"Core" training is one of the stupidest gimmicks ever to become popular among runners

Keith Stone wrote:

You're getting bitch slapped like a sissy. Want to go for round 3 so I can butt fuck you too?

Your argument, which was weak and fallible in the first place, is completely undermined by your idiocy outlined above.

While we all understand that your homoerotic urges require an outlet, it would be appreciated if you saved that for your local bath house.

Thanks, Keith!

Keith Stone wrote:

800 dude wrote:

This is totally untrue. I don't understand why you would make such a bold assertion that's so easily falsifiable.

Gee, I guess since my Jr High coach said it, my high school coach said it, I watched stuttered 16MM films in high school about it, that the college coach said it, that I read it in training books, articles, heard it from Olympians, etc, I guess because some anonymous dufus on the internet pissed off that someone asked him to do some situps says it's untrue I should blow off something I've heard for 40 years.

Yea right.

Jesus. The fact that anyone would have to explain to you how ridiculous you sound is just ridiculous.

My dad told me the Tooth Fairy, Santa Claus, and the Easter Bunny were real too. And his dad before him. Thankfully, the good lord blessed us (well, some of us) with the ability to think and reason for ourselves, rather than just blindly accepting dogma that someone else propagated.

I hope Krampus gives you 40 lashings this December 5th.

"Suggests" is the key word. I would also suggest that those muscles contract ahead of limb movement in the non-core crowd as well.

You said very clearly that you can't point to them on an anatomical chart. It's right there on page 1, you can't deny it.

But your backtracking is moot anyhow, you're still wrong. Those 4 muscles have long been known to work in concert for both abdominal stability and breathing. As I mentioned before, which you make no attempt to deny, you obviously have never SPRINTED, or you would know these things at least implicitly, just as a weightlifter knows he gets extra power from a Valsalva maneuver without knowing why.

You would run taller with good posture and breeze lightly down the track like Rudisha or Cram. Instead you shuffle along in a half-crouch like Salazar, with your soft, round Jordan-Hasay abdomen protruding forward, and your skeletal arms flapping around ineffectively. Your strategy for success is to weigh 130 pounds so that your miserable excuse for fitness can still produce an 18 minute 5k. If you actually decided to be athletic and learn to run fast, you could probably run sub-15 - but you're more interested in excuses. You are the kind of runner coaches hate.

Spoken like a beginner doing bicep curls. Muscles work in groups. Shit, even gym trainers would hate you.

I bet you have never even run 400 meters in under 65 seconds.

As usual, Bad Wigins resorts to ad hominem attacks when he has nothing else of substance to offer.

So sad, yet so predictable.

Jerkstore, M.D. wrote:

Keith Stone wrote:

You're getting bitch slapped like a sissy. Want to go for round 3 so I can butt fuck you too?

Your argument, which was weak and fallible in the first place, is completely undermined by your idiocy outlined above.

While we all understand that your homoerotic urges require an outlet, it would be appreciated if you saved that for your local bath house.

Thanks, Keith!

POD!

Every kind of generalization is Always a mistake.

With the best Kenyan and Ethiopian Marathon runners, we use "some" exercise (which somebody can define "core exercises") twice per week, for the first 6 weeks after their Marathon, and after this NEVER we use something similar during the next 3 months of training.

Under this point of view, it's true Wilson Kipsang does exercises for his balance, but for example Geoffrey Mutai and many other top runners don't do.

For a runner, it's very much more important to find the way for having a correct "balance" while running.

This balance depends on the symmetry of the technical action, and many times athletes lose the symmetry for some disease provoked by some injury. So, more than looking at "generalized" core exercises, we need to look at "individual exercises" for rebuilding the same level of strength, flexibility, mobility in both the sides of the body.

We don't use specific core exercises with any top runner, but we try to fill the gap they have about their balance, that is the only think important in order to diminish the cost of running.

Renato,

There is a video on flotrack with a group of Kenyan runners, including Kiprop, doing a circuit training in November:

http://www.flotrack.org/coverage/240285-Workout-Wednesday-Season-6/video/517342-Team-BOSS-Baltic-with-Mr-Asbel-Kiprop-in-Iten-November-2011#.U2t0qIb4KEA

Is that the kind of training you only do at specific times of the year, or do you do such circuits more or less all year around?

