UNSTABLE DYNAMIC PLANKS ON EXERCISE BALL

primary muscle: core

supporting muscles: abs, low back, hips

The plank or front hold is the most important exercise for your core as it engages all of the core muscles to build both strength and stability through your whole body. Keeping a straight line between ankles, knees, hips and shoulders promotes the type of stable strength used through those joints, and more importantly, your torso, in everyday movements like sitting, standing, walking, etc. This exercise not only makes all of the muscles in your torso have to work to maintain the alignment (abs, low back, oblique, transverse abdominus), but also involves the shoulder and hip girdle to bare the weight, the other key body parts that make up the core. Adding movement or dynamicism makes all of the muscles involved have to work harder to maintain body alignment as the load shifts throughout the movement, helping increase functional strength/stability. Adding further instability into the exercise with the exercise ball makes the muscles that work to stabilize the hips and shoulders, in addition to torso, have to be more engaged to help balance and keep alignment, promoting balance and stable strength. This is an increased challenge with the ball as it has a surface that will shift in 360 degrees of space and the inflated surface is inconsistent to balance against.

These exercises come from our exercise library at Trainer+, a web and mobile platform for personal trainers.

Are you digitally tracking every set and rep that your clients do with or without you?