Falling and Catching

Image courtesy of cookinglight.com

In previous RTS courses that I have taken the thought has been brought up by Tom Purvis that gait is a series of falling and catching.  What I believe he means by this is when you walk you are allowing your center of mass to be outside of your base of support and then you transfer the responsibility of supporting your center of mass from one leg to the other.

In other words, you are never actually having to be perfectly balanced on one leg because your center of mass is constantly outside of your base of support.

For fun, I wanted to see if I could feel what he was talking about while walking one day.  What I noticed was that whatever foot was on the ground was lateral to where I assumed my center of mass to be.  Because of that it was a continuous series of right foot on the ground, fall to the left; catch with the left foot, left foot on the ground, fall to the right; catch with the right foot.

In fact, if I would pause for just a split second during the stance phase of gait, I would notice that the associated hip of the foot that was planted would immediately adduct so as to bring my center of mass back over my base of support.  If I kept a steady stride and didn't pause at all then that falling and catching pattern between my right and left feet continued.

This experience makes me question the use of single-leg balancing exercises, specifically those that are prescribed to people with the goal of improving their balance during gait, such as is the case with many exercise programs for senior citizens.  Again, this idea was brought up in class, but I wasn't able to fully grasp the question at hand until I experienced it for myself.

Image courtesy of stack.com

If someone's reason for prescribing single-leg balancing exercises is to improve their client's ability to balance while they walk, but while they walk they never actually balance on one leg, then is that exercise appropriate based on the person's goals?  I can justify answering this many ways, but I want to hear your thoughts.

Would it be possible to improve someone's balance and ability to walk by strengthening some of the muscles from the hips down, and do so in a more appropriate manner than just having them try to balance on one leg, such that all of the exercises are within their current structural and neuromuscular capabilities?

There's some food for thought.  Let me know what you think!

Your body.  Your training.

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