Preventive Care for Your Back, Core, Hamstrings, and More
This article was originally contributed by Kimber Rozier. Kimber is a certified personal trainer with the National Academy of Sports Medicine, holds a Bachelor's degree in Exercise and Sport Science from UNC, and is a professional athlete competing with the USA women's national rugby team.
Preventive care. We’ve heard dozens of times how proactively taking care of our bodies really is the answer to good health.
But what happens when you’re already in pain and have been for longer than you can remember? It’s too late for preventive care because you already have a problem and need it fixed yesterday, right?
Wrong.
As an exercise professional, the most common lie I hear people tell themselves is, “It’s too late to start” or “I’ve dug myself into a hole too deep to get out of.”
Thinking this way is completely understandable when you've been living with pain for years. You might not even know how your pain started, much less how to fix it.
Well, it’s never too late to learn how to prevent pain and even fix the pain you already have with "preventive" care. Now is as good a time as any to learn to properly engage your core and move like you were meant to: without pain.
The area commonly called your “core” is composed of numerous muscles, includes most anything that isn't an arm or a leg, and is a lot more than just your would-be "six-pack" abs. (And remember what Sara explains in this article about crunches? Those six-pack abs do nothing to help prevent back pain!)
So, what are these muscles I’m speaking of?
But what happens when you’re already in pain and have been for longer than you can remember? It’s too late for preventive care because you already have a problem and need it fixed yesterday, right?
Wrong.
As an exercise professional, the most common lie I hear people tell themselves is, “It’s too late to start” or “I’ve dug myself into a hole too deep to get out of.”
Thinking this way is completely understandable when you've been living with pain for years. You might not even know how your pain started, much less how to fix it.
Well, it’s never too late to learn how to prevent pain and even fix the pain you already have with "preventive" care. Now is as good a time as any to learn to properly engage your core and move like you were meant to: without pain.
The area commonly called your “core” is composed of numerous muscles, includes most anything that isn't an arm or a leg, and is a lot more than just your would-be "six-pack" abs. (And remember what Sara explains in this article about crunches? Those six-pack abs do nothing to help prevent back pain!)
So, what are these muscles I’m speaking of?
Illustration from Gray's Anatomy textbook, 1918.
To get started, let’s discuss the transversus abdominis.
As Sara explains in Session 1 of the Hauber Method™, our transversus abdominis, or TVA, is a muscle that wraps around your abdomen like a big belt hiding underneath all of the other more glamorous abdominal muscles.
The TVA is the unsung hero of abdominal muscles because it aids in keeping you upright and stabilizing your spine and pelvis. Also, for more vain purposes, it acts as a sort of “corset” to pull your belly in tight.
So whether you’re looking for functionality or vanity, the TVA is where it’s at.
If the TVA had a partner in crime, it would be the multifidus. This muscle lies deep in your back and spans all four spinal regions attaching at multiple vertebrae, making it crucial to spinal stability. Additionally, weakened multifidi and other paraspinal muscles have been associated with lower back pain, so their importance extends beyond just helping you stand up.
As Sara explains in Session 1 of the Hauber Method™, our transversus abdominis, or TVA, is a muscle that wraps around your abdomen like a big belt hiding underneath all of the other more glamorous abdominal muscles.
The TVA is the unsung hero of abdominal muscles because it aids in keeping you upright and stabilizing your spine and pelvis. Also, for more vain purposes, it acts as a sort of “corset” to pull your belly in tight.
So whether you’re looking for functionality or vanity, the TVA is where it’s at.
If the TVA had a partner in crime, it would be the multifidus. This muscle lies deep in your back and spans all four spinal regions attaching at multiple vertebrae, making it crucial to spinal stability. Additionally, weakened multifidi and other paraspinal muscles have been associated with lower back pain, so their importance extends beyond just helping you stand up.
Whenever we are upright, we are supposed to be engaging these core muscles so that our joints can bend and flex the way they are supposed to while we do what we are designed to do: walk, run, jump, frolic--basically be an efficient movement machine.
