Anterior chain/posterior chain?

[Mr Punch]

There's a lot of talk on some of the weightlifting boards and stuff like crossfit about working/activating the posterior chain. Everyone seems to fling it around a lot but nobody ever really seems to define what it is.

What is it?!

Furthermore, why do people not bang on about the anterior train at all... and what would that be?!

[David Jamieson]

1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Posterior_chain

2. http://www.verticaljumping.com/posterior_chain.html

and so on and so forth.

[Scott R. Brown]

The "posterior chain" are the muscles along the back of your body that work as a unit in order to stabilize your body. They also create/provide power in your movements.

This is a new term used for novices and people with personal trainers in order to impress them with jargon. It is a fad term, like pilates and "core training"!

REAL athletes have always trained the "Posterior chain" and their "core"! It is weekend warriors or people who weight train, but don't do any other form of athletic activity that require special terms and exercises in order to develop what athletes have always done as a matter of course.

By the way I have weight trained for 35 years. I started training with the 1977 California State Champion discus thrower when I was in high school. His father, a national class track athlete, weight thrower (discus, hammer, 56 and 72 pound weight throws) was our training coach!

[Oso]

yea, crossfit is big on talking about that...as well as 'stabilizing the core' ...but, i think it's like Scott said...to do most anything whole body or generating power through the legs you have to 'activate the posterior chain' and 'stabilize the core' or you don't get very far without injury.

i think crossfit talks so much about it simply to get people thinking actively about doing it. i know I'm better for the CF training process....but, it's just one process of many that can probably work just as well.

[Mr Punch]

Thanks guys. Yeah, I was thinking it was kind of jargonese, Scott.

And DJ, I'd read the wikipedia entry... which actually says... **** all! The other link is the closest I've ever seen to a decent explanation so I'll read it again when I have more time.

And Oso, maybe the thinking about it thing is important, eh?

[taai gihk yahn]

it seems kinda cutsie - the one thing that I have a problem with is that it "links" together muscles that functionally don't necessarily have the degree of commonality that would warrant that sort of grouping; for example, although both technicaly hip extenders, glutes and hamstrings have markedly different functional roles, to the extent that when hamstrings take over the job that glutes do (which could happen, for example, because glutes get inhibited by hyperactive antagonistic hip flexors), it's only a matter of time before you are going to get symptomatic somewhere in the low back, pelvis or hips; so I just don't really see the point of linking these muscles in terms of their physical location / proximity to each other; if you wanted to talk about a functional chain during jumping, I'd look at gastrocs / quads / glutes, because these are all anti-gravity extensors, and when functioning in a closed-chain capacity are going to be what propel you vertically and keep you from collapsing when you land - for vertical jumping, hamstrings are minimally involved

in some manual therapy approaches, there is a lot of talk about anterior, posterior and other chains, but this is looking at non-contractile connective tissue chains, and are looked at as pathways of compensation via which dysfunction "travels" from the site of injury to a distant area (e.g. - a chronic ankle sprain ending up being "felt" in the ipsiateral low back or the contralateral shoulder) - but this is, again, a compensatory tension diffusing mechanism as opposed to a primary functional one;

[Scott R. Brown]

a compensatory tension diffusing mechanism as opposed to a primary functional one;

I have that now. I injured my right inner groin a year ago, and I've been feeling it in my right hip flexor and one of my lateral hamstrings at the attachment up near the ischial spine! I now walk with a limp if I have to walk up a hill or walk for too long of a period, especially when I carry my daughter.

Like I said, It is just another "fad jargon term" used to make people think they need personal training.

[Mr Punch]

...it "links" together muscles that functionally don't necessarily have the degree of commonality that would warrant that sort of grouping...

Very interesting post, thank you.

[taai gihk yahn]

I have that now. I injured my right inner groin a year ago, and I've been feeling it in my right hip flexor and one of my lateral hamstrings at the attachment up near the ischial spine! I now walk with a limp if I have to walk up a hill or walk for too long of a period, especially when I carry my daughter.

if you are near San Diego, you could try to see Randy Kusanose, PT (http://www.jiscs.com/Faculty.aspx) or he may be able to refer you to someone closer to you; or, check out this website, I have recently added this to my "tool box" and it works very nicely - if you read the content / watch the vids he has posted, you could pretty much figure it out w/out taking the seminar (I did, but took the class for the CEU's and because I wanted to meet the guy)!

Like I said, It is just another "fad jargon term" used to make people think they need personal training.

seems that way - although PT's are just as gulity of that trend!

Very interesting post, thank you.

you're welcome, but don't think my musings are the last word per se - just a relatively informed opinion, certainly if someone gives me a better argument in favor of it, I'm all ears

BTW, I should add that, contractile fibers also participate in compensatory activity,( like hams "taking over" as primary movers during hip extension) but again, muscle function is more "spiraled" - if you look at flexors versus extensors, they tend to leap frog from the front to the back, sort of - so if you look at gastroc / quads / glutes as compared to anterior tib / hamstrings / psoas; at the same time, gastroc is a weak flexor of the knee and hams are a secondary extensor of the hip, so there is some overlap, but it is context dependent (hams functioning as extenders to limit hip flexion during swing phase of gait);

I think that the appeal is looking at a picture of muscles and saying that based on location and proximity alone, which is easy to "remember", you derive a functional paradigm, which ain't necessarily so...