Is good core bracing in itself enough to maintain good/safe form or should you still be striving to straighten out ur back more on deads and squats?
Not quite sure I follow your question, but if I understand the gist, I would say that bracing is a way to ensure that you keep your spine in as neutral of a position as possible and eliminate or at least minimize lumbar flexion. It’s all part of the same thing. Having had surgery to repair a herniated lumbar disk, this is something I work really hard on in squats and deads. If you’re bracing really hard, your lumbar should stay stable.
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Here’s what I do to brace in no particular order:
*try to push my midsection out to all sides whether I’m wearing a lifting belt or not
*arch my entire back from tailbone up to the neck (not through the neck)
*at the same time I arch my back, I try to anchor my sternum to my pelvis and then it follows naturally that I’m anchoring my mid section to my pelvis
There’s others thing I do that I don’t really think about anymore but that’s what I’ve got offhand.
P.S. I forgot about one important thing and it’s that I do a ‘power kegel’ while I’m doing all this other stuff. Like try to make the muscles work that are working when you try to stop peeing in mid-flow and when you’re trying to hold back a bad case of diarrhea at the same time. I know it sounds weird but I’m not kidding.
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They should be one and the same. Google Brian alsruhe breathing and bracing