isometric workout gear with roller worn on feet or hands

Other health benefits that can be gained by incorporating isometrics into your fitness programs include: Improving one’s balance and coordination is especially important for the aging population as good balance helps in preventing injury from falls.

Isometric muscle contractions often challenge one’s balance, which brings me to my next point: the many health benefits that isometrics provide. If you have ever practiced Yoga, Pilates or Barre, then you are already familiar with isometric contractions, as many of the poses and exercises performed in these formats involve various types of isometrics. A plank is a static exercise and therefore considered an isometric. In contrast, when one holds a plank position, the muscles of the back, abdomen, and shoulders are all contracted, but they are held in that contraction for a substantial amount of time with no change in the length of the muscles. Any exercise in which you contract a group of muscles and sustain that contraction for a given amount of time, without moving at the joints, essentially would be considered an isometric exercise.įor example, a classic biceps curl is considered a dynamic exercise because as one pulls the weight up toward the shoulder, the bicep muscle is shortened on the concentric contraction and then is lengthened as the weight is released and lowered back down on the eccentric contraction. Isometrics are defined as static (rather than dynamic) exercises in which neither the muscle length nor the joint angle change.

Similar to wall sits, hip bridges and static lunges, isometric muscle contractions are great additions to a well-balanced fitness regimen. That plank position I was holding, is actually a perfect example of an isometric exercise.

I’ll never forget the time I was holding plank at the completion of a rigorous strength training workout and the trainer says: “What are you whining about? You’re not even moving!” The trainer was being cynical, but he was correct! I wasn’t moving a muscle, but I was engaging several muscle groups at once and definitely feeling the burn.

Isometric workout gear with roller worn on feet or hands