CORE muscles are those muscles that are DIRECTLY attached to the spine, hips and shoulder blades.

Core stabilization training focuses on utilizing your deep muscles by attempting to balance the underutilized deep core muscles and the overworked superficial muscles.

For example:

When exercising on a machine you are isolating a particular muscle or group of muscles. The focus is NOT on encouraging your CORE muscles to assist in stabilizing or supporting your body.

The Bottom Line:

The core muscles will be more utilized when there is a balance demand, because the nature of these muscles is to STABILIZE. Think of the core muscles as ‘reflex’ muscles.