Fitness and Other Stuff...

Traditional weight training was first brought to us by body builders of the 1980's. We were shown unbelievable physiques that seemed almost unrealistic. Body Builders would exercise using isolation exercises to "pump" up each of their muscles individually.

Fast forward to the future of today, science has shown us that our body does not produce maximal force in isolation exercises. In fact, compound exercises are essential for overall calorie expenditure and proper body functioning. Our muscles are controlled by our nervous system. When a force is applied on our muscles, our nerves, which are found inside and around our muscles send important messages to our brain which relay a signal for our muscles to contract. The more nerve and muscle fibers we activate the harder our body has to work, and develop new pathways to send information.

Sports Conditioning is a combination of training Balance, Movement and Strength. Through these 3 major components, we can train our entire body to move and function the way it should while still gaining muscle size or "hypertrophy". Functional Fitness is training our bodies for everday movements that we need to perform such as picking up a bucket and putting it on a shelf.

As our daily lives become more and more sedentary, we are slowly losing our everyday body movements such as our range of motion of squatting on a chair, to using our backs instead of our legs to pick up a heavy object. Sitting at our desk jobs 8 hours a day has produced major lower and upper back issues as our shoulders become more rounded, and less retracted. As a result, our posture becomes extremely poor.

But many youth and heavy strength trainers still do not realize the importance of Sports Conditioning, functionally training their bodies. If they were to realize the potential and educate themselves on proper technique, their desired musculature could be reached much more rapidly. The overweight population can achieve their desired body fat loss at rates they have never seen before.

It is time we adopt the way in which are professional athletes are trained by our professional trainers. Professional athletes train for functionality, and in essence, there isn't a lot of difference between Sports Conditioning and Functional Fitness. Both everyday people and bodybuilders can learn something from science. Fitness is about opening your mind and allowing science to progress as the health and fitness industry evolves.