Rotator Cuff is a rehab workout for the four small muscles that hold your shoulder together and never get thanked for it: 10 arm twists, 10 raised arm twists, 10 half bows, 10 full bows, a 10-count hold per side with the hand tucked behind the lower back, and 10 elbows in. Small movements, deliberately unimpressive to watch, quietly essential to everything your shoulders will ever do.
The rotator cuff's job is rotation, and this sequence trains it in every arm position the joint works from. Arm twists rotate the whole arm along its axis with arms low; raised arm twists repeat the pattern with arms out at shoulder height, where the cuff has to rotate and support against gravity at once. Half bows and full bows - forearms rotating forward and down from a goalpost position - take the joint through the internal and external rotation range that throwing, reaching and carrying all depend on. The behind-the-back hold stretches the front of the shoulder and the internal rotators in a position modern life never visits, and the elbows-in finisher works the retraction that pulls your shoulder blades into the posture everything else hangs from. Nothing here builds a muscle you can see. Everything here maintains the machinery underneath the ones you can.
Move slowly and within a comfortable range on every exercise - in rehab work, the quality of the rotation matters infinitely more than its size, and nothing here should hurt. Rotate from the shoulder, letting the hands follow rather than lead. Keep your elbows at shoulder height through the bows and let the forearms do the travelling. In the hold, ease the hand up your back only as far as feels workable and breathe through the full count on both sides.
Four small muscles, one small workout. Do it now or meet them later, in physiotherapy, under worse circumstances.
Make it Harder: Wrong question for rehab work - the right one is consistency, so do this sequence daily and let the gains come from showing up.
Make it Easier: Halve every station to 5 slow reps and keep the range comfortable.
