Blog · Approach

Just give me the exercise

By Remko Opdam · 30 June 2026 · 4 min read

In short

Back pain rarely sits in the back. The cause is often a hip region that is not doing its share.
"Prescribing" one single exercise usually does not solve the underlying problem.
A good assessment comes before the right exercise, not the other way round.

Just give me the exercise. It is one of the questions I am asked most. And it makes sense. Something hurts, you want something concrete to work with. Even so, it is rarely the right starting point, and here is why.

Take back pain, which a lot of people carry around. Often someone has already seen a physiotherapist and remembered one thing: do the back extension and you will strengthen your back. So the question to me is simple. Which exercise exactly, and how do I do it. Learn that one movement, do it now and then, done.

The place that hurts is often not the problem

Back pain rarely sits in the back. Very often it sits around the hip. Those are the muscles that should be doing the heavy work when you stand, bend or lift. If they are not, your lower back takes over. It is not built for that, and in time it starts to protest.

Most people find that logical enough. And still the question stays stuck on that one exercise. So I just show it to them. That is how it went recently, when we had a few minutes left.

On the first or second repetition it came out by itself: "I mostly feel it pulling in my hamstring and my glute." Exactly. Not in the back.

The exercise someone is counting on often proves, within two repetitions, where the problem really is. Not in the back that hurts, but in the hip underneath it. That is no coincidence. An exercise chosen for the wrong reason frequently exposes exactly what is going on.

And even then: once every few weeks builds nothing

And suppose it was the right exercise. Even then, "every now and then" does not work. That is not how a body works. Muscles only get stronger if you give them a regular stimulus and let them recover in between. Leave weeks between attempts and you start from zero every time.

"But I do not want to become a bodybuilder" is the usual reaction. I understand it, and it always makes me smile a little. Driving 140 on the motorway does not make me Max Verstappen either. A few exercises will not turn you into a bodybuilder. The goal is not to get big. The goal is to get stronger, so that standing, lifting and moving become easy again.

My job is not handing out an exercise

This is exactly where I make the difference, and where the single-exercise idea goes wrong. My value is not in handing over a trick. It is in working out what is really going on, building a plan around it, measuring whether it works, and building it up so that after a while you can do it yourself.

An exercise is a tool. But a tool without direction and without consistency changes nothing. That is why I never start with "which exercise", but with "what do you want to achieve, and where are you stuck now".

What you can do with this yourself

Test your hip if you have back pain. Do you feel a back exercise mainly in your hamstrings and glutes rather than in your lower back? Then your limitation is probably in the hip, not the back.
Choose consistency over one-off attempts. One exercise every few weeks does nothing. Two or three exercises done consistently twice a week do the work. Repetition beats good intentions.
Start with your goal, not with the exercise. "Which exercise should I do" is the wrong first question. "What do I want to be able to do, and where am I stuck" decides which approach fits. The goal picks the exercise, not the other way round.

And if you have been training around a complaint for a while, have it looked at properly. Not the exercise you think you need, but what is genuinely underneath it.

Frequently asked questions

Why does one specific exercise often not fix my back pain?

One specific exercise often does not fix back pain because the back is usually not the real cause, it is the place that feels the consequences. Back complaints frequently start because muscles around the hip, the glutes in particular, are not doing enough when you move, bend or lift. The lower back takes that work over, it is not built for it, and in time it starts to protest. An exercise someone finds online, or remembers from a physiotherapist, usually targets the symptom rather than the reason the hip is not engaging. Without that diagnosis the complaint is likely to return, even if you do the exercise faithfully. An exercise can only really help once it is clear which part of your body is not pulling its weight, and why, instead of guessing from where it hurts.

How do I know whether my back pain is actually a hip problem?

A simple clue is where you actually feel an exercise: if a movement meant for your lower back pulls in your glutes or hamstrings instead, that is often a sign those muscles were not doing their share and are now taking over the heavy work. That is exactly what happens with many clients: on the first or second repetition they suddenly feel it somewhere they did not expect. A proper assessment by a trainer or therapist who looks beyond the painful spot usually brings this to light quickly. At Infinite Health we therefore always look at movement, and at how muscle groups work together, before choosing an exercise. In practice that takes no more than a few minutes during a session, and it saves you months of exercises that are not quite hitting the mark.

How long before I notice a difference if the cause is somewhere else?

It varies a lot, but most people notice something within two to six weeks, provided the cause is actually being worked on and not just the painful spot. The first thing that changes is usually not that the pain has gone, but that it appears less often or does not linger as long. That is an important signal: the pattern is starting to shift. Full recovery takes longer, particularly if the complaint has been around for years, because the compensation is ingrained and your body needs time to properly adopt a new way of moving. What almost never works is one session and then waiting. What does work is working consistently on the muscle group that is lagging, including in the weeks when you feel nothing much, because that is when the new pattern gets laid down.