Tim Robards knows there’s more to fitness than being able to plank for three minutes.

Whether I’m walking past a boxing class, outdoor fitness group, or a PT smiling cunningly as he holds the stop watch, it seems that planking is the new crunch. We are told that its great for the core and the lower back but is it really and are you doing it right?

The time you can hold a plank is used as a general descriptor of your current level of fitness. Like a belt that you can add notches to, your planking time is beginning to be a highly respected number in the fitness world that some are putting a lot of emphasis on.

It’s also believed by many to be the ultimate mid section sculptor, targeting the rectus abdominous, internal and external obliques, the transverse abs and other hip stabilisers. It is the precursor to the myriad of different push-up variations that are out there too.

One professional to make comment on it recently is Roger Kerry, the physiotherapist and associate professor at the faculty of medicine and health sciences at the University of Nottingham. “Everyone is focused on targeting their core and it’s seen as the best way to do it, but as an exercise in itself it has some less appealing issues,” he says.

When it comes to the plank, he believes “They do it, but don’t really know why. In theory, there are a lot of different fitness dimensions involved in the exercise — muscular endurance, strength, muscular control — but in reality it does none of them very well.”

Kerry says some of the negatives effects come from the time challenges that come with planking where beginners go from nothing to several minutes worth of planking in a week, which defies all principles of workout progression.

“You would never run for a mile one day, two miles the next and seven miles after a week,” he says. “It is completely ridiculous that all sense is thrown out of the window when it comes to this exercise.”

So think twice before you do a 30-day planking challenge.Source:ThinkStock

From my personal experience in practice, most people don’t know how to hold a plank properly and activate the right muscles. Just like learning a new dance move, there needs to be body awareness and co-ordination to do this properly.

This could part explain why research has found that the muscles the plank is reputed to hone so effectively aren’t actually being honed in reality. Researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison tested the plank using electromyography, alongside a range of other exercises purported to be effective at strengthening the core, including the side plank and bicycle crunch.

Exercise physiologist Dr Cedric X Bryant and his team first measured the baseline abdominal strength of the 16 male and female participants. They compared a variation of plank exercises and found that none surpassed the muscle activation of the traditional crunch.

Dave O’Sullivan, the clinical director for ProSport Physiotherapy in Huddersfield, like myself, is convinced there are better ways to develop a functional core, than a major focus on planking duration.

“People come into my clinic on a daily basis and tell me they have super-strong core muscles because they can do the plank endlessly,” he told The Times.

“But the range of muscles worked in the exercise is actually minimal. No matter how good your technique, the problem is that you are working the two big rods of muscle, the erector spinae, that run up either side of your spine when you do the plank. Your abdominal muscles aren’t dominating the movement at all.”

With these opinions and research presented, I would urge you not to scrap your planking, but firstly get the technique right before then introducing some more dynamic movement into a normal plank.

If you think about the times we injure our backs we are usually upright and bending to some degree. Also most of the activities we need to be strong and functional involve us being upright, unless you clean man sized air-conditioning ducts for a living.

So learning to incorporate unstable surfaces, equipment like rings/TRX, flowing movement like in yoga and pilates is the way forward.

Dave backs that up saying “More dynamic moves allow the abdominal muscles to lengthen and shorten without stressing the lower back,” he says. “It can be as simple as adding rotation or arm movement to a plank. Just avoid the basic front and side plank that require you to stay in one position for a prolonged time.”

I’ve included a video to explain how to hold a plank properly, and then progress that into the basic movement of a push-up.

It’s something that seems simple, but prepare to have a whole new appreciation for the standard plank and push-up! If you’re still hellbent on static planking then I suggest working toward a total of two or three minutes, but in lots of around 20 secs. Multiple lots of perfect planks are worth a lot more than grunting your way through a back straining sag.

Tim Robards.Source:Supplied

Dr Tim Robards is a chiropractor and exercise scientist (B. Med. Sc, M. Chiro). Tim recently launched his unique exercise and diet program The Robards Method.