The Hollow Body is an excellent exercise to establish awareness regarding core stiffness. It is a vital tool to learn or re-establish segmental muscle recruitment that is required to maintain a strong position. The hollow body hold and other isometric exercises are important standards to help develop a sense of bodily (neuromuscular) awareness and create a strong foundation before involvement where the muscles shorten (concentric) or lengthen (eccentric) where the movement of our limbs, trunk and or rest of the body is involved. The ability to maintain a strong core is foundational to stabilizing the body through not only exercise training but also postural control, walking, and other activities of daily living including but not limited to eating, dressing, etc.
At its base level, the hollow body is an isometric exercise that involves the whole body.
Isometric activity is sustained static muscle recruitment and activity with an increase in tension, accompanied by no change in the length of the recruited muscle tissue or change in joint angle.
The hollow body involves primarily the core: the upper portion -rectus abdominals, lower abdominals (transverse abdominals).
From here we have at least 3 possible progressions. For this article these are the 3 hollow body variations we will cover:
a) Legs lifted towards the chest with the knees bent (dead bug isometric hybrid) and
both arms extended behind the head.
b) Legs lifted off the floor with the knees extended (legs straight) and arms held stacked
over the shoulders.
c) Legs lifted off the floor with the knees extended (legs straight) and arms extended
(straight) overhead not touching the floor.
How to perform the Holow Body Hold
1) Start by lying down on the back with the arms by your side with the palms facing down.
Inhale, brace the core and lift the legs off the floor. With the knees bent more of our body weight is distributed over a smaller area. With our legs extended it will be more challenging to keep the lower back flat against the floor and maintain core stability for the hollow hold the further I extend my legs away from the body.
2) Once I lift my legs off the floor I will extend the knees as much as I can, a softer bend of the knees can also be incorporated and will be easier to maintain. Flex the toes up towards the shins. Push the lower back into the floor.
3) Set the shoulders down and back into the floor. Position the arms either stacked straight up over the shoulders or reach back overhead. As I reach back overhead I want to remain active with my free hands. Move with intent with body weight as I would with any additional external load.
4)Flex forward and lift our head, neck, upper back and shoulders off the floor. It is important not to lift with the head and neck or hold excess tension during the active hold. Maintain rhythmic breathing and hold the hollow body position for the desired time.
When we position ourselves into the hollow hold we can see how much full tension is created. Lift our legs off the ground we prioritize the lower abdominals. As we hollow out and lift the head, neck, upper back and shoulders we engage the upper part of the rectus abdominals. As I pull my toes up towards the shins, the supporting muscles of the lower limb are working. If I hold my legs straighter the quads and hip flexors work, hamstrings are involved a bit more when compared to bent legs. Shoulders are reaching back overhead have passed through a full range of flexion and a bit of extension as we move back overhead.
The hollow body hold and other isometric exercises create a strong foundation to maintain proper core stability, alignment of the head and neck and an improved ability to engage in and self-correct our training practices.
