Core Training

Almost everyone whether they’re training or not desires abs and a core sculpted of bronze and possess godly strength, but seems that there aren’t many who have an actual clue how to go about it. Going by the general consensus you would assume a healthy dose of situps and crunches will harden the guts, but things aren’t always what they seem.

The good news is that you can expect to develop abs of steel. The bad news is that you gotta change how you think about training the core. I say bad news because most people are very defensive about changing dearly held beliefs, irrespective if they’re right or wrong.

Training the core correctly will increase your usable strength and physical capacity for work. In old muscle speak, it builds great muscle coordination, that is, movement quality. Also, I won’t go into it here, but trust that quality core training is supremely beneficial for preventing injuries also.

The basic function of the core in movement terms is, in conjunction with the spine, to serve as a solid foundation for the arms and legs to propel the body or to propel an object. It becomes apparent that situps and crunches involve flexing the torso, hence become unsuitable. They still train the core, just not in the most beneficial way. The torso needs to act as a stabilizer, not as a prime mover, which is how most people train their core.

Then which exercises fulfil this function? Basically, the exercise or movement that we’re looking for involves force acting off-centre to the body’s centre of mass, whether the force is external resistance or body leverages. A one arm press will work your obliques and QL’s better than twisting situps. Why? Since the weight is off-centre, you’ll find that if you don’t stabilize with your core, the weight will topple you. Try a one arm dumbbell bench press. Now perform a regular bench press with a barbell. A lot easier to balance yourself with the bar isn’t it? Your torso also doesn’t move, rather you are moving the weight.

Here’s a list of movements that will train the torso efficiently;

Unilateral or single-handed exercises
Farmer’s walks
Suitcase-style deadlifting
Turkish Getups
Goblet Squats holding the weight or kettlebell arm’s length in front of you
Walking whilst holding a weight overhead
Squats
Deadlifts
Use kettlebells instead of barbells or dumbbells

Or if you’re real tough, push or pull a car with one arm only, then alternate hands.

Effective ways of programming core training is to alternate your main lift with a core-challenging movement. You could also leave it for the very end. It doesn’t really matter, just practice these movements by not going to failure. You want quality.

Feel free to use your own movements, as long as your torso isn’t moving, and the resistance forces your limbs to adjust to keep your balance.

It seems excessively simple, but that’s pretty much all you need for an iron core.