Dr. Andy Galpin

This is a side bend, right?

This is you reaching from one side to the other where one oblique gets stretched and one oblique gets crunched.

Both flexion, but now we have more anterior flexion.

And then now you have lateral flexion.

You also then have extension.

This is the opposite of flexion.

Kind of a bit wordy here, but it's going backwards, right?

This is, instead of bringing your chest closer to your knees, it's doing the opposite and bringing your back closer to your hamstrings, the extension portion.

And then you have rotation, of course, moving side to side.

But around 25 years or so ago, people like, but not exclusively, Dr. Stu McGill and plenty of others were instrumental in saying, hey, look,

we're approaching this movement stuff incorrectly.

Because remember, prior to that, ab training was sit-ups and crunches for Arnold and his friends, and then maybe our Jane Fondas.

But what they started saying is really, the main driving function of our core musculature is not movement, it's stability.

And so like our biceps and our triceps are there to move our elbow, to flex and extend our elbow.

That's their primary job and most of our muscles.

The core is a little bit unique because it is not meant to be a large flexor.

There's not a lot of human movement that requires you to bring your rib cage to your thighs.

It's mainly there to make you stable.

And so the easy analogy, I know some people hate it, but I actually think it works really well.

If you were to take your hand and place it flat on a table, and I want you to keep your hand and spread your fingers as wide as you can.