The analogy of the mast of a ship being the spine is very popular but has a few problems. First, the support wires are not guy wires ( some PT from Toronto supposedly referred to them as guide wires for some reason) they are strays and shrouds. Ship building requires a lot of engineering and spouting off lame rehashing of Paul Chek is outdated at best. Paul has helped the industry back in the 90s with his quest for higher learning but it’s time to look at the current research and historical success in regard to program design. Sexy concepts like fascial lines, stability, super stiffness (but superman exercises are not allowed ironically!), core activation, energy leaks, drawing in with hockey pucks, are just pieces without a compass.
Now we have quests for no movement like it’s banned for some reason. Coordination is not activation, and activation is not activation because you are getting isolated isometric contractions. Look what the industry has come to with the bastardization of Physical Therapy? Anti-Movement training. Super Stiffness? Reducing muscle slack in sport is not going to be developed by not moving at all. Bilateral exercises that bridge the spine are a nice starts but look at when people fail in low back actions? Standing actions. If your athletes have poor upperbody strength cook chops are frankly a waste of time, as loading the spine in a stable position needs extreme loading with offset vectors. I use various chops but prefer the more old school approaches and the chop has some use.
The above photo is the detroiter in figure skating. The reason he can do this is because the skeleton is linked and supported through alignment from the influences of ballet and other forms of dance. This is a motor skill that will not transfer beyond the specific position he is displaying. Hence the risk of this move being too much for competition if a slight stumble occurs. Having people do 100 lb snatches simply is another waste of time if they are cleaning sufficient loads. Training the core is about a spectrum of modalities as the action is a composite contraction with specific timing mechanisms. I will go into this more with a case study of one of my athletes.
Discuss entry