Core Strength Training: Training abs the right way

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What’s up everybody?  Things are settling down for me after returning from a beach trip only to jump right into a busy schedule of fall training.  Part of the busyness included speaking at a seminar last weekend for state baseball coaches who are wanting to develop both their faith and their profession.  My contribution to the seminar was a presentation on “New Thoughts on Training Your Players”.  This presentation will be available at some point on the site. 

Until then, I thought I’d share some content from 1 of the topics I spoke about, since it got everybody’s attention because it was against the mainstream approach to training . . . core strength training, or even more specific to this post, ab training exercises. 

When considering the core, you have to remember it is a cylinder, meaning that it has a front, back, and sides.  All those parts must be strengthened and function properly for the core to perform its primary functions of stabilization and transfer of energy.  

The anterior core, or abdominals, is the glamour region of the core and usually gets the most attention.  Unfortunately, it’s very misunderstood and often trained ineffectively.  As I stated above, 1 of the most significant functions of the core is stabilization, and in this case I’m talking about stabilization of the lumbar spine. 

The vertebrae of the lumbar spine aren’t designed for movement.  They’re bigger than the vertebrae of the thoracic spine (mid to upper back) and are designed to have a very liminted range of motion with regard to flexion, extension, and rotation.  Instead, movement should take place in the joints above and below the lumbar spine, the thoracic spine and hips. 

With this in mind, we should approach all abdominal training with the goal of PREVENTING movement, not creating it.  I know that’s crushing news to the millions of people who rely on crunches and sit-ups for their abdominal routine, but the proof’s in the pudding. 

Core Strength Training

The most signicant muscle that makes up your abdominal region is the rectus abdominus, and its segmented design in the body doesn’t at all suggest that it should be used for trunk flexion.  In fact, you can gradually compromise your posture over time by doing loads of crunches when you consider that the rectus abdominus attaches directly to the rib cage.  So, when you perform crunch after crunch you are shortening that muscle and pulling your chest down, causing bad posture.     

In addition, trunk flexion isn’t a functional movement.  Think about it, how many times a day do you perform trunk flexion?  Maybe once when you get out of bed in the morning.  So, why would we want to promote a movement through training that we don’t want to see show up during our daily routines? 

And, this concept is even more critical for an athlete.  The trunk flexes to compensate for a lack of flexion in the hips, and if your athletes’ hips aren’t mobile and can’t generate flexion, they won’t perform at their highest level, or even worse, be very vulnerable to injury.  An athlete’s core must be strong enough and stabile enough to prevent movement and transfer forces from the lower body to the upper body.  If it can’t handle this function, you’ll never be able to maximize the power generated from the legs. 

And, for those of you who will still cling to crunches with the hopes of getting lean and sexy abs, you’re wasting your time.  Crunches don’t create a lean mid-section.  Being lean creates a lean mid-section.  In other words, if your diet is bad and you aren’t performing the exercises that rev up your metabolism and burn fat, you can do a million crunches a day and you’ll still never see your abs.  

So, with all that said, you may be wondering, “what abdominal training should I do?”  Glad you asked . . .

There are many options, but I’ll start you off with a simple roll-out progression.  You may be tempted to go straight for the ab wheel, but I’d rather you start with a stability ball roll-out.  It teaches good movement and won’t totally crush your abs the first time you try it, unlike the wheel.  Here’s a look . . .

Notice the individual’s posture in the video.  You want to keep a straight line through the body and not allow the hips to break.  This requires you to fire the glutes to keep the hips extended, which is an advantage to using the stability ball.  The arms should stay straight as well, forcing the individual to draw the ball in with his abdominals.  You can control the intensity on this movement by either rolling out short (easy) or lengthening the lever and rolling out long for a higher degree of difficulty. 

The next progression would be to use an ab dolly, which is a piece of equipment similar to what kids use in a P.E. class.  You would place your elbows and forearms on it and perform the same movement.

Most people don’t have access to an ab dolly, so they would have to progress straight to the ab wheel.  The intensity is greater on the wheel than on the stability ball because the upper body is set much lower.  Here’s a look at the ab wheel movement . . .

Notice that in both movements the abs are being trained as a stabilizer instead of a mover, as no movement is passing through the lumbar spine.  It’s both challenging and functional. 

That’s the evidence.  Now it’s just a matter of whether or not you want to follow the uneducated herd or blaze your own trail toward better performance.  The topic of core strength training has many layers, so I’ll be sure to cover it more in the future, but this post should serve as a good starting point.

Your Coach,

Brian

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