The human body is a multi-jointed structure standing on these tiny little axes at your feet, constantly fighting the force of gravity and relying on these core stabilizers to counteract the uneven distribution of our own body weight so we don’t fall over. When we try and actually move, without stabilizing the spine and supporting our other joints through their intended range of motion, it’s basically chaos.
If we are designed to be constantly using these core muscles, why aren't they super strong, and why do we have all these back/neck/shoulder/hip problems?
Because we aren't using our core stabilizers.
We sit at work. We sit at home. We sit in the car. We lie down to sleep. Sure, we walk to the car and up the stairs, maybe even go to the gym and assume that’s enough, but we don’t do nearly enough targeted core stabilization to support the running, walking, jumping, and frolicking that we were built for.
Therefore, our bigger, bullying, vain muscles (the glutes, quadriceps, pecs, and hamstrings, for example) step in and overcompensate for the work we’re not allowing the unsung heroes (our TVA and multifidus, for example) to do.
We become too tight where we should be flexible and too weak where we need to be strong. Our muscles and bones end up playing tug of war, and the result is pain.
The human body is a multi-jointed structure standing on these tiny little axes at your feet, constantly fighting the force of gravity and relying on these core stabilizers to counteract the uneven distribution of our own body weight so we don’t fall over. When we try and actually move, without stabilizing the spine and supporting our other joints through their intended range of motion, it’s basically chaos.
If we are designed to be constantly using these core muscles, why aren't they super strong, and why do we have all these back/neck/shoulder/hip problems?
Because we aren't using our core stabilizers.
We sit at work. We sit at home. We sit in the car. We lie down to sleep. Sure, we walk to the car and up the stairs, maybe even go to the gym and assume that’s enough, but we don’t do nearly enough targeted core stabilization to support the running, walking, jumping, and frolicking that we were built for.
Therefore, our bigger, bullying, vain muscles (the glutes, quadriceps, pecs, and hamstrings, for example) step in and overcompensate for the work we’re not allowing the unsung heroes (our TVA and multifidus, for example) to do.
We become too tight where we should be flexible and too weak where we need to be strong. Our muscles and bones end up playing tug of war, and the result is pain.
To correct this imbalance, we need to retrain our muscles and nervous system and let the TVA, multifidus, and the rest of the muscles in the pelvic floor reclaim their proper role.
I had to learn this the hard way. I was sprinting multiple miles a day on a lower leg stress fracture and high hamstring tendinopathy, both chronic issues that kept me awake at night and brutalized my days. It felt like nothing could save me. Until finally, I agreed to this thing we like to call “prehab”: preventive rehab.
I already had a problem, so I didn’t understand how any “preventive care” was going to take care of it, but I was desperate. My amazing team of coaches, trainers, and doctors formulated exercises designed to “engage my core” and "activate my glutes," just like the Hauber Method™ teaches us to do, and I was saying, “Um, guys, the problem is in my leg...not my abs.” But I knew my way around the body enough to understand that it’s all connected. It took a while and a lot of concentrated effort on everyone’s part, but it worked.
I’ve never looked back, and I've never felt better. “Prehab” is a way of life for me now. So if you think it’s too late for it to help you, trust me, it’s not. No time like the present.
I had to learn this the hard way. I was sprinting multiple miles a day on a lower leg stress fracture and high hamstring tendinopathy, both chronic issues that kept me awake at night and brutalized my days. It felt like nothing could save me. Until finally, I agreed to this thing we like to call “prehab”: preventive rehab.
I already had a problem, so I didn’t understand how any “preventive care” was going to take care of it, but I was desperate. My amazing team of coaches, trainers, and doctors formulated exercises designed to “engage my core” and "activate my glutes," just like the Hauber Method™ teaches us to do, and I was saying, “Um, guys, the problem is in my leg...not my abs.” But I knew my way around the body enough to understand that it’s all connected. It took a while and a lot of concentrated effort on everyone’s part, but it worked.
I’ve never looked back, and I've never felt better. “Prehab” is a way of life for me now. So if you think it’s too late for it to help you, trust me, it’s not. No time like the present.
Published in 2014. Updated and republished on December 6, 2019.
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