Start in the Middle.

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Stop bracing and gripping.

Muscles have the most potential to help when they start in a mid-length position.


Cues you will probably never hear me say: “brace,” “squeeze,” or “grip”.

Why? 

Because contracting a muscle with maximal conscious force tends to cause the muscle to shorten.   If the muscle is short before you even begin to move, the muscle has less potential to generate force to help you move.  For the most potential force (and most functional movement) we want the muscle to start to gently engage in a middle length, not maximally long or short, when we are preparing for a movement. 

(There are absolutely exceptions to this, and I’ll get to that at the end.)


My favorite example of this is what happens in a hip roll, hip lift, or bridge type movement (depending on your movement discipline).  Let’s say your pelvis is still resting on the floor and you “squeeze” your glutes before you ever leave the floor.  You have just taken away the assistance of one of the most powerful muscles of hip extension.  If you get a lot of hamstring cramping when you perform this exercise, this is probably why…

Okay, so let’s go back a step… The function of the glutes (among other things) is to pull the leg backward relative to the pelvis (hip extension).  If you are in a position where the legs can’t move but the pelvis can, the glutes will work to push the pelvis forward relative to the legs (still hip extension).  So, in a hip bridge the movement that is occurring at your hips is this extension, and your glutes should definitely help you with this.

If you maximally contract your glutes before you lift your hips your glutes will help some, but not as much as they could.  There are many factors that affect a muscle’s ability to generate force, but one of those factors is length.  When the muscle is at its shortest or longest state it doesn’t have very much potential to help. When the muscle starts in a middle length position it has the most potential to generate force.  (I’m happy to explain the role of actin-myosin cross-bridging if you like, but I’m sure you want to follow me down that nerdy rabbit hole!)

So, if you maximally contract your glutes before you move you have shortened the muscle and reduced its potential to facilitate the very motion it is most essential for!  The consequence of training this way is that the hamstrings try to pick up the slack for the glutes, as they are also a powerful hip extensor.  This often leads to hamstring cramps during bridges and reinforces chronic tension in the posterior muscle chains of the body.

Excellent news though!  There is another path to your bridges!  Create a functional low-level contraction to prepare movement and teach your body to integrate muscle contractions that are proportional to the degree of movement and challenge of the exercise. 

In a functional training bridge, you might gently engage your glutes by pressing the feet into the floor without allowing your hips to lift or allowing your back press into the ground.  Then think about continuing to press your feet down and notice that the pelvis starts to rest more lightly on the ground and the glutes are working harder.  Because the feet can’t actually move through the floor, pressing your feet (and therefore legs) backwards engages the glutes to move the hips forward and up to the sky (hip extension)!  As the movement the movement now starts with the glutes in a middle length position, they are now in a better position to help generate force, allowing for the coordination of the movement of the skeleton with the contraction and shortening of the glute muscles.


This is a functional movement.  Muscles working only as hard as they need to, while shortening (and lengthening) in appropriate proportion to the challenge of the exercise and the movement of the skeleton.


Gripping muscles also makes it harder to refine movements.  Think about trying to be stable standing on one leg or doing an exercise that requires balance on one leg for a longer time.  If your muscles are trained for gripping, they tend to have two modes: on and off (and mostly on).  But when we are trying to balance, we need that middle ground of 10% more or less.  So if a muscle is maximally short (which you now know means it has less potential to generate more force) it tends to create rigidity, there is less ability to make small refinements, and when we do try to correct we tend to overcorrect and lose our balance.  Finding support from our legs without gripping increase our ability to work functionally and grow past barriers.

I don’t want to finish this without acknowledging that there are times bracing is appropriate.  When the intention is to protect one region of the body during a movement in another location of the body AND the load being placed on the body is very heavy (think about weight lifters), then bracing can be a totally appropriate cue.  But in general, the movements that should require bracing are those that place extreme loads on the body. 


In everyday activities and bodyweight training the muscles should respond at a level that is appropriate and, importantly, they should shorten and lengthen (contract more or less) proportionally to the changes of the skeleton during movement.


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The Neuro-Musculo-Skeletal-Fascial System