Have you ever heard the term “functional training?” In this post, we will define functional training. We will also give some examples and some ways you can incorporate functional training into your workout program.
What is Functional Training?
Functional fitness training is any type of training that helps you to perform activities of daily living safer and more efficiently. Simply put, functional exercises emphasize motions you may use in your daily life like pulling, squatting, carrying, twisting or placing things overhead.
Functional exercise boosts balance, strength, coordination, stability and power to make activities of daily living easier.
Benefits of Functional Training?
Functional exercise improves your ability to perform activities of daily living with greater ease and less fatigue. It also broadens your abilities in sports and life and lowers the risk of slips, falls or other injuries while performing common activities. Finally, functional exercise training can also boost your health and provide some of the other common health benefits of a more general strength and exercise program.
What are some Functional Training Exercises?
Here are some functional fitness movements.
Squats are a very functional exercise. Throughout life, you will always need the ability to sit down and stand up from a chair. Practicing the squat exercise builds your leg strength and stamina so that you can always rise from a chair.
Deadlifts also improve your ability to safely perform activities of daily living. This movement helps you to build the strength to safely pick up loads from the floor, rake leaves and shovel snow.
Step ups prepare you to go up and down the stairs more safely and with better balance.
The clean and jerk or clean and press exercises prepare you to pick up a small child or suitcase and then hoist it overhead.
The farmers carry exercise is functional because it helps you to carry loads or groceries from your car.
Keep in mind however, that many other machine based or isolation exercises may also constitute functional fitness training. By helping you to build up your muscle strength and stability, they also help you perform common activities with more ease. So other exercises, like leg extensions, lat pulldowns or lateral raises, could also be considered functional.
How to Incorporate Functional Fitness
Incorporating functional fitness training exercises in your life is as simple as prioritizing exercises that mimic patterns you may use in daily life. For instance, incorporate squats, deadlifts, RDLS, farmer carries and clean and press movement patterns three to four times per week. Start with these power based exercises before progressing to more isolation exercises. Training these functional exercises with heavy weights and an explosive cadence for 3-5 reps per set will provide the most carryover to your daily life.
Final Thoughts
Functional training exercises can help improve your ability to perform daily tasks of living with more ease, stability and safety. Many exercises mimic the functions used in daily life and can be trained appropriately. Other isolation and machine based exercises can also boost stabilizer strength and stability, helping to make activities of daily living easier. As long as your resistance training exercises help serve a purpose, they can boost your function and make everyday life easier.
Need help creating a functional fitness routine that can improve your ability to perform tasks of daily living? Visit my personal training or online coaching pages.
