Hello everyone, Denise here. How many of us think about walking, sitting, running, or just doing your squats or deadlifts? We move, don’t we? And you are right, and we do move. But how many of us think about it. I’m sure not much.
In this blog, I want to help you understand how we move and why it is essential to understand this when it comes to exercise and planning your workouts.
When we move, our movements are described as motions. To make it much easier to digest, we will use planes of motion. Think of a plane of glass to explain how we form each type of movement. Stick a pin in that for now.
Our anatomical position is when we look at the human body in a standing, static position. Feet are shoulder-width apart, arms at the side of the body with palms facing out. Head in a neutral position and not tilted.
Now that we understand the anatomical position, we will use the planes to dissect and create the categorizes of our movement.
The Sagittal plane of motion.
The plane dissects the body into right and left halves. So think about if you walk, run, lunge, tiptoe, or squat; these movements are all done in the sagittal plane of motion. Now, for us to do, this movement our neuromusculoskeletal system must work together. Our joints are limited to
what they can and cannot do. So, joints in this motion create flexion and extension. Take walking, for instance; the arms and legs are always in hip flexion and extension and shoulder flexion and extension.
The Frontal plane of motion.
The plane divides the body into back and front halves. Think about standing against a wall, and you cannot move away from that wall. How would you be able to move? Our movement would be in a side-to-side manner. Think of it if you raise your arm or leg away from your body. That
movement would be in the frontal plane of motion. The joint action here is ABduction and ADduction. When the limb moves away from the body, it’s Abducting, and it’s going back to its start position; its Adducting.
So, exercises we can do in the frontal plane are lateral raises, side shuffles, side lunge, etc.
The Transverse plane of motion
The plane divides the body horizontally. The halves are top and bottom, or inferior and superior segments. With this division, the body can perform rotation efficiently. Exercises such as Russian twists, wood chops, swinging a bat or racket, and no one would guess walking. Yes, I said, walking.
When we walk, our torso rotates slightly in each stride; unfortunately, our ability to move as we should when we walk decreases more and more due to our world of increased digitization.
So, folks, those were the three planes of motion we use to assess our movement. Now that we know what they are, why are they important? Well, I would pose a question to you. If you have a plan to exercise, does it incorporate all planes of motion? If it does, you are on the right track; if it doesn’t, then you may be adding fuel to your muscle imbalances, joint immobility, and decreasing your human movement.
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