Tag: function

Muscle Power

Posted on by Michael Devon

A muscle will produce more force when it is used in integration with the other muscles in its fascially connected chain/sling.

To add to that, if you focus solely on “lifting heavy” weights on a limited range of motion exercise like the bench press (as evident by the picture), you’re packing on unfunctional muscle that can’t reach its full length potential when you need it to, away from the gym.

This can alter the tension relationships between your muscles and cause postural imbalances and injuries/pain further down the road.

It’s important that muscles function as they’re designed to and that exercise respects and enhances those functions.

We’re less about exercising and more about functioning. If you work to enhance the function of a muscle then as a byproduct you’re exercising, because if your muscle doesn’t function the way it should, then the simple act of trying to teach the muscle to perform that function will be a challenge on your muscular and nervous system, and produce the same benefit as exercise but with the added benefit of enhancing your muscle function.

The exercise pictured, the bench press, is not an exercise that you can learn or even relearn function for the pecs because it doesn’t allow the pec muscles to function the way they need to. It only isolates the pec muscles in one plane of motion, and with a limited range of motion that they rarely ever go through in the real world. Think about it, how often when you’re walking down the street or running when you play sports do you drop down to the floor, lie on your back and push weight off your chest? Or even drop to the ground and do a pushup for that matter? The answer is obviously, never! So this is an example of an arbitrary exercise that really doesn’t serve a functional purpose. Maybe for an offensive lineman on a professional football team, but even then they are standing upright when they are pushing someone off of them so the context of the bench press lift doesn’t carry over as much as we think it does.

The bench press lift itself is fairly limited and doesn’t train the rest of the fascial chain/sling that the pec muscle is a part of, so it’s not going to produce as much force or power because it’s just the pec muscle activating by itself.

Try this. Tap your index finger on your desk and feel/listen to the sound it makes when it contacts your desk. Now use your other hand to pull your index finger back (essentially winding it up) and then let your index finger slam down on the desk. It should produce a louder sound and feel more powerful than just tapping by itself. This example is showcasing how weak the muscle is when it works in isolation, but by pulling it back with your other hand you are involving more of the nearby muscles and stretching the fascia that houses it so when you let go it’s ready to produce more force because of more muscle recruitment achieved from a fuller range of motion.

So when you train your pecs, absent of their fascial connections, you’re missing out on the nearby muscles that the pecs attach to resulting in less power output. Additionally you aren’t getting a full range of motion (like your finger pulling back more) to get the pec fibers to stretch more, so that you can get a deeper contraction after the stretch. Although we’ve focused on the pecs as the example, the same can be said of every muscle on your body. The more muscles you can connect with a movement, and completing a larger range of motion will allow better force production and power from that muscle, resulting in overall better function.

When you have been used to a certain way of training and exercising your entire life, whether from high school athletics, body building magazines, commercial gym culture, or YouTube videos it can be hard to grasp the concepts of what real functional training aims to do. So if all of this doesn’t make complete sense, don’t fret, this is on the cutting edge of where the fitness industry is shifting and it challenges the brain and body at the same time. We’re here to help provide clarity and direction for those wanting to workout to enhance their function in life outside of the gym. This approach is different from general exercise to just get a workout in, versus exercising to improve the function of a muscle and a muscle chain/sling as described above. The latter will have the body in a healthier state and improve the overall fitness of the body, as opposed to becoming better at exercises we’re teaching your body how to become better at functions so it can perform in any given scenario.

For more visual examples demonstrating this concept, be sure to follow us on social media, @safunctionalfitness, to see exercise videos showcasing how we train entire muscle chains through entire ranges of motion.

