The external rotation is a great exercise that can be easily performed on the field, at home, before or after games or practices. The bands are highly portable and rotator cuff exercises are VERY underutilized in softball. 

Too many softball players throw with pain or have reduced throwing velocity because of poor arm strength in the rotator cuff. This can be easily prevented by good preventive exercises like these. 

The Theraband CLX shown in the video above is very durable, useful and inexpensive. We use them with all of our teams and we use them each day in our academy. 

Make Your Own Workouts Using These Five Exercises For Softball

Many coaches have limited budgets with which to create effective practices and workouts. Take these five exercises and add them to your routine. 

And, enroll in Early Work for Softball today.

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