“Our culture lends itself to a lot of sitting; these things combined create an imbalance in the body and add to chronic weakness in the posterior chain.”
- Dina Voigt
About Your Back…
Spring is BACK! Warm weather is coming BACK! It’s time to get back to the great outdoors, back to golf, tennis, pickleball, hiking, gardening and more!
Speaking of “back,” How is YOURS? Let’s talk about it!
The back body or “The Posterior Chain”; – what is it? Basically, the entire “back of your body”! The words “posterior chain” technically refer to all the muscles and tissues in the back of your body, from your head to your feet! This includes your butt (glutes), hamstrings, calves, and deep core postural muscles located in the back body (multifidi, erector spinae), quadratus lumborum, and more!
The Posterior Chain
The posterior chain contains some of the biggest muscles in the body and plays a major role in our everyday movements! Every time we sit, stand, jump, or bend to pick something up, literally every move we make demands action from our posterior chain. A strong and balanced posterior chain is crucial to a strong, healthy, balanced body and for preventing recurring injury. It is also crucial to success in the abovementioned activities: golf, tennis, pickleball, hiking, gardening, and virtually every MOVEMENT IN LIFE!
Many people suffer from a weak posterior chain (I am using this as a generalized, collective term in this context). Many conventional exercise modalities emphasize anterior chain strengthening (front of the body), focusing more on the muscles in the front of the body without enough emphasis on the co-contraction and involvement of proper muscles and tissues in the back body. Our culture lends itself to a lot of sitting; these things combined create an imbalance in the body and add to chronic weakness in the posterior chain.
Signs of a “weak” posterior chain include back and hip discomfort or pain, hunched or rounded back, hunched or rounded shoulders & neck, poor balance and proprioception, and even knee injuries and repeated injuries in the lower extremities (legs), including feet and ankles.
I say this all the time: even though we are bipedal (we walk on two feet), we truly are “forward-flexed beings”; everything we do is in front of us, and most of our weight is on the front of our spine. We sit at computers often, and most exercises (as stated above) focus more on the muscles in the front of the body (think crunches).
With all this being said…
Pilates is one of the BEST ways to strengthen the posterior chain and balance the entire body!
In the linked video, I show a few very effective standing stretches and exercises to start your journey to a strong and balanced body! These moves are great to do every day and as a warmup before any physical activities!
Check out the video, and let’s get BACK to it! Be Balanced!
Please email me @balancedbydina@gmail.com if you have any questions!
Happy Spring!
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About the Author
Dina Voigt
Dina Voigt is a PMA-certified Pilates trainer, a certified Yoga instructor, a Personal Trainer, a Group exercise instructor, and a Cycle instructor. She is the founder of ‘Balanced by Dina’, a Pilates Instructor Certification program.
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