No one wants to deal with lower back issues. It’s only when you get injured that you realize just how much the lower back is responsible for as part of your core, and even just as a skeleton unit. Back injuries can be nagging, persistent, and very difficult to get rid of once and for all. With that said, if you’re getting off an injury, or even if you’re still healthy—here are a few things to keep in mind to make sure that you don’t put yourself in a place that leaves you susceptible to issues.
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No. 1: Form Check
This goes without saying. Bad form will turn into an injury—it’s just a matter of when. Doing deadlifts with no regard to your technique is a ticking time bomb, with your lumbar vertebrae and lower back muscles being held for ransom. Learn and use good form. The lower back is involved in basically every compound movement, so being a good trainee is the first step to health.
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No. 2: Hip Mobility Check
Among other things, the correlation between the hips and lower back is strong. Avoiding immobility at the ball-and-socket hip capsule can affect the severity of things like pelvic tilting and gluteal ability on the opposing side. Both of those factors can be make-or-break for back stress. Use full ROM when you can in exercises like squats and lunges, so you can exercise the full mobility of your hip capsules.
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No. 3: Rotation Check
No. 3: You’re rotating through the thoracic region.
Depending on which segment s of the vertebrae are in question, they’re responsible for a certain degree of rotation respectively. The least rotational ability comes from the segments of the lumbar vertebrae. Personally, I’ve found that middle-aged clients who come to me with back pain also tend to play plenty of golf. The rotation responsible for a swing highly depends on your thoracic spine having the capability of fully rotating. If it can’t, something has to compensate and often it’s the lumbar spine that gets pulled and twisted out of position. The moral of the story: Make sure your T Spine functions healthily. Even if you’re not a golfer, the lumbar vertebrae can be over-rotating during simpler scenarios—especially when paired with tight hips.
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No. 4: Compression Check
A deadlift, bentover row, standing press, back squat, and hang clean may sound like one hell of a total body conditioning workout—and it very well would be. But it would be at the expense of your back health. Even if it feels good at the time, it’s important to be mindful of how much compression your back has to deal with in every workout—especially the total body ones. All of the exercises I listed create downward compressive force on the lower spine, which could leave it feeling quite tight. Instead, mix in exercises to decompress the spine like pull ups, parallel bar dips, hanging leg raises, or lat pulldowns.
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Ian Spanier
No. 5: Glute Check
The posterior chain’s “powerhouse” comes in the proper function of three muscles groups: the glutes, hamstrings, and low back. And during athletic movements like running, jumping or sprinting, they should fire exactly in that order. When things are off, and the glutes aren’t strong or responsive enough to do their job, they leave the low back and hamstrings to take on the loads they forfeit. Not a good situation and a major cause of undue stress. Train the glutes to get strong so they can do their part. My favorite exercises to get the glutes going are barbell hip thrusts, walking lunges, and box squats. With that said, it may be something as simple as a few activations to ensure the glutes are firing during your compound movements. Precede your workouts with a few tennis ball glute bridges, seen below. Remember to squeeze the ball in your hip joint.