Functional Resistance Training

Posted on by Michael Devon

Functional Patterns resistance training does not look the way resistance training looks in commercial gyms because traditional training isn’t functional. Pistol squats aren’t functional. Bench press isn’t functional. Deadlifts aren’t functional. How many times a day do you stop and squat on one leg, bench, deadlift, or do an isolated bicep curl when you’re moving in the real world? The muscles that these exercises train certainly function to help you move but not the way they’re being trained. It’s contextual. So you do need strong pecs and biceps as well as glutes and hamstrings but the way these muscles are being conditioned through traditional exercises doesn’t translate to how they need to function to help you move better in the real world. Your pecs and biceps help drive your arms and torso when you’re walking and strong glutes and hamstrings propel your pelvis and legs when you move. But since most of human movement is upright, on two legs, and horizontal in nature, vertical forces like squats, benches, and deads don’t have much transferability to realistic movements. Sure, those exercises will make you stronger but I say again, in what context? Are you squatting down the street or walking down the street?

Human Function

Posted on by Michael Devon

The human body has evolved to function in the way that it has through environmental stimulus from the natural world. In nature, a human would need to be efficient at walking, running, and throwing in order to survive. Just because we have changed our environment through technological innovation over the past several hundred years, does not negate the thousands of years that went into forming our body into what it is today.

There are specific ratios of movement, rotations, muscular tensions, and pressures that need to be coordinated in order to have efficient gait and throwing. Almost every movement that a human does is going to be a derivative of those patterns. By optimizing the length tension relationship of muscles through these patterns, you end up with a structure that is able to float in a sea of muscles and distribute force through entire kinetic chains as opposed to compressing joints and vertebrae with the impact of every step you take.

Our gym utilizes Functional Patterns training because FP seeks to codify and quantify the specific movement sequencing needed to optimize those patterns and get ordinary people to move in a closer approximation to an elite athlete.

Once these patterns are instituted, progressive overload can be utilized to build muscle that serves a functional purpose rather than isolated muscle that makes us clunky and inefficient movers.

Auto Mechanic vs Body Mechanic

Posted on by Michael Devon

When your check engine light comes on in your car or you hear an unfamiliar sound when you’re driving it, you know something is wrong and you take it in to the shop for a mechanic to evaluate what’s wrong. You wouldn’t chance driving a malfunctioning car at 70 m.p.h. because there is a lot of risk if something is wrong with your engine or your brakes aren’t working properly when you’re driving at high speeds. So why do you treat your body any differently? When your knee hurts when you walk, or your shoulder hurts when you carry a bag, or your lower back is in pain every morning when you get out of bed, that’s your body’s “check engine light” and it’s telling you that something is wrong and you should get it checked out.

The same way a car mechanic addresses the problems with your car, that’s how our team of trainers views and treats the problems with your body. We don’t want you operating at “high speeds” when your body isn’t functioning properly to support your movement. We aim to correct what is wrong so that your function doesn’t create more problems in your joints from faulty body mechanics. The human body was born to walk, and eventually run, literally the way our species evolved was by using our muscles in this fashion. So if you can’t perform one or both of these fundamental functions without some form of ache or pain, then your body isn’t functioning optimally. When your body isn’t functioning optimally it can still find ways to move and mask the pain, learn to live with the pain, or avoid the problem entirely. But this isn’t conducive to overall health and fitness.

If you took your car to the car mechanic and they told you everything is fixed and working now…as long as you don’t drive over 50 m.p.h., make a left turn, or put your car in reverse everything will be fine. You’d likely except them to keep working on it until you can use your car safely on the roads. When we initially meet with you, we take an intake of what functions you have problems performing and we work with you to fix these dysfunctions in order to truly function without any consequences or restrictions. If someone comes in with shoulder pain, we wouldn’t say don’t raise your arm past your shoulder, drive with that arm, or carry your groceries with that arm and everything will be okay. That would be the same issue with your auto mechanic not fully fixing your car. We would be teaching people to avoid the problem and not getting at the root to fix it.

When working with us you should feel as though your mechanical dysfunctions, joint problems, muscle aches, etc., are on the path to getting resolved as we troubleshoot what is causing the malfunction rather than just having you avoid the issue. Avoiding the issue doesn’t do anything for your function in the real world, avoiding bending your knee, twisting your spine, or raising your arm overhead when you are performing exercise might make you feel like you’re getting stronger but it’s because you’re not allowing your body to encounter these problematic functions. But what happens when you need to bend your knee, or twist, or raise your arm up in real life? Dysfunction and pain! It’s time you start addressing these issues when you exercise to start creating a better path of movement without restriction.

Book your initial consult to start learning what muscles function and what muscles don’t, and how revealing this is the first step towards regaining your freedom of movement…without having to remind yourself not to use a part of your body so it doesn’t hurt, that’s not true function. You, or your trainer, or your therapist are avoiding the problem if you aren’t actively testing ways to address and correct it, and while we don’t guarantee an over-night fix of the problem, we will do what’s necessary for your body to start fixing the underlying issue and get on the path to healing. This is what separates us from your typical gym trainer, we have tools on our tool belt that nobody else does. The sharpest tools in our shed come from Functional Patterns! So stop spinning your wheels with what the mainstream fitness and rehab field dish out, hoping pain relief and function will come back when you need to start taking steps to make it happen, we will help guide your steps down a sustainable path towards health and fitness. Come check out the less beaten path at our gym!

Fitness: The Ability To Adapt To Your Environment

Posted on by Michael Devon

At this gym we take the mind and muscle connection to a deeper level of understanding and coordination to ensure you get results and not an injury!

You see it’s not enough to think of one muscle while you’re exercising, because when you’re being human and moving your body around like a human body is designed to move (with all its neuromyofascial connections) you have multiple muscles working at the same time- in coordination with each other to facilitate motion. In reality, an isolated muscle contraction can’t do anything to cause better movement, because an isolated muscle contraction does not exist… except in the gym.

Training to stimulate one muscle at a time creates a broken kinetic chain, which is what your body utilizes to function, move, and perform in the real world. Instead of just focusing on the legs or arms, we teach you to integrate your lower body with your core, and with your upper body. Then you learn to use those muscles to move your body through a specific exercise pattern that makes integrating those muscles more feasible. You’re verbally cued to position your bones and joints a certain way to start the exercise, move through the exercise, and finish the exercise so your muscles learn to automatically contract when your body moves through certain positions. Then we pattern exercises to mirror the positions your body moves through most in the real world, so your muscles contract properly during activities away from the gym.

If you’re still blindly performing an exercise for the sake of exercise, and not sure what or where you should feel muscle activity then you’re selling yourself short and not making the most of your time in the gym. We all have busy lives and struggle to fit exercise into our schedules, so you might as well make the most of every minute by mentally controlling the physical actions of your body during a workout. The mental coordination to position your body to produce proper muscle activity can be overwhelming at first, that’s why we help guide you through the process to ensure you’re building your body up and not breaking it down. We show you how your body prefers the path of least resistance and will easily compensate it’s way through an exercise, but then we correct your compensational movements by retraining your brain to recognize the difference and ingraining the correct form of body mechanics to serve your body in the gym, and away from the gym- enhancing your fitness, aka your ability to adapt to any environment and fulfill the task at hand!

If this all sounds super intimidating, don’t worry, because this is what we take care of for you. We hash out all the technical difficulties on our end so you don’t have to figure out what exercises will help or hinder you. If you want results, thats what this gym is about! Contact us today to find the answers your body needs to make real changes that last.

Why We Build Your Body For Life Outside The Gym

Posted on by Michael Devon

When your training doesn’t involve rational components, your function away from the gym diminishes, because in reality the human body moves via macro and micro rotations. Perhaps not overnight, but eventually routine tasks you used to be able to do without any repercussions become a chore on your body. Playing a game of golf on the weekend leaves you feeling like you just ran a marathon, you start noticing little aches and pains that had been there for awhile but now they’re becoming less tolerable. Since none of this happens overnight you’ll start to blame your age and say it’s just a part of getting older. It can be, if you don’t take the necessary steps to prevent the degeneration.

