RSSRant: "Functional training" is bogus (Yes, I said it!)
July 10, 2011
 |
| Image by Andrew Malone. |
Functional training has roots in physical therapy where patients receive therapy to improve function lost due to disease or injury. Functional training is, similar to therapy, geared towards improving ADL (activities of daily living). But people striving to improve performance or body composition should do a lot more challenging work than people in rehab. Has the human race physically deteriorated so much that it is necessary to introduce exercise to make housework and carrying groceries easier?
I really dislike how functional training is marketed as the ultimate form of exercise. Flipping tires and swinging kettlebells is by some considered functional, at the same time weightlifting is discredited as pretty much useless. Nonetheless, kettlebells are not any more related to ADL than dumbbells. Both these tools are nothing more than exercise tools that are only as good as what you do with them.
What is considered functional anyway? The answer depends on what you are training for. No athletes will ever excel in their sport just by doing “functional training”, simply because it is lacking an essential component – specificity. Conversely, functional training advocates will write off isolation movements due to the fact that they are lacking generalization. If all of us trained by a generalized functional training model we would become better at banging on tires and whatever else we would be doing, but none of us would improve any specific performance or acquire a specific trait such as muscle hypertrophy. To become good at something requires years of specific, repetitive training of the desired skill or activity. As for ADL such as carrying groceries and climbing stairs, a "non-functional" bodybuilder can do that just as well, if not better, as someone engaging in functional training.
In fact, functional training often incorporates so-called non-functional exercises, such as push-ups or squats on unstable surfaces. What activities of daily life does that imitate?
My biggest beef with functional training advocates is that many of them will claim that exercises such as barbell deadlifts, chest presses, and biceps curls are not functional. Please tell me, how can any movement that is natural for our anatomy be non-functional?
Training is per definition functional. Stop the gimmicks and arrogance and do some real work instead.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
0 comments (+add yours?)
Post a Comment