With the positive comments coming from the warm up video, I will aim to do 1 each week on a different topic and obviously this week will be training the core musculature.
The core is the engine room of the body and provides the power to your movement. I went into it in the How Much Ya Bench? series but I'll reiterate.
The job of the core from a postural point of view is to stabilise the lumbar spine through resisting rotation. From a performance point of view it transfers force.
Taking jumping as an example. When you jump you 'dip' into a half squat position where you are attempting to produce force by pushing your strength down your legs and into the ground. That same force is then transmitted up the legs and into the core and hopefully distributed into the upper the body to complete the jumping action with maximum force.
If your core is not strong enough to handle the force, then it will dissipate half way through your jump and you'll lose power. This can be referred to as an energy leak so what you need to do is to strengthen up your core to handle the stresses going through it and out to the extremities.
Core Activation
At Full Circle Fitness teaching core activation is part of our initial assessment and it is constantly cued during all exercises and with all the lower back pain getting around, we'll keep doing it.
One way of teaching it is to lie on your back with your feet flat on the ground. Now we want to place our fingers just above the hip bones on the front of the body (the top of the iliac crest for you geeks) and cough. What you should feel is something firm push out against your fingers. Cough again. Yep that is your core muscles activating.
Intrabdominal Pressure
Back in the early 90's it was thought that the best way to activate your core was to draw your belly button into the lumbar spine and a lot of trainer's still do this but what's the first thing you do when someone goes to punch you in the guts? Yep, you push out. But pushing out is only half the battle won.
You need to be able to keep a level of this activation constantly but a lot of people will simply lose this activation when the breathe out and this is where injuries can occur during activity. Now lie down and assume the same position as you did for the activation test and breathe all the way in through your nose.
This is where explaining gets hard.
What you want to do now is exhale through pursed lips over 7 - 10secs but only exhale about 70% of that breathe with the remaining 30% being 'pushed' into the stomach, creating the same pressure as you had when you tensed up your guts before getting punched. This is what you should do before each exercise and the more you do it, the more natural it will become.
Practice this during week and hopefully I can get a video together with various core exercise and progressions for you to use in your own training.
Please leave a comment.
The core is the engine room of the body and provides the power to your movement. I went into it in the How Much Ya Bench? series but I'll reiterate.
The job of the core from a postural point of view is to stabilise the lumbar spine through resisting rotation. From a performance point of view it transfers force.
Taking jumping as an example. When you jump you 'dip' into a half squat position where you are attempting to produce force by pushing your strength down your legs and into the ground. That same force is then transmitted up the legs and into the core and hopefully distributed into the upper the body to complete the jumping action with maximum force.
If your core is not strong enough to handle the force, then it will dissipate half way through your jump and you'll lose power. This can be referred to as an energy leak so what you need to do is to strengthen up your core to handle the stresses going through it and out to the extremities.
Core Activation
At Full Circle Fitness teaching core activation is part of our initial assessment and it is constantly cued during all exercises and with all the lower back pain getting around, we'll keep doing it.
One way of teaching it is to lie on your back with your feet flat on the ground. Now we want to place our fingers just above the hip bones on the front of the body (the top of the iliac crest for you geeks) and cough. What you should feel is something firm push out against your fingers. Cough again. Yep that is your core muscles activating.
Intrabdominal Pressure
Back in the early 90's it was thought that the best way to activate your core was to draw your belly button into the lumbar spine and a lot of trainer's still do this but what's the first thing you do when someone goes to punch you in the guts? Yep, you push out. But pushing out is only half the battle won.
You need to be able to keep a level of this activation constantly but a lot of people will simply lose this activation when the breathe out and this is where injuries can occur during activity. Now lie down and assume the same position as you did for the activation test and breathe all the way in through your nose.
This is where explaining gets hard.
What you want to do now is exhale through pursed lips over 7 - 10secs but only exhale about 70% of that breathe with the remaining 30% being 'pushed' into the stomach, creating the same pressure as you had when you tensed up your guts before getting punched. This is what you should do before each exercise and the more you do it, the more natural it will become.
Practice this during week and hopefully I can get a video together with various core exercise and progressions for you to use in your own training.
Please leave a comment.
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