I recently came across the Baby GetUp through my good friend Dr. Perry Nickelston.  When I heard him talk about it, what he used it for and the benefits from this exercise I was thinking to myself: “Hey I’m gonna give it a shot; it sounds like a nice corrective exercise to include in a training program to help develop proper muscle sequencing and reinforce a good fundamental movement pattern”.  The Baby GetUp can indeed help you in that regard, but HOLLY SH*T I wasn’t expecting what I was about to experience!  I wouldn’t even say it was hard; I literally couldn’t even do it!!

As someone who takes care about how my body moves and with the time I spend on corrective exercises I wasn’t expecting to be slapped in the face by the Baby GetUp like I did!  The name of the exercise itself suggest an easier version of the Turkish GetUp.  A ‘regression’ of the Turkish GetUp would be a better term, because it might look simpler, but it doesn’t mean it’s easier.  This is the video from Dr. Perry that demonstrate the Baby GetUp:

You’re probably telling yourself it really doesn’t look that hard.  And you’ll most likely be able to perform it more easily than I did, but I’m sure you’ll be surprised by the level of difficulty of the exercise on AT LEAST one side of your body.

In fact, this is a great way to identify asymmetries from side to side in inner core muscle sequencing.  When trying the Baby GetUp, make sure that you’re not cheating by reaching with your neck, getting your top leg off the floor and holding your breathe in.  This should be a movement pattern that feels (or becomes) ‘nice and smooth’ to perform.  It is a fundamental movement pattern, and if you don’t own it, your setting yourself up for compensation movement patterns, and injury in the long run.

I know what I’m gonna be working on in the next couple of weeks!

For an in depth look at the Baby GetUp, check out Perry’s original article on his website HERE.

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Core Training. One of the most important component of a training program.  We all include in our program exercises like planks, rollouts, knee tucks, rotation/anti-rotation exercises to work the core in all possible ways. 

But what happens when you perform these exercises with high loads or you go to failure on them?

You overload the rectus abdominis, external obliques and in some cases the lumbar erectors. 

But isn’t that the whole purpose of core training?

The answer is, in part.  The rectus abdominis, external and internal obliques as well as the lumbar erectors are part of what we call the outer core.  The thing is there is also an inner core.  The inner core is a term I learned from Dr. Perry Nickelston and it is used to describe the core muscle group formed by the diaphragm, the pelvic floor, the multifidus and the transverse abdominis (TVA).

The inner core is responsible for the muscle activation that support respiration and segmental stability at the lumbar spine.  When these muscles are not properly activated, more stress is applied to the outer core muscles to stabilize the spine and this can further lead to back pain.

So how do we train the inner core?

First of all, the inner core needs some low load exercises to activate properly without having the stronger, more dominant outer core muscles compensating if the load is too heavy.  The inner core is also easily activated by squeezing something between your knees or by reaching overhead with your arms.  With that in mind, I am currently using a variation of the dead bug series that combine both activation patterns of the inner core muscles. 

When performing this exercise, you should focus on keeping your belly thight the whole time, crushing the ball with both knees and you should avoid arching with you lower back as you reach overhead (you want to keep a slight natural arch in your back though).

I’ve had great results from implementing this movement in my own training program.  I still need to play around a little more with these inner core activation exercises, as I’m just starting to understand their true function.  I do believe that inner core training is a good complement to any core training program.

Dr. Nickelston also wrote a very interesting blog post on Carson Boddicker’s website about the inner core where he demonstrates 2 simple progressions of exercises that  work on activating the inner core.  You should definitely check it out HERE.