Sitting at a desk — or any chair surfing — are a unavoidable reality of modern life.
Upside: we can focus for long periods and work in comfort.
Downside: sitting harms posture.
We end up with:
Forward head → limited airflow & core stability (diaphragm inhibition).
Slumped shoulders → limited overhead mobility , increased chance of shoulder injury.
Tight hips → weak glutes , shear forces on lumbar spine, back pain.
So on Swings, instead of hips driving the movement, the lower back strains. A common “fix” for tight hips is targeting hip flexors. When I first learned about this in 2001/2, it felt great —until it didn’t. The looseness never lasted . Research shows hip flexor stretching briefly boosts deep abdominal activity, but it fades when training ends. Sitting then maintains tightness, creating a loop. At the same time, I relied on abdominal bracing for core stability. Which worked —until it didn’t. A hard brace raises hip joint forces. Research shows strong bracing lowers shear at the lumbar spine but increases hip compression by 8–12%. It also limits hip-knee flexion and elevates ground reaction forces, shifting stress to hips instead of glutes.
Combine tight hip flexors, weak glutes, and max bracing, and you get aching backs and damaged hips. That’s how I injured both labrums after years of stretching and bracing.
The Fix: Restore Anticipatory Control
In a balanced body, the deep core fires milliseconds before moving an arm, check here leg, or kettlebell. This anticipatory response, or reflexive stabilization , is also called reflexive stabilization.
Studies show the Transverse Abdominis and Multifidus activate promptly in pain-free lifters but late in those with back pain. Conscious bracing can’t substitute—once the bell moves, you’ve only got milliseconds. If the reflex is off, shear forces hit when load peaks, often causing that “lightning shock” in the lower back. So, how do we restore it? With specialized stability drills that re-train feed-forward activation.
One of the best is the Dead Bug, proven to restore pre-emptive stability . We use this and others in the Stability phase of the SSP Model (Stability–Strength–Power) from Systematic Core Training for Kettlebells.
The prescription:
Five minutes of stability training before KB sessions.
10 minutes after.
Then advance towards Strength and Power.
This reactivates the deep abdominals, re-strengthens them with the pelvic floor and diaphragm, and restores the ability to create intra-abdominal pressure (IAP) to safeguard the spine in Swings, Cleans, Squats, and Snatches.
Should You Ever Brace?
Yes—on heavy , deliberate lifts like Deadlifts, Squats, and Presses. But bracing should layer on top of reflexive stability, not replace it.
Stay Strong,
Geoff Neupert.