When Functional Training Stops Being Fun.

Functional training: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Functional_training

Crossfit, functional training and the like are sweeping the globe becoming ever more popular.  The selling point of these workouts is the emphasis on making training fun using explosive efforts, unusual challenges and what I call "big-bang" exercises; these use lots of muscles simultaneously, challenging stability and strength across multiple joints

Now don’t get me wrong; this is great stuff! Functional training is the best way to improve your movement skills, strength and improve vitality with one very important caveat. You have to have a functioning body to benefit from these functional exercises! When I say functional body, I mean this: Every joint is able to move through an optimal range of motion, stabilised under optimal muscular tension without compensation.

This is not the case with most people, most people you’ll find in the gym (even the fit looking ones!) have some form of dysfunction, shoulder impingements, restricted thoracic extension, SI joint instability etc etc…

If you are one of these people and you dive into a “functional” training program; stuff like tyre flips, Olympic lifts, pull-ups, kettle bells (the list is long….) then you are just waiting for a problem to flare-up. These exercises place huge demand on the whole body, they might be “functional” but that doesn’t mean they will do you any good!

A much better, but complex and more difficult to mass market (hence you don’t hear much of this at your local “globo-gym”) idea is to first work on exercises and stretches that will iron out your dysfunctions, improve your movement, strength and stability in your weak areas before you think about “going big” on the latest Crossfit WOD.

Now this might not get you the six pack abs or drop you a dress size in time for the office party but neither will it throw out your back, give you shooting pains or cause you to have to stop training for a couple of weeks whilst you recover from the “benefits” of your last workout. However if you take the time to lay the foundations with a bespoke program based on skilled assessment and add in functional training exercises as your body is ready for them you can be feeling, looking and training better than ever before without risk of injury. That sounds like fun to me!