Tired of idiots on here wrote:

coach comments nicely wrote:

A strong core stabilizes your torso, reducing unnecessary motion in the shoulders and hips. When you have to much rotation (e.g.

http://marklandclinic.com/wp-content/uploads/runner.jpg

) you are adding extra torque on your center of gravity, causing it to shift left and right which is highly inefficient.

Another load of 100% pure arbitrary made up bullshit.

1. As noted previously, there is no such thing as the "core," so you can't identify "its" function or quantify "its" strength level.

2. There is no evidence that exercise of any kind accomplishes any of the things you said (i.e. reduction of "unnecessary motion of the shoulders and hips," etc.).

3. Neither you nor anyone else can prove how much "motion of the shoulders and hips" is ideal, so neither can you say what constitutes excess.

You should watch a video of Ritz racing now versus Ritz's victory over Webb and Hall at Footlocker. The amount of core work he does with Salazar (Core: glutes, back, hips, abdominals) has stabilized his whole frame.

The OP is spot on! Somehow "core" training has worked it's way into the rehab area for any patient suffering from back or leg pain. 95% of the time just blindly or specifically trying to strengthen one's core does nothing or very little for patient's in pain. Just a gimmick that should pass soon. If you want to be a better runner then you need to spend more time running and not worrying about co-contracting your transverse abdominus and multifidus.

I'm a PT wrote:

Somehow "core" training has worked it's way into the rehab area for any patient suffering from back or leg pain.

Yeah, because your stomach muscles totally don't support your back at all.

Bad Wigins wrote:

Instead you shuffle along in a half-crouch like Salazar

Salazar had the next best running economy that Jack Daniels had seen during decades of testing elite runners. So what's your point?

you guys are killing me wrote:

I'm a PT wrote:

Somehow "core" training has worked it's way into the rehab area for any patient suffering from back or leg pain.

Yeah, because your stomach muscles totally don't support your back at all.

Core training often CAUSES back pain.

As someone who has an exceptionally strong core AND severe back pain, I can assure you that there is no magic formula for it curing said pain.

you guys are killing me wrote:

Yeah, because your stomach muscles totally don't support your back at all.

The stomach is an internal organ, not muscle. You are clearly one of the things I'm tired if in here.

This is one of the smartest posts I've seen on LR. Core is right up there with plyo, minimalism, chocolate milk, form training and other pseudo-scientific corporate nonsense. Variance in running performance is explained by DNA plus running a lot.

I'm a PT wrote:

The OP is spot on! Somehow "core" training has worked it's way into the rehab area for any patient suffering from back or leg pain. 95% of the time just blindly or specifically trying to strengthen one's core does nothing or very little for patient's in pain. Just a gimmick that should pass soon. If you want to be a better runner then you need to spend more time running and not worrying about co-contracting your transverse abdominus and multifidus.

Run more AND do "core" exercises. You can even do planks while watching TV if it is so impossible for you to stay away from "america´s funniest home videos".

I never said doing core exercises is necessarily a bad thing. However, I have made two observations over the 10 or so years-

1) Strengthening the core of patients struggling with low back pain does not make a significant change in patient's pain levels. I have had numerous patients that have very strong cores come in but have been dealing with chronic low back pain. The "stable spine" theory/model is old/outdated and needs to be changed. Movement is the medicine!

2) Strengthening your core will not make a significant improvement in your running efficiency or economy. Maybe on a very small scale but that would be very hard to measure. I became a better runner when I decided to devote more of my time to running. Think of most crossfitters.

I guess we will just disagree on this topic. If you would like to do planks and crunches while watching TV then...you will become very good at doing planks and crunches.

You've restored a tiny amount of my lost faith in PTs. Thanks.

If you want to get a strong core, do more high intensity interval work and compound lifts. If you want lower back pain and a hernia, which I've seen 3 different guys get (probably from planks), do a lot of "core" work right after you run.

Here's my view: if running requires a strong core, then running should develop a strong core. If you're able to do incredibly intense running without also developing a strong core, then running probably doesn't require a strong core.