core training

I recently read an article in Mens Health Magazine that talked about core training. It said that Ab training is easy; core training is hard. Core training works your abdominal muscles along with your lower back and draws in your glutes, hamstrings, and everything in between while an exercise like the crunch works a tiny amount of muscles through minuscule range of motion. Even your lats are involved; the connective tissue at the bottom of your lats play a crucial role in stabilizing your spine and helping transfer force between the muscles in your upper and lower body when you row, climb, or pull. Core training isn't the answer to every fitness question. When researchers try to correlate core stability with athletic performance, the results are underwhelming. Burt good strength coaches include core training in their programs anyway; they know it's important for back injury prevention, if nothing else. Stability of your lower back depends on the endurance of the supporting muscles. Spinal instability leads to injury. Injury can be a career killer for an athlete, and just plain deadly for an older adult.

So now you may ask the question: what can I do to train my core?
Here is one example I found: Assume a push-up position, with your arms straight. Lift your right arm and left leg simultaneously, and hold that position. Concentrate on keeping your body still-- don't let your hops drop or your torso rotate. Keep holding. A little longer. Wait.. okay, you lost it. No problem. Just repeat by lifting your left arm and right leg. And hold that. If you do this exercise, unless you're a recreational acrobat, you're probably going to be sweating and shaking. If you train like that for 10 minutes each time you go to the gym, it will be hard not to get lean.