Today's guest post comes from Josh Henkin. After Dan Swinscoe's guest post earlier in the week, it seemed like a good follow-up to have Josh speak to the more general principles of stability training.
And, as a friendly reminder, you can get 10% off both sandbag products and educational resources folks at Ultimate Sandbag Training through tomorrow (Sunday) at midnight. Just head HERE and enter the coupon code cressey10.
Enjoy! - EC
Teaching is something that is my passion; it is in my blood, as almost everyone is my family has been a teacher of some sort. Having the wonderful fortune of being able to teach continuing education programs for over a decade, I’ve loved helping professionals find solutions to problems. How do I know what the problems are? Being a coach for 25 years, owning my own gym for a decade, and working with diverse populations has taught me that our true job as a strength coach, fitness professional, or clinician is to be a solution to problems.
Even though we may be looking at solutions to different issues, there tend to be concepts that are key for a wide variety of goals. In order to accomplish our goals in helping people,
we look at the what gives us the “biggest bang for the buck.” Stability training is something that can deliver on that front. In this article, I address stability training methods because they are sorely misunderstood and often lead us to performing exercises we THINK are based around acquiring better stability in a given situation, but we are often missing the goal.
What Is Stability Training?
We could have a LONG dissertation discussing stability training, but I want to focus on some key concepts, how they impact our programming, and the exercises we select. Stability can be something we look at in regard to isolated joints or the whole body. For the sake of this post, we are referencing more of whole body stability.
When you say the words “stability training,” most of us think of exercises that make us wobble or shake a lot. Sadly, that isn’t stability training. In order to address stability, we need a much better understanding of what we are trying to achieve.
Go on the internet and look up stability training or even most textbooks, and you’ll get a wide array of definitions. Probably the best and most simple can be thought of as “allowing wanted movement while resisting unwanted movement.” That seems really simple, but it has been said by some of the best coaches in the industry. If you find that too vague for your liking (don’t overlook simplicity in delivering great concepts), I tend to really like what performance expert, Dr. Brandon Marcello says: “Stability is about timing and sequential activation of muscles.” (1)
Hmm, what is Dr. Marcello referring to in such a statement? Motor control is probably the concept with which many professionals are least familiar. If we look at much of the research on causes of injuries, we tend to see a common theme of a muscle isn’t working at the right time. This flies in the face of the fact that we think if we just make a singular muscle strong it will fix all the problems in movement. Just looking back at all the focus we placed in training the Transverse Abdominis (TVA) is a great example.
While most thought the result of all the studies on the TVA meant we had to isolate and strengthen the TVA, they ignored the points the researchers were making. In a 2017 study by Selkow et. al, they concluded, “TrA activation and timing were altered following a four-week core stability program in people with and without LBP” (2). See the key word of timing, not strength?
What does this really mean for most creating fitness and strength training programs? Our energy in developing stability should be focused upon foundational movement patterns and how we progress them. Dr. Marcello’s makes the complex digestible by defining stability training around three important concepts…
-Feedforward (this is more reactive)
-Static
-Dynamic
With these three concepts there is also one more caveat: they should be multi-planar. Most people are unaware of these ideas when they are creating their stability drills, especially when it comes to being more multi-planar. While I would love to address these all in detail, I’d rather bring some of these concepts to life with a special emphasis on how we go from building a pattern to making it more multi-planar.
Movement Patterns and Planes of Motion
When I created our Dynamic Variable Resistance Training system (DVRT), it was thinking about how we address training movement and not so focused upon specific exercises or muscles. In order to do so, we have to offer concepts that get us all on the same page and speaking the same language. There are three ideas we need to better understand so we can have our training come to life!
Most roll their eyes when you say “functional training,” but it is an actual method that sadly has been hijacked by clever marketing. Spine expert Dr. Stuart McGill sums it up best, “functional training incorporates the goal of enhancing strength throughout the body segment linkage” (3).
That sounds great, but what is Dr. McGill referring to when he says “linkage?” If you have heard about fascial lines, I believe that is a great way to help us better understand that we have specific chains that coordinate the use of different muscles for ways to help us achieve stability so we can demonstrate strength.
