How weight Training Can Harm You and the Solution

Filed under: Sports Health & Fitness by: Bullet

Working out on weight machines builds muscle that has no significant functional application. What happens is that the small, stabilizing muscles that support the major muscle groups aren’t built up, because the machine is providing the stabilization.

So even though major muscle groups are strengthened, when the weight machine isn’t there providing support there’s a muscle that provides a strong contraction with little to no stabilizing support . This is counter-productive for an athlete in triathlon or duathlon training, cycling and bike workouts etc, and can also cause injury.

Functional exercises are a stacks better alternative . Functional movement patterns simulate many of the same movements our “primal ancestors” ( cavemen ) would have performed when surviving , whether tracking a wild animal ( or being chased by one ), lifting objects such as logs and rocks, orcombat via swinging, throwing, and pulling ( such as a bow ).

Let’s split these functional movement patterns into 7 basic types .

Squatting: Involves bending at the knees and the hips, while keeping the back straight, and lifting a weight from the ground or pushing a weight that is located on the back or chest. Imagine your primal ancestors squatting down and lifting a heavy rock to dig for grubs, or using the legs and hips to lift a heavy log up onto a primal structure. Exercise examples: Barbell or Dumbbell Squat, Squat to Press.
Bending: Involves flexing and extending at the waist, preferably in a standing position . This would often have been combined with a squatting, lifting, or rotating motion, such as hoisting a heavy rock out of a field. Exercise examples: Medicine Ball Overhead or Side Throw, Dead-lifts.
Lunging: Involves stepping forwards with just one leg, and bending that leg down. This motion would have been used for either traversing terrain, carrying hunted game over a log, or stepping into a spear throw. Exercise examples: Walking Lunge, Barbell or Dumbbell Weighted Lunge, Medicine Ball Lunge with twisting.
Pushing: Forcing weight up or out from the body is an action that might have been used, when herding animals, pushing a plow, or hoisting a weight overhead. Exercise examples: Standing Cable Chest Press, Push-up, Standing Dumbbell Shoulder Press.
Pulling: Involves using the arms, chest, and shoulders, as well as the legs, to drag or pull a weight towards the body, which would have been used to Pull dead animals, row across water, draw a bow or lift yourself into a tree for safety. Exercise examples: Standing High, Mid, and Low Cable Rows, Pull-ups.
Twisting involves turning and rotating with the torso to apply a force. The other movements mentions so far would usually accompany this one . A twist combined with a lunge and push would comprise a throwing motion. Exercise examples: Medicine Ball Throws, Cable Torso Twists, Medicine Ball Woodchoppers.
Gait: Involves moving over terrain, whether walking, jogging, or sprinting. This action would often have been interspersed with other movement patterns, such as walking to track a wild animal, sprinting to hunt it down, then twisting, lunging, and pushing to throw or thrust a weapon. Exercise examples: Sprint to Medicine Ball Throw, Dumbbell Lift and Press to Power Skip.

There are stacks of ways that these movement patterns can be combined to design a workout routine, but there are only a fewoptimum choices. You can see how for athletes – triathlete & duathlon training, cycling and bike workouts, this data is really significant.

Shape 21, is a great book that gives the knowledge to put these movements together into a routine that allows for the ideal balance between muscle groups, effective caloric burning, fat utilization, and metabolic boosting, and injury avoidance. It also includes grocery shopping lists, a nutritional plans, and a range of functional workout programs from beginner to intermediate to advanced, so I really recommend it.

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