My core is weak!
One of the most common complaints I hear from clients is “my core is weak.”
Your core is stronger than you think!
It supports you all day long - not just walking, standing or sitting but for every single activity you are doing.
Reaching for something on a high shelf? Your core is supporting you. Getting in and out of the car? Your core is supporting you.
“Press your lower back into the floor!” “Engage your abdominals!” “Brace your core!”
I’m sure you’ve heard these cues before and as a trainer and teacher of 14 years I’ve used them plenty of times myself.
But why are we using these?
To learn how to use our abdominals better and get a deeper mind-body connection - yes. To maintain the spine in an ideal position to support being able to move some weight with your limbs? Absolutely.
Yet it’s important to remember that your abdominals do a lot of work on their own without you thinking about it!
And sometimes if you think your core is “weak” you might be over-using these cues on yourself. Perhaps you feel like you need to protect your spine because your back hurts but maybe the constant tension is causing more problems than it’s fixing…
What do you normally think of when we talk about core exercises?
The Plank? (Aside: Do you love Planks or do they make your your back hurt?)
Deadbugs?
Other Pilates / Yoga exercises like the Teaser / Boat Pose?
Yes absolutely!
But what about other exercises like Squats? Lunges? Press-ups?
Every “exercise” is a “core exercise” dammit!!
When you do a squat you are keeping your spine fairly fixed so that the legs can bend and straighten.
A press-up is basically a plank with moving arms. So again - fixed spine.
Your core is ALWAYS working to enable movement!
Lunges are a little different... although we are keeping the spine fairly fixed, in order to do that there is a lot of rotational core stability happening to maintain balance while one foot is in front of the other. We are using our core a LOT.
With all these examples, although we don’t think of them as "core" specific exercises, the more challenging we make these exercises, the stronger our core needs to be to provide the stability to allow us to do them.
So WTF is rotational core stability?
Get up and take a walk round for a moment, letting your arms hang naturally at your sides.
(Did you actually get up and do it? ;) Go on….)
Did you notice how your arms swing naturally? Most likely, they are swinging in opposition to the foot that is stepping forward.
But it’s not just your arms and legs moving - as one side of your pelvis moves forward the ribcage on the same side is rotating back. Cool huh?
So, your core is working for you all day! It is stronger than your think - but there’s never any harm in getting stronger!
And there’s soooo many ways we can get a stronger core, without necessarily doing specific “core” exercises!
On Saturday 29th July at 10:00 BST I’m teaching a fantastic new workshop - “Core Confidence: Revealing Your Hidden Strength”
This workshop is for you if:
You think you have a weak core
Doing planks hurt your back
You feel like you’ve hit a plateau with your core strength
You have been told to engage your core to help with your lower back pain and it doesn’t seem to be helping
Info and booking for Core Confidence here (and if you are reading this after the workshop click here to purchase the replay.)