The Importance of Balance

One of the underlying, and often unspoken, benefits of core work is that it improves our balance. But why is it important to have good balance?

Good balance improves the postural alignment of the body and helps further develop coordinated movement. Everything we do relies on good balance -- from getting out of bed in the morning to sitting upright at our desks, to running on the street or trails-- the less balanced we are, the harder we have to work to maintain healthy posture , and the more likely we are to end up with injuries from that strain.

Proprioception is the body’s ability to interpret and use information about your position in space. This is how your body takes all the environmental feedback it receives-- cues from the bottoms of the your feet, the relation of your inner ear to gravity, and what you’re seeing ahead of and around you-- and uses that information to sense which muscles to activate or deactivate to maintain your desired position. It does this when you stand up, sit down, or stretch up onto your tiptoes to reach something from the top shelf, and it does this whether you’re riding a bike, running, skiing or strength training. Your body’s ability to interpret and respond to those signals naturally degrades as we age (and as we spend more and more time sitting at a desk), which means you have to work harder just to maintain balance-- which leaves you more prone to injuries that may sideline you from your activity of choice.

An example: while running on Forbidden Drive on Saturday, I stepped on a large rock and rolled my ankle. I almost fell, but caught myself-- my body figured out what muscles it needed to activate to get my left foot on the ground and immediately shift my center of gravity from right to left. This all happened in less than the time it took me to reflexively say, “OW!”

I ran a few more steps and decided that my “Ow!” had been more a reaction of surprise than of pain, and continued running (this happened about 3.5 miles into a 10-mile run). On the way home, we stopped at a farmer’s market and walked around there, and it was fine. Sometime later that afternoon, my right ankle decided it was pretty sore, so I took it easy and mostly stayed off my feet. On Sunday, the ankle was a little stiff, but not painful or swollen.

If I had twisted my ankle like that three or four years ago, before spending time getting into better shape and doing more balance-challenging activities like running, hiking, cycling and plyometrics, my ankle might very well have been sprained, and I would have been wearing a brace and hobbling around on crutches. I used to be that person who had “weak ankles”-- really, what I had was pretty poor balance and untrained muscles overall.

I’m sure by now you’re thinking, “That’s great. But what does this mean for my running and walking?”

We’ve talked previously about how core strengths affects your stability and your efficiency of movement. Part of the reason core strength has that effect is because it can help improve your overall balance. The more well-balanced you are, the more relaxed your muscles can be until the body needs to activate them to maintain balance. The more relaxed your body can be, the less stress you’re putting on the muscles when you don’t need to use them-- and the less unnecessary stress you put on your muscles, the less prone to injury you will be.

When I say “relaxed”, I don’t mean you’re loosely flopping around as you move. I simply mean that you’re not tensing up to stay upright-- if you notice that your shoulders draw up toward your ears as you walk or run, or that your arms and shoulders are particularly tired after a long walk or run, this is a good indicator that you’re placing unnecessary stress on your muscles just to stay balanced.

Test Yourself

To test your own balance: stand up with one foot directly in front of the other, so the heel of the front foot is touching the toes of the foot behind it. Keep your feet flat on the floor and close your eyes. How long can you hold this position? Do you start wobbling almost immediately? Can you last 10 seconds, or 30? The longer you can go without wobbling or losing your balance, the better your balance is.

Fix it

So now that you know how good (or how poor) your balance is, what do we do to improve upon that? One of the first things you can do is simply add more balance-challenging activities to your normal workout routine. For example: if you’re already doing crunches or planks, add a stability ball. You can sit on the stability ball and do crunches; for planks, put your shins on the stability ball, your hands on the floor, and plank as long as you can hold it! You can also add extra challenge by getting into the plank position on the stability ball, then drawing your knees toward your chest, rolling the stability ball in with your legs, then stretching your legs back out to plank position again.

One of the most simple exercises to improve balance is simply standing on one foot. Hold for as long as you can before switching to the other foot; if it’s too easy, add some challenges like swinging the raised leg forward and back several times.

Is standing on one leg too easy? Are you a master of squats in your typical workout? Try taking one leg out of the equation. Place a chair behind you; stand on your left foot and rest your right foot on the chair. Proceed with your normal number of squats. Still not challenging enough? Pat yourself on the back, then add either hand-weights or a barbell balanced across your shoulders.
One of my favorite challenges is one-legged toe-touches. Begin by standing on your left foot and raising your right foot behind you. Pivot at the hip until your torso and right leg are parallel to the floor, then reach down and touch your left toes with your left hand. Stand up again and, without letting your right foot touch the floor, pivot down again and touch your left toes with your right hand. Stand up, switch feet, and do two touches of your right toes-- again, without putting your opposite foot down between toe touches. You'll be amazed at how hard this gets as you keep going.

Any of the jumping exercises discussed in the Plyometrics post will help develop balance in addition to general core strength.