Walk the Line: Keeping your balance
When we look at the traits that make up overall athletic ability we typically look for speed, strength and power as the usual suspects. There is one quality in particular that draws each of these together, one quality that conveys ability beyond athleticism.
When watching the elite in any sport, we can see there is very little that separates them. Sure, some are a bit faster and others a bit stronger, but the real superstars - they all seem to have something else. A something else that gives the Ablett, Slater, and Azarenka's of the world that extra poise and grace. Something else that seems to give just them, more time.
Balance.
Whether it's the idea that balance is something you've either got or not, or perhaps because it's difficult to quantify and measure; given the difference it makes, it's strange that few athletes (outside of the martial arts) do any training dedicated specifically to improving it.
We seem to accept it as an 'X-factor' - a divine gift bestowed on a chosen few.
But while some have more natural ability than others, as with any other athletic quality, balance can be trained.
And what can be trained, can equally be detrained. Our abilities here can be chalked up as yet another casualty of our sedentary lifestyle, but balance has an obvious and immediate transference to our everyday lives - relevance to us all.
Definitions of balance, as it pertains to biomechanics and athletic performance, are commonly staid and incomplete. None of them convey the athleticism we see from the seemingly impossible angle, over some bland description of just standing upright:
maintaining the line of gravity within the base of support
the ability to maintain equilibrium whether stationary or moving
Snore. Again, the martial arts to the rescue:
The ability to maintain or recover your center despite an external force(s).
When we consider that, for a surfer this force may be a wave, for a footballer an opposition player, and with both also subject to gravity, now we start to get a bit closer. Particularly as this also addresses the idea of recovering balance. In many sports, you may purposely sacrifice your balance to gain an advantage, safe in the knowledge you will subsequently be able to regain it.
In fact, this, is the essence of all movement. Walking is simply the act of (voluntarily) losing and regaining balance, repeatedly.
But maintaining balance requires the coordination of input from multiple sensory systems:
Vestibular system: organs that regulate equilibrium including the inner ear.
Somatosensory system: information from skin, joints and mechanoreceptors that through pressure and vibration detect our movement and position in space as well as the position of body parts relative to each other - proprioception.
Visual system: reference points to our verticality and our position relative to our environment. Although we rely heavily on this information, we are also easily deceived by it, and pilots, for example. are well drilled to ignore these cues in poor visibility, and fly solely on instruments
Together these systems detect changes in body position relative to our base of support - a delicate dance of messages received and corrections necessary. Call and response.
Any changes to these systems, as with an inner-ear infection, for example, will have a corresponding influence on our ability - try balancing with your eyes closed. Age-related decline in balance is due to the reduced ability to receive and integrate this sensory information, e.g. the myofascial system losing sensitivity. The shuffling walk of the elderly that we assume is due to creaking limbs or weakness, is, in fact, an effort to maintain a connection to the ground - a consistent point of reference.
Each of these also highlight that, as Gray Cook (FMS) states - balance is an act of feedback, and can best be thought of as an input, not an output.
Any form of athletic training will typically have some positive influence on our balance, not surprisingly unilateral (single leg) and core training having more influence than others. But it's important to understand a principle readily overlooked, and particularly when any balance-focused activities shift from the more traditional, like tai chi and yoga, to something like slack-lining.
The all-too-common sight of people in mainstream gyms standing on balls or foam rollers 'training their balance' are flouting perhaps the most fundamental of all training principles - that of specificity. The SAID principle - Specific Adaptation to Imposed Demand. You get 'specifically' what you train for.
This is regularly disregarded, or if I'm charitable - misunderstood, by trainers who have their unfortunate clients standing on a Bosu ball. Outside a rehab protocol (where this does have some application), this makes you better at standing on a Bosu ball, and that's it. Unless these people work in a circus, this has absolutely zero carry-over to their daily lives - and more likely a negative - decrease in athleticism - effect.
Why? Because they live their daily lives on solid ground - it is them moving not the surface they are standing on.
Conversely, a surfer would train their balance (for surfing), by surfing.
Good balance and core strength go hand in hand, and any focus on quality of movement must also be 'balanced' - they can hardly be separated. Insurance from a fall becomes nothing short of life-saving as we age, but our skills here, or lack of them, extend well beyond these more obvious associations, to better posture, and less pain.
Your brain is primarily concerned with your immediate survival, so any lack of balance signals a severe and constant danger. If neurological alarm bells start ringing every time you get up to go somewhere, the association made - moving equals danger - means that pretty soon you are not going to be going anywhere. A ruling quickly secured via the brain's customary method of enforcement - pain.
A mastery of balance is hard-won and can take years, but, like anything, it is best achieved through consistent daily practice.
And if you train it daily - it takes very little time at all.
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Every time you brush your teeth stand on one leg, like a flamingo, alternating legs every 30 seconds.
When that becomes too easy. Do the same thing with your eyes closed.
You can do this any number of times throughout the day:
waiting for the kettle to boil
when on the phone
commercial breaks
waiting in a queue, etc (maybe just lift one foot slightly off the ground rather than switching to full-flamingo)
DONT TRY IT IN THE SHOWER
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A flamingo, brushing it's teeth.
Whether you look to develop your balance through exercise or a balance-focused activity, the payoff should not be underestimated. As with anything that works well enough in the body - we all take it for granted and don't spend any time thinking about it, until we lose it.
Steadily diminishing with age, our balance deserts us when we are least able to contend with a fall - right when we need it most. This is compounded by the fact that we have long stopped training it. As children we trained it incidentally, but when was the last time you walked on a low wall or hopped along a curb?
Inextricably linked with posture and core strength, balance will improve our ability to reach, crouch, jump and control any of the complex movements that make up daily life. But it also serves to heighten our awareness. As with any form of training, we become more sensitive to our abilities, and as our balance relies on a number of bodily systems (as above), it can act as the canary in the coal mine, signalling potential problems with ears, vision or other illness.
A warning we can only ever be aware of, if we are consistently testing it.
Fall, wobble, or walk the line.
References:
http://experiencelife.com/article/build-your-balance/
http://sportsmedicine.about.com/cs/conditioning/a/aa062200a.htm
https://www.t-nation.com/training/bosu-ball-the-good-bad-and-ugly
Further reading:
http://balance-is-key.blogspot.com.au/
http://www.humankinetics.com/excerpts/excerpts/designing-balance-training-programs-2