MC2 CORE
From Steve Edwards’ blog as he reveals more about the upcoming P90X:MC2 workouts:
_________________________________
I’m not necessarily going to post these workouts in sequence but mc2 Core is going to be the first workout on the schedule. This will remind those who’ve done P90X Lean of opening with Core/Syn but this workout is even more applicable to the journey of this particular program.
To talk about what’s right with this workout I need to begin by explaining what’s wrong with us. We are out of balance, which is not just because we watch too much TV and don’t exercise enough(I explained yesterday most injuries are due weakness in hip and shoulder stability). Our general lifestyle activities create imbalances because certain muscles in your kinetic chain take over movements that were once done by other, smaller muscles. The longer this goes on the worse it gets, and training can even exacerbate the situation by making the active muscles stronger, thus creating greater imbalances.
To combat this we’re changing the platform that you training on to create instability in order to force these forgotten muscles back into action. When you free these stabilizer muscles to fire it allows the muscles that were doing double duty to work more efficiently and, thus, your performance increases before you’ve seen any tangible muscle strength increase. Furthermore, for those of you only interested in how you look in the mirror, this forces your body back into the alignment it was born with so that you’re appearance will improve, too.
The keywords you’ll hear in this workout are open and engagement—especially if Steve Holmsen’s cueing takes effect on Tony. In order to keep your body stable you’ll be forced to engage areas that may be foreign to you, which is all designed around getting your body to open up. We tend to get smaller in life and training the wrong way can exacerbate as your force your body to finish exercises without good form. As your muscles contract you get smaller, and our natural tendency is to continually force them at expense of our posture. So a cue you’re going to hear a lot about is staying open during a movement.
To answer a couple of inevitable questions: it’s called a core workout because you are learning to engage your core in every movement that you do. If you learn to properly engage you core, and stay open as you move, your body’s potential for improvement will dramatically increase.
The other question I know you’ve got; is this going to get me pumped and force me to bring it? In a word: yes. While you do spend a lot of time balanced in precarious stances there’s plenty of resistance movement to make you sweat and have you screaming to finish sets. At least that’s how it is for me.
Need a coach?
My email: coachwayne@teamripped.com
IG: @wayne_wyatt
