The sport skills of kicking a football, swinging a tennis racket, shooting a hockey ball, getting air and spin on snowboards, spiking a volleyball, driving a golf ball and hitting a baseball are all dependent on a highly developed torso capable of explosive rotation. The paradox continues in that most exercise professionals, with their good intention of ensuring core exercises are safe, prescribe very limited exercises that ultimately under prepare their clients for sport demands and actually set them up to be injured.
In the fitness world, ‘core’ strength has become a very common buzzword. In sport, you are definitely only as strong as your weakest link, and for most athletes this is the core or speed center, which includes abdominals, low back and hip musculature. For a solid base of support which is capable of transferring power through the kinetic chain, you need to build strength from the center of the body out to the periphery, as opposed to preferentially working on the muscles you can see in a mirror. However, enhanced skill execution and sport power cannot be optimized with traditional floor based sit up exercises.
In the past, core development has been attempted through the utilization of floor based exercises such as crunches, sit ups, leg raises, rope crunches, and back hyperextensions which predominantly isolate abs muscles.
However, the speed centre must be developed with the intent of improved performance. Nothing on the court, field or ice is done in isolation. Isolation exercises will hurt your sport performance and lead to injury. Strength exercises must incorporate the entire body and accelerate through various joints, activate all muscle groups and move through varied planes.
The Twist Team!
In the fitness world, ‘core’ strength has become a very common buzzword. In sport, you are definitely only as strong as your weakest link, and for most athletes this is the core or speed center, which includes abdominals, low back and hip musculature. For a solid base of support which is capable of transferring power through the kinetic chain, you need to build strength from the center of the body out to the periphery, as opposed to preferentially working on the muscles you can see in a mirror. However, enhanced skill execution and sport power cannot be optimized with traditional floor based sit up exercises.
In the past, core development has been attempted through the utilization of floor based exercises such as crunches, sit ups, leg raises, rope crunches, and back hyperextensions which predominantly isolate abs muscles.
However, the speed centre must be developed with the intent of improved performance. Nothing on the court, field or ice is done in isolation. Isolation exercises will hurt your sport performance and lead to injury. Strength exercises must incorporate the entire body and accelerate through various joints, activate all muscle groups and move through varied planes.
The Twist Team!
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