Fun and Fitness for the 40-Something

Last week I wrote about how some weight training can help those with lower back pain. What about ab workouts? Do they help or hinder your back?

A sports medicine doctor recently told me that core training could help me deal with the early signs of arthritis he saw on an x-ray of my lumbar spine. I found that reassuring because I’ve done core training since I first wrote about its increasing popularity several years ago. But the New York Times just reported on “growing dissent among sports scientists about whether all of this attention to the deep abdominal muscles actually gives you a more powerful core and a stronger back and whether it’s even safe.”

The notion that we should pull in our belly buttons during crunches and other exercises stems from the idea that the key to core fitness—including back health—lies in the deep transversus abdominis muscle. According to one expert (”a highly regarded professor of spine biomechanics”) who has been crusading against ab exercises that require hollowing your belly, though, the core is about more than just the abs.

He says that the muscles in the core—i.e., the muscles and connective tissue that encircle and hold the spine in place—must be balanced if the spine is to bear large loads. When you focus on strengthening just one part of the core muscles, like the abs, you risk destabilizing your spine by pulling it out of alignment. “In research at our lab,” he says, “the amount of load that the spine can bear without injury was greatly reduced when subjects pulled in their belly buttons” during crunches and other exercises.

The article goes to describe three exercises the expert recommends to strengthen all of the major muscles that girdle the spine:

1) Side plank

2) Bird dog

3) Crunch (see below)

The expert in the Times article was very specific about the proper type of crunch and railed against sit-ups, which can put far too much stress on the disks in your back. A safe crunch begins with lying down, one knee bent and hands positioned beneath your lower back for support. You should not hollow your stomach or press your back against the floor. Gently lift your head and shoulders, hold briefly and relax back down.

The takeaway? Remember that your core is much more than just your ab muscles. As the Times article concludes, a six-pack isn’t worth a wrecked back.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, June 24th, 2009 at 7:51 am and is filed under General Fitness. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.