If you aren’t familiar with fascial lines, how can we make these concepts meaningful and provide the “Cliff’s Notes” on these concepts? I like to sum it up with these ideas as the following;
1. Hands/Feet: Half of our bones are in our hands and feet, and that is very significant. The contact we have with our environment usually comes from our hands and feet, so coaching them has a huge impact in making these important connections in the body. Renowned physical therapist, Gray Cook says it best!
“If the feet are sloppy and the grip is off, not only will the person not activate the right muscles, but he or she is not even up taking the right sensory information. Let me say that again. If there are any mobility or stability compromises between the foot and the brain, it’s like standing on two garden hoses wondering where all the water is. The information pathway is broken two ways… up and down.”
How does it apply to our training? When I created the Ultimate Sandbag, it was in an effort to create a tool specifically made to address movement, not create a tool and then try to invent a purpose. Simple concepts make our training so much better and teach our clients how to move better instantly! Pretty cool if we can use load as a teaching tool and to provide feedback, not just stress the system.
Examples: Press Out Squats, Arc Press, and Bird Dog Drags
2. Lat/Core/Glutes: While the concepts of fascial lines can make for an entire post, I like to introduce complex subjects with easy to grasp ideas. One of the best examples is the connection of our lat/trunk/ and opposing gluteals to create what is known as the Posterior Oblique Sling (POS). We use this system all the time to create stability for the spine as we perform complex locomotive motion. If you look at an anatomy chart, you can see the fibers of the right lat go right into our thoracolumbar fascia, and travel into the opposing gluteals.
This is why before you do a deadlift, you should try to “break the bar.” With this concept, we have an improved understanding how to develop better exercises and re-think maybe familiar ones. Change is never easy, but appreciating the science should help. This is especially true when we think how the glutes help create stability in what is known as “force closure” of the SI joint.
“Force closure is the term used to describe the other forces acting across the joint to create stability. This force is generated by structures with a fibre direction perpendicular to the sacroiliac joint and is adjustable according to the loading situation. Muscles, ligaments and the thoracolumbar facia all contribute to force closure. Force closure is particularly important during activities such as walking when unilateral loading of the legs creates shear forces.
Force closure creates greater friction and therefore increased form closure and what is called “self-bracing” or “self-locking” of the joint. According to Willard et al. force closure reduces the joint’s ‘neutral zone’ thereby facilitating stabilization.”
Examples: Lift/Chop Hip March, Front Loaded Good Mornings, Deadlift Matrix
3. Progressing Planes of Motion: While we know planes of motion are relevant to what we do in any exercise or real life/sporting movement, we don’t have good systems of actually progressing these concepts. The sagittal plane is not a “bad guy;” it is the most stable plane (why so many like lifting in it) and should be our foundation to teach foundational movement patterns. However, where do we go from there?
In DVRT, we move to focusing on moving through the sagittal plane while resisting the frontal and transverse plane. Then, moving into the frontal plane, and eventually the transverse plane. There are many steps in between, but the highest level in our system is moving one segment of the body in one plane of motion while resisting at another segment. This concept can be applied to any of our seven movment patterns (squat, hip hinge, push, pull, lunge, rotate, and gait) in what we call our MAX (multiple axis) drills. The overall point is that we should think about planes of motion as a training variable with the same value and need of progression as load, volume, etc.
Examples: MAX Lunge, MAX Front Loaded Rear Step Good Morning, Front Loaded Rotations
This is probably a lot of information and a very different way for people to think. Even though questioning what we are doing is difficult, I think of the famous Maya Angelou quote, “Do the best you can, until you know better. Then, when you know better, do better.” Our profession is a rather young one, especially in regard to strength and conditioning and fitness. Evolving and growing only allows us to create better solutions for the people that come to us for help. We have to be open to growing if we are going to make the impact we all desire and that is at the heart of all our goals!
Note from EC: Don’t forget about the great discount in place on sandbags and the associated educational resources at Ultimate Sandbag Training through Sunday at midnight. You can get 10% off by heading HERE and enter the coupon code cressey10.
About the Author
Josh Henkin, CSCS has been in the fitness and performance industry for 25 years. He has been highly sought after for his functional training concepts and DVRT system which has seen him teach in over 13 countries worldwide. Josh has also served as a consultant for the U.S. Marines HITT program, U.S. Army Special Forces Recruiting Battalion, as well as numerous Fire & Police Departments as well as Division 1 programs and Rehabilitation Clinics around the country. You can follow him on Instagram at @UltimateSandbag.
