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The Importance of Good Core Strength. While some people may look like they are stacked with lean muscle, this does not mean they necessarily have good core muscle strength. The truth is that poor core strength affects people of all body types and fitness levels and can lead to various pains, injuries and other health concerns.
The good news is that you can achieve optimal core strength with little to no equipment at all. Still, some basic pieces of core strengthening equipment can help you take your core workouts to the next level.
So what does it mean to have “good core strength”, what are the benefits, what can we do to improve it, and what equipment can help us achieve results faster? Read on to learn more.
The Importance of Good Core Strength What is Core Strength?
The core muscles protect and support the central armature of your body, giving you balance, as well as supporting and stabilizing your body as you go about your day.
The various muscle groups that make up your core encompass multiple core areas of your body, including:
- The spine
- Upper, mid and lower back
- Chest
- Abdominals (stomach muscles)
- Torso and hips
These muscles are essential for the everyday activities everyone performs, such as:
- Walking and running
- Stopping
- Turning
- Lifting
- Getting up from a prone or seated position
- Squatting, bending and more
Without a core muscle system, our bones and wider muscle groups would be useless, which is why it is so important to keep a good core condition throughout your life.
Having weak core muscles is like having a bad foundation on a building; although everything built on top of the foundation is solid if the support network that your health is built upon is weak, you are heading for trouble down the road.
Over time, bad core strength can result in potentially deteriorative or severe health conditions, such as:
- Poor posture
- Chronic back pain
- Reduced balance
- Lifting injuries
- Impeded organ function
- Reduced range of movement and more
While our exercise intensity levels are sure to change over our lifetime, keeping good core strength throughout your life can yield many benefits to your health and even affect the rate at which your body ages and deteriorates.
The Benefits of Good Core Strength
While we briefly mentioned the functions of your core muscle groups, that does not explain what the many benefits of an active and developed core can offer.
Balance and stability
When we are younger, we tend to be more active. However, as we age, we tend to lose core strength unless we focus on maintaining it.
The World Health Organisation estimates that over 35-million people suffer falls severe enough to require medical attention per year, with over 684-thousand of those individuals dying from the fall.
This makes fall injuries the second leading cause of unintentional death worldwide, with adults aged 60 years and older suffering the majority of fatal falls.
By making core strength exercises a priority in your healthcare regime, you increase and maintain your sense of balance, physical stability, and fine motor skills, significantly reducing your chances of suffering an accidental fall.
Improved Posture
Today’s sedentary lifestyle and poor posture habits from smartphones and long hours sitting at computers and workstations are causing major health concerns worldwide.
If you are not in a sedentary office job, you may be performing heavy lifting tasks, like trade work and other manual labor jobs, which puts a lot of pressure on your body over the years.
Some of the possible adverse health impacts of bad posture from poor core strength and a sedentary lifestyle include, but are not limited to:
- Bulging discs
- Chronic back pain
- Rounded shoulders
- ‘Potbelly’
- Chronic aches and pains
- Impacts on organ function and health
- Shallow breathing
- Muscle fatigue
- Headaches and more
As you can see, having a good core strength has little to do with physical aesthetics.
When core exercises are done with good form, you are training your core muscle groups to support your spine and posture for the benefit of your entire physical system.
There is also a wide range of other potential benefits from regularly working on your core muscle groups, including:
- More defined abs
- Slimmer waistline
- Taller stance
- Increases agility
- Less physical pain
- Better sleep and more
Now we know why core strength is so essential to the general support and protection of our health; what are the best ways to build a strong core? Read on to find out.
What are the best core strength exercises?
While there are an exhaustive amount of primary and progressive core strength exercises online, there are a few that anyone can do without needing bulky or expensive equipment.
Some of the best primary exercises you can regularly perform for a strong core include, but are not limited to:
- Planks and plank variations
- Bridges and bridge progressions
- Supermans
- Leg lifts
- Hanging knee and leg raises
- Pushups
- Plank shoulder taps
- Crunches, situps and variations
- Russian twists and more
There is also some simple, easy to afford equipment you can use to take your core exercises up a notch, and most of them can fit into a cupboard, drawer or gym bag.
Some of these pieces of core strengthening equipment can include:
- Ab wheel rollers
- Balance boards
- Inflatable balance trainers
- Chin up bars
- Rocker boards
- Core floor slider discs and more
Would you like to see faster results by incorporating some of these essential pieces of equipment into your core exercises routine?
Why not check out some of the gear at ProsourceFit today? They keep an extensive range of quality, affordable core exercise tools for all fitness levels.
The team here at My Gear Expert care about your health and wellbeing, which is why we love to present you with helpful fitness articles, like the importance of good core strength.
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