How Long Should You Hold The Plank Position?

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The plank is one of the simplest exercises you could ever imagine and yes, it actually works. Yep, even though we manage to complicate things and mess them around, it actually works!

All you have to do is get on the floor, facing the floor, and get in a position where you’re supporting your weight on the balls of your feet and your forearms. That’s it. Stop. Don’t do something else, don’t even think about complicating it, just stop.

You can change things about a bit, sure … for example you can put your feet closer together (which makes it a bit more difficult to balance) or you can move your forearms closer together (same results, more difficult to balance), but that’s about it. Oh, and you could raise one foot so you’re literally balancing on the ball of one foot only. That’s certainly a bit of a challenge. Okay, I suppose you could do it on one forearm, not two … or do it on one forearm and the ball of one foot, on the opposite side (it’s starting to get really awkward to balance now!), but that’s about it.

Hold on, I better back up a bit. What I meant when I said don’t do anything else, I meant just do the plank (whether the simplest version or one of the variations), and don’t do anything other than that. Specifically, I meant not to try to do l-o-n-g, drawn out planks, five minutes or more.

And the reason I said that is that there’s really no point. There’s nothing to be gained from it. The single thing it’s got going for it is that you can brag that you can hold the plank for five minutes. Woo-hoo! Wow! What an achievement!

And that’s it. And into the bargain you’ll be putting an unnecessary and unreasonable strain on your spine. You’ll be forcing your spine to support your bodyweight in an unusual position for an unusually long time. And for no good reason. Not a great idea!

In fact, according to Professor Stuart McGill, PhD, the ideal time to hold the plank position is just … wait for it … 10 seconds!