Core Strength: A Lesson from the Live Oak

There are plenty of 300 year old sprawling Live Oak trees in south Louisiana. Their powerful lessons fell on deaf ears until recently. You see, coaching isn’t simple. There are many axioms to trust and the art of coaching is to relay the right message at the right time to the right athlete. To aid in this endeavor there are three points to help relay those messages. Tell them what to do, how to do it, and most importantly in order to build conviction, why it is important to do it that way. You see, individual effort is the key to success and without full conviction, overall effort will suffer.

Then the question: “Coach, why do we work so hard on developing core strength?” This Live Oak tree helped me explain. Technically, you must have proximal stability to achieve distal mobility. Not being much on technical terms…the strength of your trunk determines the amount of power transferred from your roots to your branches. Suddenly the proverbial light bulbs popped on all over the weight room. The message was clear - the stronger your core, the more explosive your power. Now that everyone was on board with why we devote so much energy to core strength, the most important two questions became what do we do? How do we do it?

Now we can get some work done. Core stability comes from developing the muscles of the abdominals, the low back, and the hips. That is the link between our upper and lower extremities. Our power transfer is reliant on how well this core works. A steel bar will turn a boulder, but if I take the exact same force and apply it to a rubber bar the boulder doesn’t move, the bar bends and the force dissipates through the middle. If your core gives and bends, your force dissipates and performance suffers.

In addition to multiple variations of sit-ups, leg raises, and twists, develop your core by mastering this one exercise: I present to you, the overhead squat.

Coaching Points

• Use a light training bar or broom stick to learn the lift.
• Stand with your heels shoulder width apart and your feet angled outward.
• Grip the bar with hands wide apart so that when the bar is over your head there are about six inches between bar and head.
• Lock out your elbows, get bone on bone support.
• Squeeze your scapulae together and hold them tight by flexing your traps and shoulders.
• Engage the lift by first moving your hips back and then squatting down.
• Keep your weight over your heels.
• Squat as low as your hip flexibility will allow, we will eventually be squatting far below parallel.
• Push back up by applying as much force to the ground as you can, pushing through your heels.

Do not be deterred.
This is a completely natural human movement, but one that is rarely practiced. You may be challenged by flexibility, range of motion, balance, strength, or any combination. Comfort comes through repetition and the benefits of your efforts will far outweigh your struggles. Your hips will open and strengthen reducing your risk of injury and increasing athletic performance. You will enjoy strength through the entire range of hip motion. It is a total body workout and great for weight loss. It also addresses weakness in the core and the shoulder region. Remember, range before load, as you progress and you are able to perform 10 full range overhead squats with your stick, then you can load the bar with weight.