Tommi Boards

Tommi Boards

About

Tommi Boards are designed to provide the healthcare professional with a high quality, affordable wobble board to address patients and athletes needs for a product that increases proprioceptive ability and strengthens core stabilization/postural muscles. Proprioceptive awareness is vitally important to any rehabilitation or training program.

Tommi Boards are handcrafted and are extremely strong and durable thus providing an affordable alternative to high price wobble boards while providing the options in terms of degree of difficulty and range of motion that are necessary for both patients during rehab and advanced athletes.

Each 16” diameter board comes with 1 large and 2 small solid wood balls that provide varying degrees of difficulty: the boards may be used as a rocker board and/or a wobble board, essentially providing two boards in one.

Tommi Boards also make weeble boards which are 12” in diameter and a more advanced version of the wobble board that act independently under each foot providing enhanced proprioceptive training. Weeble boards can also be used for shoulder rehab and functional pushups providing a great neuro-muscular challenge. The boards come with 2 large and 2 small solid wood balls providing degrees of fixed angle of difficulty.

Wobble boards have a hard, flat platform over a hard, round, unstable base. To use a wobble board, stand, sit or kneel on the flat surface and find your balance over the base, challenging your muscles and proprioceptors. Balancing on a wobble board is generally achieved with a seesaw rocking motion between your feet. Popular with surfers, skateboarders and other board sports and fitness enthusiasts, wobble boards are good for developing agility, but can also be used for rehabilitation. Ankle sprains are the most common injuries in a variety of sports. In a study published in “The American Journal of Sports Medicine,” training on a wobble board can help prevent repeat ankle sprains in athletes with a history of them.

Wobble board exercises are performed in bare feet and on a soft floor such as a carpet (not deep-pile!) or a rug or mat, rather than a hard floor such as wood as the board is liable to slip. If you are new to this, ensure there is a wall or something close by that you can reach for if you loose your balance.

Pricing

16" wobble board

$59.99

Set of 2-12" weeble boards

$64.99

20" wobble board

$69.99

Complete package

$159.99

Wobble Board Benefits

Improve Proprioception and Balance

Proprioception is your ability to sense your environment and adjust the positions of your body accordingly. It is what allows you to hit a tennis ball, hold a weight or stand on one foot, for example. Proprioception must be developed in the same way strength and aerobic capacity are -- by progressing to more difficult challenges only after you’ve developed the basic skill. Balance training should begin on the floor. Once that becomes easy, add challenges, progressing from static to dynamic exercises. The instability of a wobble board adds a dynamic component to your balance training, forcing greater neuromuscular activation to further develop your proprioception. The results are better balance and stability, the ability to change directions more quickly when needed and more finely tuned motor skills.

Improve Functional Strength

Another important benefit of using a wobble board is improved functional strength. Functional exercise helps your muscles work better in everyday activities. No individual muscle functions alone, so exercise should include a variety of movement patterns for best results. Functional exercises done on a wobble board challenge multiple muscles and joints to stabilize and adjust themselves. Because your core muscles contract whenever you are in an awkward or unstable position, just standing on a wobble board will develop core strength and improve lower body strength. Holding a plank position with your hands on the board will develop core and upper body strength. Using the wobble board to do squats, lunges and pushups will increase the dynamic properties of these exercises for greater challenge.

Improve Mental Focus

To balance properly, you must learn how to keep your center of gravity aligned over your base of support. Challenging your balance forces the left and right halves of your brain to communicate more, thus improving sensory integration and coordination. If you then move an arm or leg across the mid-line of your body while on the wobble board, you further challenge this neuromuscular communication. By doing slow, controlled balance exercises on wobble boards, you will increase your self-awareness and instill a sense of calmness to improve your mental focus.

Wobble boards have been used for year in therapy sessions to help children with attention deficit disorders. Using a balance board simply forces the brain to work in union to maintain proper balance. This helps improve handwriting as well as sensory communication skills and reading, which makes it suitable for children suffering from Attention Deficit Disorder plus other developmental delays.

Prevent Injuries

By developing proprioception, strength and focus, wobble board exercises help you react to sudden changes in your environment, thus reducing the risk of injury. Ankle sprains are common in many athletes. The American Journal of Sports Medicine published in 2004 a study by researchers from EMGO-Institute in The Netherlands. It demonstrated that wobble board training can help prevent repeat ankle sprains in athletes with a history of ankle sprains. A different study that was conducted by researchers from Qatar Orthopedic & Sports Medicine Hospital in Doha, Qatar and published in a 2012 issue of Clinical Biomechanics showed that the muscles on the bottom of your feet contract more readily with greater postural demand, as is required on a wobble board. Working these muscles is beneficial, because they are essential for optimal posture and movement function.

Wobble boards also loose adhesions, increase blood supply to injured tissues, improve venous and lymphatic drainage thereby reducing healing time.