References:
1. The Why’s, What’s, How’s and When’s of Stability Training, “Power & Resiliency Summit”, October 19, 2019, Results Fitness, Newhall, CA.
2. Selkow, Noelle M et al. “Transversus abdominis Activatioin And Timing Improves Following Core Stability Training: A Randomized Trial. “International Journal of Sports Physical Therapy. Volume 12, 7 (2017): 1048-1056.
3. McGill, Stuart, Ultimate Back Fitness and Performance. Waterloo, ON: Wabuno Publishers; 2004 ISBN 0-9735018-0-4. 329p., illustrated Can
4. https://www.otpbooks.com/gray-cook-expanding-on-the-joint-by-joint-approach-part-2-of-3/
5. https://www.physio-pedia.com/Sacroiliac_Joint_Force_and_Form_Closure
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All the way back in 2011, I wrote up a detailed article about the New Balance Minimus, a shoe that had just been released and really caught my attention as the best option in a sea of minimalist sneakers that had flooded the market. That review - alongside my work with professional baseball players - actually led to a consulting deal with New Balance, and it's been a great partnership for the past nine years.
One of the biggest initiatives as part of that collaborative relationship was to find ways to continually improve the Minimus. Over the years, Cressey Sports Performance's staff and athletes have provided regular feedback to New Balance to fine-tune the designs. Those collaborations led to the release of the limited edition Minimus 20v6 Cressey Trainer in 2017. It sold out in a matter of days - and we've had people asked for a new CSP Minimus every day for years.
Well, we're happy to announce that we've come through for you. The Minimus Prevail CSP is now available for sale:
This is a very limited edition shoe; only about 1,000 pairs were produced. With that in mind, if you'd like to pick up a pair, don't delay! You can check them out at the following links:
Physical Preparation Podcast with Radley Haddad - Radley Haddad is the Major League Coaching Assistant and Bullpen Catcher for the New York Yankees, and a retired CSP athlete who also trained with Mike at IFAST. I especially liked his insights on the transition from playing to coaching, and the importance of using data not just to help athletes learn how they can better, but verify why they performed successfully.
Top Tweet of the Week
There are huge differences among what athletes need to do, want to do, and are willing to do. Good luck finding a coaching textbook that can walk you through these important differentiations. Time in the trenches to establish relationships and read personalities is imperative.
I just wanted to give you a heads-up on one-day seminar with me in Kansas City Saturday, August 22, 2020. Important note: this is a reschedule of the event that was originally planned for April 18.
We’ll be spending the day geeking out on shoulders, as the event will cover Shoulder Assessment, Corrective Exercise, and Programming. The event will be geared toward personal trainers, strength and conditioning professionals, rehabilitation specialists, and fitness enthusiasts alike.
Agenda
9:00AM-9:30AM – Inefficiency vs. Pathology (Lecture)
9:30AM-10:15AM – Understanding Common Shoulder Injuries and Conditions (Lecture)
10:15AM-10:30AM – Break
10:30AM-12:30PM – Upper Extremity Assessment (Lab)
12:30PM-1:30PM – Lunch
1:30PM-3:30PM – Upper Extremity Mobility/Activation/Strength Drills (Lab)
3:30PM-3:45PM – Break
3:45PM-4:45PM – Upper Extremity Strength and Conditioning Programming: What Really Is Appropriate? (Lecture)
4:45PM-5:00PM – Q&A to Wrap Up
Location
Elite Sports Mall
2115 East Kansas City Road
Olathe, KS
Continuing Education Credits
This event has been approved for 0.7 CEUs (7 contact hours) through the National Strength and Conditioning Association.
Cost: $149.99 Early Bird (through July 22), $199 Regular (after July 22)
Note: we'll be capping the number of participants to ensure that there is a lot of presenter/attendee interaction - particularly during the hands-on workshop portion - so be sure to register early, as previous offerings of this evan have sold out well in advance of the early-bird registration deadline.
When and How Static Stretching Can Actually Work - Dean Somerset kicked off 2020 with an outstanding post that highlights just how challenging it can be to get static stretching to work for you. Hint: set aside a loooooooong time.
Power Moves - I just finished up this quick audiobook by Adam Grant, and it was outstanding. I'd highly recommend it regardless of the industry in which you work. It's only available as a listen, and I actually think it's better in this medium than as a book.
