The Guaranteed Way to Make an Exercise More Challenging? Do It on a Stability Ball

5 years ago

The surefire way to make any exercise move harder? Do it on a stability ball. Stability ball exercises are a $20 way to take your floor routine to the next level, adding a bonus level of dynamism to your workout. “Adding a stability ball to an exercise can take a basic move from ‘I can do this in my sleep,’ to ‘this is the most challenging thing I have ever done,’” says Tiffani Robbins, director of the sculpt program at NYC’s Fithouse.

This happens because your core has to fire up to do work in addition to whatever other exercise you’re doing, and that means a major payoff. “Stability balls challenge both balance and stability, which are a part of functional training that should not be overlooked since they are a huge aspect of our daily lives,” Robbins tells me. “Working with any type of unstable surface or object will automatically recruit additional muscles when performing certain moves. When adding a stability ball to an exercise, your core will have to engage more to find balance than when you do the the move without it.”

That added muscular engagement ultimately has other positive side effects, too. “There are two standout benefits that come to mind when I think of the stability ball: Improved spinal stabilization and increased use of muscle fibers during a given exercise,” explains Nicole Petitto, senior manager of group fitness and co-creator of the Pilates Remix class at Equinox. “The stability ball is also ideal for increasing core strength, balance, and coordination.”

What size stability ball should I use?

When it comes to picking out which stability ball to use, size does matter: If you’re between 4.5- to 5-feet tall, use a 45-centimeter ball, if you’re between 5- to 6-feet tall, use a 55-centimeter ball, and if you’re over 6-feet tall, use a 65- to 75-centimeter ball. An easy way to test it, says Robbins, is to sit on a ball with your feet on the floor, and make sure your knees are out at 90-degrees.

Another thing to assess? Make sure to check your equipment for over-inflation, punctures, or worn areas, so you can be sure it will be able to function properly and support your bodyweight (instead of collapsing or falling out from under you). “When working with a stability ball, you may notice a heightened awareness of your posture, a deeper connection and engagement to the core, and the identification of where potential muscle imbalances may lie within the body,” says Petitto. “Aside from providing a greater level of intensity to a given exercise, the stability ball also offers immediate feedback to the body that can improve your alignment and the proper execution of a movement pattern.”

You can up the ante on just about any regular ole exercise by turning it into a stability ball exercise. For example, Robbins loves to add them to abdominal work, while Petitto makes them a part of her Pilates routine. A few pro tips, no matter how you decide to use them: “I usually program movements to be performed in a slower and more controlled manner to ensure the level of safety of an exercise,” says Petitto, noting that anyone just getting started with their stability ball routines should “begin with the most regressed version of an exercise and slowly build to find the level of challenge that is right.”

If you’ve got certain medical conditions like balance disorders, dizziness, osteoporosis, or epilepsy, you may want to be careful about introducing a stability ball into your regimen. Even if you don’t have any of those conditions, starting your stability ball exercises with a personal trainer can help (or at least, have someone there to spot you for the first few times you try them), and be sure to only bring a move onto the ball once you’ve mastered it on the floor.

“A lot of time people hate stability balls because they think they can’t find their balance, which is obviously the point,” says Amanda Kloots, creator of AK! Body. As anyone who has ever tried any sort of a workout on top of a stability ball knows, balancing makes things a whole lot harder, and of course, a whole lot more effective. With all of that in mind, here are 16 stability ball exercises to make your mat moves more effective (and interesting) than usual.

Full body

Full body ball workout: This one’s a killer, care of Kloots. Start standing up with the ball at your feet, and come forward climbing over it. Walk your hands out into a plank until your feet reach the ball, flexing them to keep the ball in place. “Hold both knees together, squeezing your inner thighs and your glutes, cupping the ball with your flexed feet,” says Kloots. Roll both knees into your chest with the ball held under your feet, then stretch them back out into a plank, “like a caterpillar,” Kloots explains.

Next, stand up, hold the ball above your head, and do 16 jumping jacks, bringing the ball up and down as you jump. Still standing with the ball over your head, bring your right knee up 16 times, and equal out on the left side. “It’s a great way to also work your heart, because any time you go down and up, you’re maximizing cardio,” says Kloots. “Then, when you hold the ball and you do those jumping jacks and then those leg-knee pulls on the right and left, you can feel your arms, and they will burn because that ball gets heavy, and you’re not used to holding something above your head like that. So it’s a great way to incorporate the stability ball into a cardio exercise, but also rolling yourself out working on stability and control of your abs.” Um, ouch.

Core

Stability ball plank knee tucks and plank to pike: Place your hands on the floor and your ankles on top of the stability ball in a plank position. Keeping your balance, carefully draw your knees into your chest by slightly lifting your hips and rolling the ball forward, then return to your starting plank position. Keeping your legs straight, pull your hips up in the air into a pike position, and then again, go back to your beginning plank position. Keep your shoulders over your hands and your core engaged the entire time.