Bracing your abs is bad for your back

Do you brace your ab muscles in an effort to stabilise your back?  It’s time to stop.  

It might be something your mother drilled into you growing up: “Hold your stomach muscles in. It will tone your abs and support your back”. It's also a common go-to exercise for personal trainers and physios.

For years now we've seen how bracing your back doesn't work.

Bracing or adominal hollowing by tensing your stomach muscles or drawing your belly button in towards your back isn’t good for your back for four reasons:

1. If you train your back to be stable by consciously drawing your muscles in, what happens when you’re not consciously thinking about it? No stability. For 99 per cent of your day!

2. If you train your back to be stable by bracing your muscles, it might be stable when your trunk is still and braced. But what about when it’s moving? It can’t move with your muscles braced, so they turn off when your spine moves and you’re left with no stability. Your spine needs to move.

3. Does a lion pull its belly button in before it jumps on a gazelle? It’s not natural; it’s not how our musculoskeletal system works.

4. The better you can brace your muscles, the better they become at bracing and the easier it is to do. So people pull in their ab muscles even harder just so they can feel it. Then over time what started off as an appropriate amount of bracing becomes way too hard, way too rigid and way less functional – because if you go back to point two, you then can’t move. As soon as you move, the bracing muscles turn off.

The muscles that stabilise and control the movement of your spine work at a low level that you can barely feel. In fact, you shouldn’t even be conscious of them. If your trunk muscles don’t naturally do it, the best way to train them is through controlled movement. Get your posture and movement correct, with as little muscular effort as possible, and you’ll be using the right muscles.

When is bracing your stomach muscles appropriate?

There are a small sub-set of people who do need to learn how to brace their back to begin with, but this is just a short-term technique to get the connection happening. Once the connection is there between brain and muscle, the person would be advised to stop consciously contracting their stomach muscles and let their neuromuscular system take charge on a sub-conscious level -  as that’s what it’s designed to do.

Let your inner lion jump naturally

So no more pulling your belly button in, and no more planking!  And if you need support to achieve this, our physios can work with you to train you how to strengthen your back and engage your muscles correctly.

Book in for a free assessment at your local Back In Motion practice.     

Nathan Rickard – Director, Back In Motion Hawthorn

Nathan is a Physiotherapist who believes in physical rehabilitation to optimise the mechanics of the body.  This is what gets great results, not just a quick fix.  He is also focused on holistic health and fitness. This approach not only helps current injuries, but prevents future injuries and the poor health that often comes with our sedentary lifestyles.  

More specifically, he has a special interest in:
•Lower back pain
•Knee and ankle injuries
•Running and exercise related injuries
•Running and Sports-Specific Movement Analysis

Nathan has a young family and enjoys coaching at his son’s football team (where he employs his understanding of Sports-Specific Movement Analysis – although crowd control is a more important skill at this age!).  He also plays hockey for Old East Malvern, surfs, and tries to snatch the odd game of tennis and golf when able. Skiing with his family is now a priority once a year, and he practices what he preaches with a balanced gym, running and Clinical Exercise program.