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The best load management strategy is to actually load in the offseason so that you aren't a delicate little flower by midseason. I'm not saying there's no merit to strategic rest; rather, there are a lot of athletes who are fundamentally unprepared for the stress they encounter.
I've already highlighted the top articles and videos I put out at EricCressey.com in 2019, so now it's time for the top guest posts of the year. Here goes…
1. The Biggest Mistake in Program Design - Kevin Neeld, Head Performance Coach for the Boston Bruins, reminds us to make sure that our programs evolve as our knowledge and experience in the field accumulate.
2. 5 Non-Traditional Exercises for Catchers - CSP-Florida Director of Performance Tim Geromini works with all our catchers in Florida, and he's devised some creative ways to help them feel, move, and play better. This article includes a few of them.
3. 10 Reasons We Use Wall Slides - Wall slide variations are a mainstay in all of our upper body training and rehabilitation programs. Eric Schoenberg, who serves as the physical therapist at our Palm Beach Gardens, FL location, shares why that's the case.
4. 5 Great Kettlebell Exercises for Baseball Players - Dan Swinscoe is a great physical therapist in the Seattle area, and in this article, he shares some of the KB variations he likes to use with his baseball players.
With my last post, I kicked off the "Best of 2019" series with my top articles of the year. Today, we'll highlight the top five videos of the year.
1. Glute-Ham Raise with Banded Reach
If you've followed this blog for any length of time, you'll know that I'm a big fan of training the posterior chain and also working on getting serratus anterior firing to improve scapular upward rotation. So, you can imagine how excited I am to present to you a video that hits both. Mets pitcher Noah Syndergaard offered a great demo:
The subscapularis is the largest of the four rotator cuff muscles, but it might also be the most misunderstood. This excerpt from my Sturdy Shoulder Solutions resource will bring you up to speed on it.
3. 1-leg Dumbbell Pullover - The 1-leg dumbbell pullover is a nice variation on a classic. It’ll add a rotary stability challenge to what is normally considered an upper body and anterior core drill. I’m using this variation a bit more in the late offseason (with throwing volume and intensity ramping up), as you can get a good training effect with less external loading.
4. Half-kneeling Cable Lift with Flexion-Rotation Hold
The half-kneeling cable lift w/flexion-rotation hold is a new variation on an old drill, and we've been implementing it quite a bit with athletes this year. It's a creation of CSP-FL co-founder and pitching coordinator Brian Kaplan.
5. Landmine Squat to 1-arm Press
It's not secret that I love landmine presses, and this is a great progression. This drill fits well as a first exercise on a full body day and pairs well with horizontal or vertical pulling. I really like it late in the offseason when we’re trying to keep sessions a bit shorter and get extra bang for our training buck. I’d do sets of 3-5 reps per side.
I'll be back soon with the top guest posts of 2019!
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With 2019 winding down, I'm using this last week of the year to direct you to some of the most popular content of the past 12 months at EricCressey.com, as this "series" has been quite popular over the past few years. Today, we start with the most popular articles of the year; these are the pieces that received the most traffic, according to my hosting statistics.
1. The Most Important Coaching Responsibility- Coaches are some of the most important influences in young athletes' lives on a number of fronts. In this post, I focused on what I believe to be the single most important responsibility of a coach.
4. Mid-Week Movement Miscellany - This was a collection of random thoughts on movement that unexpectedly proved to be a big hit.I might have to turn it into a regular series.
We skipped a week of recommended reading/listening, but the good news is that it gave me some time to stockpile some good stuff for you!
Trusting the New Coach: A Challenging Conversation with Clients - This might be my favorite article my business partner, Pete Dupuis, has ever written. That's because it's one of the biggest challenges our business has faced over the past 12 years, and he's navigated it masterfully. If you own or manage a training facility, this is a must-read.
Adam Grant: The Man Who Does Everything - This was an outstanding podcast from Tim Ferriss with Adam Grant on the topic of time management. Regardless of your industry, you'll take away some great nuggets.
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In coaching, simplicity and efficiency win. If you come up with a drill that requires two bands, a connection ball, three weighted balls, seven blue M&Ms, a tire iron, and a half gallon of snake oil, your drill isn’t any good for anything other than social media entertainment.
