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The Pelvic Floor
A couple of months ago I wrote about the Transversus Abdominus, one of the “core” muscles”. I’ve told you time and again that I consider the TA and the pelvic floor, for my purposes, to be the 2 core muscles. Others contribute, of course, but when I refer to your core, those are the muscles I am referring to. The pelvic floor muscles are slings that run between the pubis & the anus, and among other things, they control the flow of urination. They are the muscles that are used in Kegel exercises. When you use the pelvic floor as stabilizers however, you only contract them, on a scale of 1-10, to about a 2 or 3. If you engage them more intensely, & hold the contraction of the pelvic floor for a long period of time, it can pull the sacrum into nutation – when the apex of the sacrum is pulled forward. Think of a model walking down a runway with her pelvis tilted posteriorly, and forward of the torso.
I am told by instructors that have gone through instructor training more recently than me that not as much emphasis is placed on the pelvic floor as it used to be. But old habits die hard; so I still emphasize it, although not as much as the TA.
To engage the pelvic floor, you pull up on it lightly. Another way to think about it is to pull your navel lightly up toward you ribcage.
I mentioned that the pelvic floor is a stabilizer. It along with the TA, diaphragm & psoas are stabilizers of the lumbo-pelvic (lower back-pelvis) region of your body. Why is stability of this region important? “Especially when in neutral position, the spine depends heavily upon active stability provided by various muscles. An illustration is that when stripped of muscle and left to rely upon passive (bone and ligament) support, the human spine will collapse under 20lb (»9kg) of load. …it is the muscular systems that contribute to lumbopelvic stability which take up the slack.” (Sports Performance Bulletin, sportsperformancebulletin.com)
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ArticleThe Diaphragm
 I just said above that the diaphragm is one of the stabilizers of the lumbo-pelvic region of the body. This short article explains the diaphragm a little more.
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Newsletter Archive
Remember, you can always find past issues of the newsletter by following this link . You'll never know what stimulating articles you've missed until you do!
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Video Highlight - The 100 on the Reformer
One of the most basic exercises in Pilates. You’ll notice that I mention the “core muscles” in the description of the exercise. Guess which ones I’m referring to.
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The 100 on the Reformer
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