Published on Wednesday, 29 September 2021 at 1:08:57 PM
By now, we all know better than to skip leg day. But there’s another muscle group that needs its fair share of attention.
While the muscles in your mid-section aren’t the most powerful, they are the most important. Your abdominal muscles, as well as the muscles within your lower back and around your sides, ensure you can stand up, get out of your chair, walk around and lift those weights on leg day.
Why you need to strengthen your core
Your core muscles are key to stabilising your spine and pelvis, as well as maintaining good posture. All of this ensures you can move the rest of your body easily.
Just like everything else, if you don’t use your core enough it’ll weaken, in turn putting more pressure on your other muscles. In fact, a weak core is often associated with lower back pain and knee pain.
Core training ideas
There are so many ways you can train your core, and most gym instructors will include at least one core exercise in your routine.
Some ideas perfect for beginners include planks, bridges, crunches and toe taps, as well as a range of variations to take it to the next level.
Swimming, pilates and yoga are ideal for targeting your core, and there are hundreds of core exercises you can do with a stability ball.
In this video, our gym instructors demonstrate 5 of their ideas: the plank side tap, hanging knee raises, the boat pose, cable ab crunches and if you want to challenge yourself, a Les Mills Core class.
Les Mills Core? Tell me more!
Brought to you by the same team responsible for Body Pump and Body Attack, Les Mills Core is a 30 minute group fitness class that focuses on building strength and stability in your core.
The 30 minute class consists of six “tracks” or sections, set to music; a warm-up on your back to prep your core muscles, three core strength tracks and two standing strength tracks to integrate your upper and lower body.
The class works to build lean muscle mass and improve the functional fitness in your core, targeting everything from the mid-thigh up to the shoulders. Some of the exercises use weight plates and resistance bands, but they’re optional – you’ll still get a killer core workout just using your bodyweight.
It’s a short class, so time will go by fast – but that’s not to say it’s easy. The class will tire out your core, so it’s best not to do any resistance training afterwards. If you want to combine it with another class or gym workout, it’s best to do that before your Les Mills Core class.
At Beatty Park, we instruct seven Les Mills Core classes every week. If group fitness isn’t your thing, our gym instructors and personal trainers can show you a range of workouts to target and strengthen your core.
Check out our timetable here or talk to us today about our gym and swim memberships, which include regular fitness appraisals and personalised programs.
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