At the heart of “core training”, as presented by many trainers, coaches, therapists, is the idea that increasing core strength will improve performance.
Yet since the 1980’s, researchers have yet to prove the link. In fact, the studies repeatedly show no improvement in athletic performance from “core training”.
So, why bother?
The “core” concept originally started out defined as the muscles of the mid to lower spine – front and back – whose job was to prevent shearing or slipping of the spinal segments during movements like bending or lifting. The problem is that these muscles, such as the multifidus, are not under your conscious control like, say, your fingers. You can wiggle your fingers whenever you want but if I ask you to wiggle your lower back right and left, you’ll be scratching your head on that one forever or at least be a poor imitation of Miley Cyrus twerking.
According to a study performed at Indiana State University, researchers had a group a healthy, young (age 21 to 28) volunteers run through a battery of tests that included “core stability” (whatever that is) and then perform another battery of tasks like jumping up and throwing a medicine ball backwards and shuttle runs.
And to their great surprise, there was a low correlation between “core stability” and performance.
This study had caused quite a stir in the personal training / sports training world where there is often a heavy emphasis on “core strength” – sometimes interchanged with “core stability” – to improve some degree of performance.
But, this study is a good example of a mixed set of definitions and a poor set of assumptions.
What researchers found out several years ago was that if you contracted the abdominal muscles, specifically the transverse abdominus (which is automatically activated in something like a plank or a half kneel chop), the multifidus would also contract. And, since we know that people who have had long standing back pain have atrophy or a wasting of these muscles, the era of “core training’ was born. By using the core muscles, you help rebuild the endurance of the multifidus and other stabilizer muscles of the spine.
But, before long, the personal training / sports world – and some of the physical therapy world too – altered the language to “strengthening” and “stability”. And when you add “strengthening” to a concept like the core, you open up all sorts of stupid drills designed to improve “stability” (see the pic for an example of what I would call a stupid drill).
Why would you ever do this?
It’s not really a surprise that testing “core stability” and certain sport related tasks show a weak correlation. You get good at what you do so performing a plank will not make you better at throwing a ball. The two activities are completely different in movements, muscle recruitment, muscle fiber use, energy systems, etc. I think you could have studied power output on a cycle and throwing a ball and found a similar result.
Why Training Your Core is Worth the Time
There are some types of exercise whose purpose is prevention and core training is that kind of exercise.
You won’t carve a bunch of fat off your body from performing planks or half-kneel chops. And you won’t ski much better, jump higher, or run faster either. But you will build the resilience of the weak and atrophied stabilizer muscles and all of the connective tissue that anchors the muscles to the bones.
The “tougher” this tissue is the better for you. It enhances the way your body moves, will improve your flexibility, and in some cases eradicate back pain.
So, yes you need to work on your “core”. It’s a wise thing to do over time to stay fit across all the dimensions of fitness. Just don’t expect to run a faster 10k because you can hold a plank for three minutes.
