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I have a few exercises that I use with my students, that I call the “impossible exercises”, Well, they’re not exactly impossible, but its difficult to do them much, or we can do much less than we imagine we ought to be able to do. One is the transversus abdominis activator – lie on the back, arms crossed over chest, knees to chest, and then raise the sacrum a little bit off the floor. Surprisingly difficult. I get my students to learn the movement if they cant do it, by flinging the legs up a little bit and then getting the deep abdominals to come in at the end to give the legs and sacrum a little kick along the way. I hope this gives them the feeling of what activating the TA is like, so they can concentrate on that and enhance it. Why is it so difficult? This exercise is much easier if the legs are raised vertically instead (lying on one’s back). I think this shows why – when the knees are to the chest, the pelvis is tilted up towards the head at the front, so the TA is already shortened, so its difficult to make it contract more. Not sure if this is correct though. Maybe in that position other muscles can come in. Other impossible exercises are done on the front. One is a glut activator – lie on the front, one knee bent up to chest, other leg out straight behind. Then lift the straight leg off the floor, using the glutes – without bending the knee. I can do this on my flexible side, but only sometimes on my other side, and in neither case can I go far, or hold it for a long time. Many of my students can’t do it at all. To make it easier for them, I then get them to raise their hips up on a block, and then they can do it. Why is it so difficult? When standing, and not working against gravity, we can take our leg back at the hip much further than we can when on our front. I am not sure why, but it may be that with the knee bent to the chest, the pelvis (as in the previous case) is tilted up towards the head at the front, so the hip joint of the leg going back at the starting position, is already extended beyond its normal neutral position. So naturally it is more difficult to take it further. Again, I am not sure if this explains it fully. Another difficult one is the arch body hold. I and many of my students can passively (with our arms) push up quite high into a cobra. However we find it difficult to raise the upper body in the arch body hold more than a short distance, and difficult to hold it for a long time (though we are working on that). Why is the active range so very much less than the passive range? I think it might be just lack of strength (even on these people who are already stronger than the average). However it is a common gymnastic/contortion exercise to arch the upper body high just with back power, so the muscles are there – just not strong enough in us. Whether normal people need them that strong is another matter. Still, its frustrating that we are so bad. Same with the legs in the arch body hold. The active range is far less than the passive range (and unlike the earlier cases, the pelvis is in neutral, so there is no pre-contraction at the starting position which might explain the poor lift). Again, maybe lack of strength. If anyone has any views on this I’d appreciate hearing them, and whether they think my analysis is correct, because it is frustrating that we are so bad. If anyone cant understand the starting positions, I can post photos if needed. Thanks, Jim.