Looking for a safe and effective way to strengthen your lower back? The best solution is Lower Back by Teca Fitness, the isotonic machine designed to perform back extensions, a pivotal exercise that trains the lower back muscles while seated.
Strengthening the muscles responsible for extending the spine is very important to ensure that correct posture is maintained.
If you love to train, you should also know that having a strong lower back helps you perform more confidently complex exercises such as squats, deadlifts, pull-ups, flat bench or the slow barbell.
We are talking about exercises that, performed with excellent technique and training loads, allow you to significantly increase your sports performance and help you build a strong, rock-hard physique.
If your lower back muscles are weak, you will not only find it difficult to perform these exercises perfectly, but you will most likely be at risk of injury and lower back pain.
In fact, who hasn’t had back pain?
Back pain: common causes
A common but severe condition, lower back pain is the most common musculoskeletal disorder and affects eight out of ten people at least once in their lives.
This pathology can manifest itself in various ways:
– in the middle of the back, in the area of the vertebrae
– evenly in the area of the muscles
– at the bottom and side of the back (sacro-iliac pain)
– in the buttock and thigh (lumbosciatica)
– in the calf (sciatica).
Back pain may have mechanical causes (they affect the vertebrae and muscles) or non-mechanical causes (they may cause back pain, but they are not actually in the back), but regardless of the type, one thing is certain.
Low back pain is caused by poorly functioning and weak muscles. Malfunctioning, in practice, leads the vertebrae to develop pathologies such as disc protrusion, herniated disc or spondylolisthesis. When this happens, people are affected by back pain and the pain, unfortunately, has a significant negative impact on their quality of life.
To alleviate back pain, therapy usually involves the use of medication to alleviate suffering, combined with lumbar stabilisation programmes with targeted exercises.
Is it possible to prevent back pain by training the lumbar muscles?
Research in hand has shown that strengthening the muscles in a preventive manner can help relieve pain and increase the functionality of the lower back muscles, with superior results to classic therapeutic interventions in which drugs are used.
Bottom line?
For a strong, injury-proof lower back, training the lower back consistently is definitely a decisive strategy. This is the way to go, even if you have already experienced some lower back pain. If you no longer have any pain, you will most likely feel a little fear at the mere thought of resuming your usual training, but you should rest assured.
With the Lower back machine from TECA Fitness, you can restore function to your lower back easily and, above all, safely, as the equipment allows you to modulate the range of movement and load in full respect of human physiology.
But before we find out what the strengths of the machine are, let’s try to better understand how the lower back muscles work and how they should be trained.
Lower back, muscles involved and function
In the lumbar region there are several muscles, called lumbar muscles for convenience: erector spinae (divided into three different bundles), multifidus and quadratus lumborum.
The erector spinae (composed of the iliocostalis, the longissimus dorsi and the spinalis), placed superficially, acts together with the rectus abdominis and the external oblique and are involved in two types of actions
– primary – movement
– secondary – stabilisation.
On the other hand, the multifidus is a deeper muscle that together with the semispinal and rotators extends the lumbar spine, increasing its lordosis and also acts as a rotator at the thoracic level.
Finally, the quadratus lumborum tilts the torso to the side (when standing upright) and elevates the pelvis.
In practice, the muscles of the lumbar region have a purely stabilising function (maintaining correct posture). Their contraction makes it possible to maintain an upright station or to walk and run while keeping the torso upright.
As you can see, the lumbar muscles are very active in everyday life but this does not mean that they should be neglected.
On the contrary, they should be trained like all the other muscles and to optimise results, it is important to vary the stimuli and use different types of contractions (isometric, concentric-eccentric), in other words both static and dynamic work.
Moving on to practice, there are a few exercises to train the lower back (such as Roman bench hyperextensions), but the most effective way is to use a machine such as TECA’s Lower back.
Here’s why.
An exercise such as hyperextensions partially isolates the lumbar spine, but while performing this exercise, the overall forces on the spine are quite high. In other words, proposing hyperextensions in subjects at risk of low back pain, with recurring episodes or daily discomfort, can only worsen the situation.
The solution, therefore, is only one: use the Lower back TECA, for an effective and, above all, safe exercise.
Lower back, how to perform the exercise correctly
In order for this exercise to work well and really strengthen the lumbar structure, the machine’s adjustment is crucial. Make sure that the upper padding is in contact with your shoulder blades and your glutes firmly on the seat of the machine. During the movement, it is essential that the buttocks never move from this position.
Place your hands on your knees and start pushing your weight backwards in a slow, controlled movement without jerking.
Maintain the peak contraction for a couple of seconds, then return to the starting position, resisting the weight (don’t let the load bring you back to the starting point).
Why does Lower back TECA have an edge?
Compared to other similar machines, the machine designed by TECA allows you to train all your extensor muscles in a simple, comfortable and safe way. Equipped with a height-adjustable seat, Lower back TECA allows the centre of rotation of the tool to coincide with the point of extension of the spine, for a more correct exercise, in full respect of the physiology of movement.
By using small tricks (bringing the neck into double chin), it is also possible to train people suffering from cervical hyperlordosis and dorsal hyperphosis. Conversely, bringing the neck into forced lordosis (looking at the ceiling during the exercise) makes it perfect for those with a flat back and flattened cervical lordosis.
The ROM limiter allows you to limit the range of motion to accommodate your individual muscular-articularity.
When to use the Lower back?
Use it on the days dedicated to training the back, to complete the work on the posterior chain, or at the beginning of your training for the lower limbs, with the aim of preparing the lumbar zone for the efforts it will have to sustain, favouring high repetition sets and placing emphasis on correct execution technique.
For your gym contact Teca Fitness
To train your lower back muscles or to find out about all the solutions and choose the best professional gym equipment, contact Teca Fitness. For more information on the products contact us by email at info@tecafitness.com or call us on 085.903301. We are waiting for you in Via Vestina 346, 65015 Montesilvano (PE).
