Agility ladder workouts are very versatile exercises. They can be used independently to increase your agility and footwork, or they can be used as a dynamic warm-up to your regular exercise routine. Before you get started, there are a few guidelines you should follow: Maneuver through the ladder on the balls of your feet in an athletic stance, keeping your head level, and pump your arms from your hips to your shoulders. If you don’t have access to an agility ladder, you can used painted lines on the floor, or use tape to mark out boxes.
The easiest of the agility drills is for forward movement and foot coordination. Move in a forward motion down the ladder, making sure each foot lands in the box ahead, keeping your body concentrated on a specific rhythm. To increase the difficulty of this exercise you can tap each foot, in each box, as your run forward, causing a chop-step. -- This shortens your stride and works on your balance, as well.
For lateral movement and coordination you can perform a side-shuffle down the length of the ladder, making sure your feet touch the center of each box as you move laterally to the right or left. It's important to keep yourself in an athletic position and body square to the ladder during these exercises. To increase the difficulty, you can perform a lateral hop from box-to-box. You may choose to keep both legs together, or hop only on one leg, depending on your skill set.
As with all exercises, the results you get will emulate the effort you put into performing them. The agility ladder is an extremely dynamic tool that has an endless possibility of patterns you can perform. A sense of imagination can lead to some extremely challenging, yet rewarding, workouts.
