Heavy lifting, HIIIT training, and running were essential parts of Zanna van Dijk’s workout regimen, but that changed after she suffered a serious bowel injury. The famous fitness influencer was forced to take a break from training for a couple of months and turned to Pilates during her recovery process.
Van Dijk discussed her recovery in a recent interview with Evening Standard and said she was struggling to rebuild her strength after a life-threatening injury, but everything changed once she added Pilates to the mix.
“I started doing clinical Pilates to make myself regain my core strength. When I first started going to Pilates, I had a three-inch gap between my abdomen muscles, whereas now it’s all back together. It has made it super strong and I can do heavy deadlifts again,” said Van Dijk.
Adidas’ global ambassador also came to discover that you can strengthen your core without doing crunches and replaced them with other more functional exercises.
“In the depths of my rehab, for the first three months, I was doing core rehab every single day with isometric hold exercises like plank, and variations of bear crawls, where you hold your body in a particular position to challenge your core,” explained Zanna van Dijk.
