“The Basic Elements of Core Training”

Ken Dobberpuhl, CPT, MAT

Roughly speaking our “core” is everything but our arms and legs. It is the conduit between the upper and lower extremities. All ground forces must pass through the core to allow us to use our arms for throwing, swinging etc. In fact, you can’t move your arms, legs, or head without a preliminary firing of some deep core muscles. Some of you have done the following exercise in my classes but if not try this. Grab yourself between the hip and ribs with your left hand (use your thumb and index finger). Then while grabbing, raise your right arm up laterally quickly and feel the under laying muscles fire in your left hand. The same thing happens when you move your legs or head, deep muscles of the core fire to help stabilize the spine.
If you have ever looked at those muscle charts on gym walls you may have noticed that very few muscles are oriented longitudinally, most are running at an angle. This because most human movement involves various degrees of rotation for force production. I believe this makes a good case for training movement patterns that actually create rotation, side bending, deceleration of rotation, flexion and extension. Ultimately the core functions to stabilize the spine in all movements and planes of motion.

So let’s look at some patterns that train our multi-directional core.
FLEXION and EXTENSION (Sagital plane) Most people spend way too much time with trunk flexion i.e. crunches when the reality is they probably need to do much more extension i.e. Cobra, prone back extensions etc.. We want to create a balance of stability and strength between the front of the body and the back. People that are obsessive about crunches for example often have back problems because they shorten the abdominals (6 pack) pulling their posture into a forward head position and thus loading the low back. So the take away message is your “6 six muscles” are probably strong enough, spend more time on extension exercises. Oh, if you want to see your “6 pack” it’s there, you were born with those tendonus inscriptions it’s probably hiding under some adipose tissue. One of most important functions of the “6 six” muscle is to decelerate extension. A beginning deceleration exercise we use in class is the stability ball kneeling rollout where you try to maintain a flat back as you roll the ball forward.

SIDE BENDING (Frontal Plane) Developing strength in this plane helps to keep us upright. We train the lateral sub-system initially by working on exercises like side laying planks to develop “linkage” between the upper and lower extremities. Many clients find a big difference between on side and the other. This happens a lot with athletes that throw or swing implements from one side only. Patterns should be trained on both sides of the body to help prevent some common overuse injuries in those sports.

ROTATION (Transverse Plane)
This is arguably the most important plane of motion for movement and force production yet ironically the least trained in many individuals. Running and Swimming and classic examples of how rotation of hips sets up force couples between the upper and lower extremities. Try running with out raising your opposite arm and leg (i.e. run with arms across the chest). In swimming we want to create a long axis of rotation again with the opposite arm and leg to roll the hips. Medicine balls and bands are great modalities for chopping patterns (high to low, low to high, side to side).

So in a nutshell a well round core program should have the following elements:
Flexion – Crunch
Extension – Cobra on SB (Stability Ball) or Low back extensions off a bench
Side Bending – Lateral Planks, SB Obliques, side bends with dumbbells
Rotation – Chopping patterns (Bands/Medicine Ball) from standing position
Deceleration – SB Kneeling Rollouts, standing single leg with opposite arm up and leaning back.

There are literally hundreds of exercise variations for each plane of motion. Mix it up, don’t do the same patterns over and over. Use difference implements, single leg, different speeds etc. Those of you attending classes are developing an exercise library for these movements and there will be more to come. Remember if you do some flexion exercises balance with equal extension (front/back), if you side bend to one side, side bend to the other and rotation needs to occur at many different angles (pushing/ pulling, swinging and chopping) just make to sure to go in the opposite direction as well.

FUNCTIONAL FITNESS

SANTA CRUZ, CA

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