Functional Movements
There is nothing wrong with wanting to look good and to have a nice body, in fact it’s hardwired into our DNA. Even when we were living in caves, aesthetic factors played a part in attracting the opposite sex. Just like other species, the weak, feeble or grossly overweight are often unsuccessful attracting a mate for reproduction. However, our quest for fitness and health was sent on a detour back in the 1970′s, thanks to the explosion in popularity of bodybuilding. The sole purpose of the isolating exercises performed by bodybuilders is to increase the size of a specific muscle. Not only does this increase in size have very little effect on the performance of the muscle, but the intrinsic properties of the isolation movements are without a doubt harmful to our joints. The knee and elbow joint for example, were not meant to work in isolation, they are smaller, weaker joints, (than the hip and shoulder) and are designed to lend assistance to the hip and shoulder, and to perform fine motor patterns. They are NOT designed to withstand the loads that isolating resistance training places on them. Despite the trend of the last 40 years, we can’t undo the evolution of the previous 200,000 years!
Fortunately, we can still achieve a great looking body by performing functional, instead of isolation movements. In fact, we can achieve this body in a much shorter period of time if we constantly vary these functional movements and do them at relatively high intensities. Best of all, we are then given a body that not only looks great, but can actually perform with a reduced chance of injury.
In short, if your trainer has you performing any exercises on a machine, or even free weight exercises that isolate a single muscle group, such as the bicep curl, or if you have a trainer and you aren’t familiar with the deadlift, clean, over head press, and push press, you should absolutely get a new trainer! Be sure and let your trainer know why you are leaving him/her, hopefull, over time, they will become educated and not subject future clients to these time wasting, health risks, they are currently so proficient at.
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Sports Performance WOD:
3 Rounds
4 Squat Cleans
8 Burpee/Knees to Elbow
10 Wall Balls
REST 2 minutes, REPEAT 3 times
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Monday’s WOD:
“Tabata Something Else”
20 seconds of WORK, followed by 10 seconds of REST
perform 8 sets of each exercise before moving on to next
score total number of reps
Pullups
Pushups
Situps
Squats
results:
