Functional Strength Circuit Training
- Think about the physical tasks that you perform every day.
- Getting out of bed, walking up steps, standing from a chair, getting into a car, pulling weeds, loading a dishwasher, caring groceries?etc.
- The list is long, user-dependent, and defined by you and your current state of fitness.
- While some of these tasks may seem trivial, a lifetime of poor movement patterns will lead to back pain, neck soreness, knee damage as well as creating general levels of fatigue and soreness.
- FUNCTIONAL FITNESS TRAINING is aimed at performing exercises in an optimal, fluid, more precise movement pattern.
- This will allow you to accomplish these necessary activities with the least possible wear and tear while helping you to remain pain free in the performance of both mundane tasks and recreational activity.
- Fat loss and muscle gain…the human body defends its weight fiercely…the human brain adjusts to use as little energy as necessary to perform physical task, i.e. workout plateaus.
- The reason to exercise is to change your internal chemistry.
- It is the growth of fat burning enzymes that is the real purpose of exercise.
- Enzyme growth depends on how many ?BIG MUSCLE? exercises you are doing.
- The problem is not excess fat; it is the lack of trained muscle.
- One pound of extra muscle burns 50 new calories per day at rest.
- A stronger body=higher metabolism (you burn more sugar before it becomes stored as fat).
- BUT, no exercise regimen will ever make-up for a bad diet.
- THE OLDER FOLKS?as we age, we lose functional capacity.
- After age 30, the aging process causes muscle to gradually shrink at about 1 pound per year.
- After age 50, strength declines to a greater degree.
- Muscle POWER begins to decline sooner and more rapidly than muscle strength (POWER is moving your foot from the gas pedal to the brake in an emergency).
- Age slows the recovery process; you need more rest between hard workouts because it takes tissue longer to repair.
- Intense, heavy exercise for you, creates micro-tears in muscle and micro-fractures in bone tissue. This forces the brain to repair tissue while at rest (sleep) which creates dense, lean muscle and stronger, thicker bones.
- IT IS NOT EASY to lose fat, build muscle, and become fit.
- We are all different, some people have more fat cells, some have a high resting metabolic rate?
- THEREFORE: Do not be impatient, improvements take time, at least a year.
- Make the training ?Real?. It should be multi-planar, multi-joint resistance that stimulates movement from everyday life: squatting, pushing, stepping, pulling and mid-line stabilization.
- ADAPT AND ADJUST: There is a certain level of intensity (overload) needed to change your internal chemistry to signal your DNA to code the enzymes to build the muscle stronger.
- You need to undertake a ?new stress? to continue to the next level of improvement. When training becomes easier (adaptation), you need to enhance (adjust) the training to make it harder.
- You want to PUSH your limits, do not EXCEED them. Technique of movement must be the primary focus.
- One good repetition done the best as you can is far better than 10 poor ones.
- You do not want to strengthen dysfunction. You want to prevent injury.
- Stand tall (mid-line stabilization)
- Move feet slightly wider than shoulders
- Toes should angle out slightly
- Flex back at hip joint, reaching back with buttocks
- Weight is on the heels and ball of the foot, you should be able to wiggle your toes
- Extend arms to counter-balance
- Sit down to get hip level to knee or lower if you are able
- Keep eyes straight ahead, do not lift or lower chin
- Keep shoulders rolled back (robin breast) and behind knee
- Keep a flat low back
- Knee should track in line with toes
- To stand, push heels into floor, raising your hips first then shoulders unfold?do not raise upper body first
Assist to make movement easier by: Use a sturdy support, hold onto support to help you sit back and down.
Enhance: To make this harder by:
The goal of all this hard work and effort is to enable you to live your life, not to just survive, but actually be younger biologically. Yes, younger! Scientist can now measure the little stands of genetic material at the end of chromosomes call telemeres. They get shorter as you grow older. But we have recently learned that they can shorten at a slower rate or even stop shortening. You want to live your life like an incandescent light bulb, not a fluorescent bulb that flickers at the end, but one that burns brightly and then suddenly goes out.
To learn more and experience this first hand, come and join us every Saturday 11am at Hazel Park for the par course primer.
To see us demonstrate this view our videos:
Yours in health,
Frank Sullivan BA, MA
Dr. Lynne Sullivan