A modern approach to abdominal training

Though you may still see people doing sit-ups and a variety of abdominal exercises at the gym, I believe the paradigm is beginning to shift.  I believe there is a greater understanding of the true function of abdominal and core muscles (not just to look good at the beach!) with the importance being to brace/stabilize the lumbar spine.

We brace inherently without even thinking about it.  Think about the last time you picked up a heavy box off the ground, or tried to push an object across the floor.  The first thing you see the person do is take a deep breath in, and watch their face go red while they strain to move the object.  Watch their breathing as they move the object.  When they get through the hard parts of the movement, they may slowly breath out, or they may stop to rest and take a full breath in and perform another repetition. 

So if this is what we do in life, why are we training the abdominal muscles to put our low backs in a flexed position? 

I often get asked what kind of abdominal exercises should I do if I should not be doing sit ups.  The modern approach to abdominal training is to just do what you are doing!  Anything where you are lifting, carrying, pushing, pulling or dragging will force you to brace.  I do believe it is important to know how to be "perfect" when you are bracing, particularly if you are performing repeated movements.  In this case, there are numerous exercises that focus on bracing such as bridging and planking. 

So if you are doing squatting, lunging, deadlifting, push ups, pull ups, sled pushes/drags then you are learning to brace.