Every year at this time, as a way to celebrate entrepreneurs fighting the good fight in a retail world of corporate giants, "Small Business Saturday" is sandwiched right between Black Friday and Cyber Monday. I love the concept, as I've been around small businesses my entire life. My father owned one, my in-laws had one, my brother owns one, my wife owns one, and I'm part of three separate LLCs myself.
I've always been fascinated by looking at what differentiates the ones that thrive from the ones that don't. This chart from the US Bureau of Labor Statistics is pretty sobering.
Having co-owned gyms for over 14 years now, I'm particularly intrigued about what makes small businesses successful in the fitness industry. Here are a few quick observations on fitness businesses that have "made it."
1. They prioritized systems early.
A lot of people get in to the gym business because they enjoy working out and think it'd be fun to run a fitness facility. The problem is that when you're just exercising, you fail to see all the behind the scenes that takes place to keep the trains running on time. The best businesses I've seen set up sustainable systems early so that they can handle growth without having to overhaul their operations.
2. They have a strong owner presence, especially early on.
I know the owner of a restaurant that opened in our town about nine months ago. It's a spot where we'll pick up a healthy dinner to go for the family about once a week, and I ate takeout from there pretty much non-stop when our daughter was born in March. Every time I've gone in - regardless of time of day - he's behind the counter. He interacts with customers, mentors employees, keeps an eye on the cleanliness of the place. It's a huge time investment, but it's the right thing to do to ensure quality control early on, and that systems and expectations of acceptable are established early on.
For some reason, the opposite of this commonly happens in the fitness industry. Many gym start-up owners think fitness businesses are far more "turn key" than they really are, so they take a lot more time away from the operation sooner in its existence. I know it was well over two years in business before my business partner, Pete, and I were both away from Cressey Sports Performance on the same day.
This number might be a bit extreme, but this statement isn't: a strong owner presence drives success on many fronts in any business, but particularly the fitness industry.
3. They compete on offering, not price.
Ask any mom-and-pop pharmacy that got crushed by Walmart in the past few decades how competing on price has worked out, and you'll understand where this is going. Just remember that in many small communities with five different bootcamp-style workout options, competing on price is the quickest way to the bottom. You're always better off differentiating yourself based on offering.
4. They drive business via marketable, differentiated skills - not just passion.
I've written extensively (here and here) on why I don't think passion for fitness alone is a good reason for starting a gym. The most successful fitness businesses out there have other things they do really well; passion just helps to deliver these benefits more consistently and with a better culture. Over the long term, it's hard to "out-passion" a terrible business model or poor training, though.
5. How they do one thing is how they do everything.
Any time I go into a new gym to train while I'm traveling, I take note of whether the person at the front desk (if there even is one), asks me to sign a waiver and health history. To me, it's kind of like a tripwire that alerts me to whether or not they have attention to detail in everything from equipment maintenance, to cleanliness, to staff education. If you're totally cool with overlooking something that important, you're probably missing a lot of other "big rocks."
6. They're authentic.
The staff at CSP and Mark Fisher Fitness have a host of awesome, decade-long friendships even though our client demographics are nothing alike: baseball players and Broadway performers, respectively. MFF's staff does a phenomenal job engaging their clients with crazy outfits, risqué jokes, and bright facility color schemes. These initiatives perform incredibly well for them, but would fail miserably for us with our baseball guys. Conversely, their clients aren't going to nerd out about fastball spin axis, scapular upward rotation, and positional breathing the way our baseball clients do. Both businesses are authentic to what they do well, but that doesn't mean our models are universally applicable across the industry.
7. They're consistent.
Our landlord once said, "Your clients hire and fire you every day." It's a phrase that's really stuck with me. The best fitness businesses I've seen are the ones that don't have lulls in the client experience, facility look, or quality of training even though over time, all these things tend to "slide" if you let them. Back in the fall of 2019, I had my first sick day in 12 years of business, and it made me realize that it had less to do with an impressive immunity strategy, and more to do with the fact that I never want to miss an opportunity for us to get better. The attendance might be excessive, but the lesson can't possibly be overstated.
In wrapping up, I should mention that this small business is having some sales this weekend. Head HERE to learn more about our ongoing 25% off sale on many of my products; it wraps up Monday at midnight. Thanks for your support!
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