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QUESTION: John, what is your recommendation and/or can you explain the different benefits of the high plank vs. the plank while on elbows? The Elbow Plank VS Top-of-Pushup-Position Plank ANSWER: The high plank, also known as the “top-of-pushup position,” is identical to the typical elbow plank, except for the fact that your arms are extended and fully locked out. This accomplishes two things: So, there’s a little story behind this one. I spend a lot of time helping beginner and seasoned trainee’s with their questions about health, fitness, and training at the Burn The Fat: Inner Circle fat loss support community. I’ve been a contributor and forum moderator there since 2006, and in that time I’ve met some pretty cool people. I’ll be honest and up front when I say that one of my personal favorite members is a woman named Jan, who is the ring leader of the Siffer-Ladies!  The front elbow plank sans grimacing face. Now, don’t let the cutesy name fool you – these ladies are not your average gym trainee’s. When I picture the Siffer-Ladies showing up at the gym, it’s like an old Western movie where everyone clears out of the bar when the outlaws arrive. The Siffer-Ladies are notorious fitness outlaws! While the so-called “civilized” women are barely breaking a sweat on the Elliptical machine while watching Oprah, the Siffer-Ladies are cranking out endless reps of alligator crawls, ab wheel rollouts, pushups, pullups and partner wheelbarrow walking. They’re hardcore – pure and simple. Some people in their gym even think they’re crazy (I can relate to that!). Jan has been somewhat of a training disciple of mine and she’s built some pretty impressive fitness levels over the years using mostly bodyweight training. You see, Jan is a lifestyle fitness trainee. She’s found something that works for her, and she’s been sticking with it for years. She trains because she loves it… in a sick sort of way (again, I can relate!). Every once in awhile, the Siffer-Ladies come up with some crazy idea like holding a plank for 5 minutes straight. I don’t know what possesses them… it’s like they just have an insatiable hunger for self-inflicted torment and indescribable agony – and I give in every time. Jan contacted me a couple weeks ago asking for advice about getting from 3 minutes to a 5 minute plank. After offering her some suggestions, I’ve been thinking about it ever since. I’ve never had any of my clients do a plank for longer than 3 minutes, and I’ve never done one longer than that either. It’s uncharted territory. So, you know me… I just had to know if I could do it myself! I’ll be honest, I had my doubts if I’d be able to complete the 5 minute plank test since I haven’t done any specific plank training in years, but I set my mind to the task and here’s what it looked like… The 5 Minute Plank For Core Strength, Stability, and Rock-Hard Abs Note: This is a guest post from Ryan Murdock and Adam Steer, the BodyweightCoach.com experts. While a six-pack stomach may be the most conventional benchmark of athletic beauty, functional abdominal strength goes deeper and is far more important than vanity. A strong core improves your posture and reduces the likelihood of lower back pain. It plays a stabilizing role in virtually every movement you do—from carrying the groceries or bending down to tie your shoes to throwing a ball or pulling a heavy lift. It is also the source of power generation in most athletic activities. We’re going to build a killer core with bodyweight exercise, in as little as 12-minutes per session. How? By training in 6 degrees of freedom. Training in 6-Degrees of Freedom What the heck does that mean? It’s a term we took from aviation, because it most accurately describes how your body moves through space. We don’t move robotically through one plane at a time. Human movement is a complex weave through different planes and on different axes. If we take the three axes of conventional movement descriptions, we can think about moving both along and around those axes in order to take advantage of our true movement potential.
• Heaving: moving up and down • Swaying: moving right and left • Surging: moving forward and backward • Pitching: bending forward and backward • Yawing: twisting right and left • Rolling: bending or tilting right and left The bottom line? Training in 6-Degrees of Freedom will kick your butt faster than any other method. Why does that matter? It means you’ll be finished training sooner. Training in 6-Degrees will also ensure that your body remains balanced. You won’t waste time dealing with overuse injuries, or overcompensations created by doing the same repetitive movements in the same planes day after day. That’s a brief primer on the theory. Let’s get to the program. Dr. Dean Goodman, a practicing chiropractor (website here), asked me: “I would like to share your core strength video with my patients….many of whom would be quite challenged simply by 15 seconds in plank. Do you have any standing core exercises to recommend?” I filmed a quick response for Dr. Goodman this morning. Beginner Core Strengthening Exercises In part 1 and part 2 of this series, I covered plank and rotation exercises. In this video, we are going to go over something a little more familiar – the more traditional ab exercise, the abdominal crunch. I’m going to teach you a more sophisticated version, because regular old crunches just don’t have the training effect I want. Regular crunches have a few qualities that I don’t like… 1) they create residual muscle tension, instead of relaxing the body The sophisticated ab crunches I will be teaching you eliminate all of the above concerns, and they teach you to integrate your breathing, structure, and movement. These exercises are far superior to the traditional ab crunch and reverse crunch. Core Strengthening Exercises – Sophisticated Crunches Last week, I posted the first video in our core strengthening exercises series. If you missed it, check it out here. Today’s core strengthening exercise video is all about training rotational movements. The first thing that may come to mind is the oblique and the serratus anterior muscles (the little finger-like muscles on the sides of your ribs) – but practicing rotation involves a host of muscle groups. Each exercise I teach in this video is full-body in nature, and that’s how I recommend you approach core strengthening exercises. Train all of the body, all the time. Here is a video with three different core strengthening exercises. Rotational Core Strengthening Exercises by John Sifferman Let me ask you something. Would you benefit from having some more core strength? I have received many questions over the years about what the best core strengthening exercises are. Most everyone is interested in the best ab exercises. This post starts the first of several video tutorials about core strengthening exercises – with some funky plank variations in this first kick-off video. I hope that each core strengthening exercise video teaches you some new ideas. Most importantly, I want you to apply what you learn and practice it so you can have the core strength of a champion. I’ll bet that if you apply the techniques that I am about to reveal to you, you will have a stronger core and better looking abs. You may need to drop some bodyfat to see them, but that’s another topic for another blog post. Core Strengthening Exercises – Planks by John Sifferman |
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CST 6 Degrees of Freedom