Functional training – not just for athletes!!!

 

You may have heard of functional training before or have even seen a video showing these functional exercises and how it uses multiple body part movements in order to achieve a greater result.  Functional fitness exercises are designed to train and develop your muscles to make it easier and safer to perform everyday activities, such as yard/house work, playing with your kids or grand children or just getting in and out of the tub or bed.

 

Functional exercises train your muscles to work together and prepare them for everyday activities by bring together movements you might do at home, at work or in sports into one exercise or movement. Functional exercises usually use muscles from both the upper and lower body at the same time while also engaging your core stabilizers (abdominal to low back and gluts).

 

Functional training is more readily know as sport specific training or exercises that prepare you for any given physical endeavour.  Does that mean that if is useless or pointless for those of us who don’t play sports?  ABSOLUTELY NOT!!!  Far from it actually; in my opinion functional training plays an even more important role in the “non-athlete,” or those of us who don’t participate in regular sporting activities.

 

Athletes or those of us who play sports regularly, recreationally or intermittently do have a greater chance of getting an injury while participating in sporting activities.  Sometime there is nothing that can be done to stop an injury on the field of play, however, because of the amount of instability that they encounter while playing, their bodies are better equipped to react in order to regain their balance and functionality of their muscles.  Therefore, when they encounter a daily activity such as bring in groceries, slipping on a wet floor or just tying up their shoes, their bodies and muscles have the memory and recognition to be able to react and compensate before a fall or injury occurs.  That isn’t to say that an injury will occur doing those activities to a “non-athlete” but the ability to perform the activity with greater ease is higher in the more functional person.

 

So, the first step to any fitness or exercise program for anyone regardless of their athletic ability, body type, size/weight or frequency of activity should be to determine the physical imbalances in their body.  We want to know the areas of imbalance for a few reasons; first, so that we don’t continue on the same path and compound the problems making them even harder to correct.  Second, so that we can rule out any underlying injury that may be the cause of the issue and fix that area as well. And, third, so that we can be conscious of the stresses that we are placing on our body on a regular basis just buy doing the simple every day activities in our lives.  Once we have assessed our weaknesses or areas that need improvement we can then design an action plan to improve and repair all of the areas affected making everyday life activities easier to do.

 

Without knowing you or seeing your test results, I feel very confident to say that you have a difference in your balance from one foot to the other and then your stability really goes for a shit when you attempt to stand on one leg with your eyes closed.  Try it right now!  Stand up and lift one leg in the air by bringing your knee to your chest and hold it there for 5 seconds with your hands either on your hips or out to the side.  Now try in with your other leg.  Which one was weaker and left you with more difficulty keeping your balance?  Now if you really want to how bad things are, do the test again, only this time close your eyes and see how long you can keep your balance for.  I’m guessing that you were shaking and doing your best to keep upright, probably even grabbing for anything to keep you from toppling over.  This is just one of the functional and balance tests that you will find in our “Functional & Stability testing and Strengthening guide.”  It’s not your fault that this tiny little test seems so monumental to accomplish because you have never been taught the importance of having a functional body.  We are here to show and educate you about the importance of having a balanced and functional body for getting in shape, staying in shape, or just making your everyday life easier.

Diet is a 4 letter word…

Have you ever noticed that all of the really “bad” words out there all have four letters in them?   Think about it for a minute, words that we deem to be bad or offensive have 4 letters in them.  S&%t, piss, c$#k, f@&k and c#$t.  Do you see a pattern emerging because I sure do and that pattern is that 4 letter words are bad.

There are two (2) very distinct words in the English language that are far worse than any of the above mentioned when achieving your healthy lifestyle and fitness goals.  The first one is “can’t” (I will discuss this in length at another time) and this is without a doubt the worst word ever created and not just for health, but in every facet of your life.  The second word is “diet.”

So, why is “diet” such a bad word?  Let me turn that around and ask you this question.  What is the first thing that comes to mind when you hear the phrase, “I’m on a diet?”  I’m willing to bet all of the little shoes in munchkin land that it isn’t a positive though on your part.  Odds are that a few key thoughts crept in such as, “what aren’t you allowed to eat? Good luck with that (sarcastically) or how long are you doing that for?”  Was I close?  Thought so.

This is the very reason why diets don’t work; they have a time-line associated with them and we don’t believe that they will work even if we are the ones on them.  Having a time-line for your health is one of the dumbest things/concepts that I have ever heard.  Imagine saying that you are only going to be healthy for 6 weeks and then I’m going to be fat and unable to tie my shoes again…sounds pretty ridiculous doesn’t it? Well, that is essentially what you are saying when you say you are going on a “diet;” that you only plan to eat well until you lose “a few pounds” and then you go right back to eating like shit.  Then you get stuck in a vicious circle that repeats itself over and over again.

Think for a minute about your car and that the gas that was supposed to be put in is premium.  You follow the instruction for a while, but the gas prices are so high that you start sneaking in the cheap stuff every now and then.  No big deal right?  Eventually the now and then becomes the norm and you only give it premium on occasion.  What do you think would happen to your car’s engine and performance?  You know exactly what would happen and the same thing happens to your body, but because you aren’t making a regular monthly payment on it you think it’s ok to neglect it and go on a “diet” every now and then to get it back into working order.  It doesn’t work that way and neither do diets.

There is no time-line on your health, so screw the diet and eat nutritionally dense foods regularly and fill up your tank with premium fuel.  I’m not advocating never eating bad food again because that is ridiculous and we still need to live and enjoy life.  So, enjoy the best life that you can by eliminating “diets” and fueling the tank with premium.

 

Kyle

How-to fix your health