![]() Of course, the dragon flag is something you'd do after you have the strength to basically do everything in that list and still need more because it is riskier than most, but unlike a crunch, can have great benefit if you do it with great form because you're training extreme core stability with the spine in its strongest position (assuming you can hold it there perfectly). That's very different than a crunch where the intent is to compress and bend the spine over and over. If I'm looking at the same exercise as you are, if you do them correctly there should be pretty much no bending of the low back through the whole movement, it's almost like a moving plank. I liken them to picking up nickels when there are silver dollars on the ground. Isolation, unbalanced, little core stability, encouraging kyphotic posture.ģ) Alternatives: Exercises with better reward/risk ratio: planks, rkc planks, side planks, landmines, pallof presses, any unilateral push/pull exercise, ball rollouts, trx rollouts, ab wheel (hands or feel on wheel), bodysaws, 2/3 point planks, L-sits, renegade rows, chops, lifts.Įven if crunches aren't "as bad as they are made out to be", with a list like this I literally see no reason to do them. It's probably been slightly overstated in the backlash against crunches but it's definitely there and well studied and the severity of a back injury is high compared to most other injuries.Ģ) Reward: Even if you remove point 5 about the disc herniation risk, points 1-4 make a pretty crappy case for the reward side of the equation. ![]() ![]() To properly evaluate an exercise you have to ask 1) what's the risk 2) what's the reward and 3) are there alternatives with less risk / more rewardġ) Risk: Yea, there's the risk to your spinal discs. Would you be eager to add these to your routine? Then I walk up to you in the gym and tell you I have an exercise for you that:ġ) only works one side of your core instead of all around, 2) is performed by repeatedly flexing your spine under high compression 3) gives a tiny fraction of the spinal stability benefits your planks are giving you (or even worsens it) 4) could worsen or create a kyphotic (rounded) back posture, and 5) on top of all that might just increase your long term risk of disc herniation and 6) literally mimics the procedure they use in biomechanics labs to create and study disc herniations. Let's suppose you did only planks for your core workout. See the Related Subreddits section for other popular fitness-related subreddits.General Posting Guidelines (click for more info): No Questions Related to Injury, Pain, or Any Medical Topic Progress Posts Must Be Detailed and Useful Posts Must Be Specific to Physical Fitness and Promote Useful Discussion ![]() No Threads That Are Answered by the Wiki, Searching Threads, or Google Welcome to r/Fitness! Click Here for a one-stop shop of our most important resources. ![]()
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