If you’ve been following us or training with us in person or online, you know we teach you how to become a functional being without the pains you used to have to live with. We guide you along the right stepping stones to continue making progress from your first session! The exercises don’t always look so hard but you quickly find out that looks can be deceiving when you execute the movement correctly.

We educate you on what you should be feeling and when/how to produce the contractions naturally during the exercise. We don’t just count reps until you’re done working out, we’re with you every step of the way to ensure your body and your brain get the most of your time in the gym, to get more out of your time away from the gym!

Stretching, Evolved.

Posted on by Michael Devon

Evolve the way you “stretch” your muscles 


We condition muscles, along with the fascia that surrounds them, to lengthen and shorten through an entire rep. Thus we are stretching and exercising all in one move


The benefit to this simultaneous coordination is that the muscles are preserving their elasticity (ability to elongate and then recoil to their original position) which is key to moving well and without joint damage.


We know that flexibility is important to overall function, but the way we push extreme ranges of motion in a static stretching position (pictured) is damaging this function of your muscles. The range of motion achieved in a pose does not automatically translate to improved flexibility when you’re actively using your muscles to move.


That’s why we train the kinetic chain to actively contract (shorten) and then stretch (lengthen) muscles while the body is moving. Then we improve flexibility by gently testing the spectrums of available range of motions that the body is capable of getting into and then out of, using the muscles. This is important because the body can achieve a range of motion (sometimes forced and painful as in a deep stretch, other times accidentally just by moving the wrong way) from the force of gravity alone. So instead of leaving ranges of motion to chance, we teach the muscles how to guide and control those ranges. 

 

The exercises we utilize are built around the core staying engaged, while the surrounding muscles go through their series of contractions and stretches. A basic explanation of a more effective way to “stretch” while still respecting the functions of the human body.

Proper Muscle Function

Posted on by Michael Devon

Without proper muscle activity, physical activity suffers. If your muscles don’t work when you work, your body picks up the slack in deficit ways.

Walking the dogs, playing tennis, exercising, standing, and moving all require functional muscles if you want to do them without consequences.

We will teach your body (and brain) how to activate your muscles to support the actions required of your body. Placing the demand on your muscles rather than your joints and ligaments.

Welcoming new clients of all ages and stages of life who want to change the way they exercise to build a better body for the demands of the real world.

Dysfunctional Muscle

Posted on by Michael Devon

Work around dysfunctional muscles and movement impairments cumulate. Work through the nitty gritty of retraining the kinetic chain to optimal function and expect a return to quality of life and freedom to move!

The way you train determines the outcome. Proper exercise patterns that respect human movements, or arbitrarily lifting weights the way you see in most gyms or fitness ads.

We aren’t your typical gym, we don’t push you to your limits of already poor movement, we push you to the edge of learning (mentally and physically) how your muscles should function, and why.

Contact us today to start reprogramming your brain and body for the reality it lives in. Otherwise, poor movement compounds and eventually leads to overuse, pain, and injuries that make life in the real world harder to live with.

Physical Fitness

Posted on by Michael Devon

If physical fitness only means big muscles and a 6 pack to you then you’ll likely encounter other detriments to your health over time. Fitness has more to do with your ability to function and perform in any given scenario without suffering from aches and pains- during and after.

Without prioritizing function in your training plan your health can suffer. Dysfunctional muscle mass compressing your ribcage can smash your intestines together and lead to GI issues. Or your lungs can no longer inflate properly so your basic nature to breathe becomes a big problem. Overly developed pecs compromise your posture, pulling your head forward out of alignment, leading to “unexplained” headaches that you’ll likely be prescribed meds for, entering the detrimental cycle of side effects that you’ll need another medication for…

You can’t have health without function. Prioritize function during your workouts to develop physical fitness and physiological well-being in the long run.