05.20.08
Posted in Core Strength, Core Training System, General Info, Neuromuscular, Working Out at 9:26 am by Fit Guy
there is no cookie cutter approach to functional fitness, per se. sure, there might be general routine to follow, but the key is to realize that each exercise is also an assessment. for instance, i’ll have everyone start with the same basic exercises. however, each person will reveal different imbalances and need to correct “personalized” faults during the exercises. next, each person will need to add/subtract exercises based on their current level and personal progress. the starting routine is a rule of thumb, but it must always be designed to evolve with you.
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03.06.07
Posted in Core Strength, General Info, Neuromuscular, Posture at 7:15 pm by Fit Guy
It seems everyone is using Swiss Balls for rehab and sports performance, but why? The balls activate the “core” and also increase the spinal loading (i.e., not good for rehab). The ball activate the “core” while you are not standing in gravity and only partially dealing with ground reactive forces (i.e., not good for sports performance). The balls are good for a change of pace to stimulate the nervous system and a different workout, but not as the primary workout.
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02.28.07
Posted in General Info, Neuromuscular, Posture at 3:18 am by Fit Guy
I’ve received some emails about balance and posture and how the P.A.S.T. balance boards work to improve total body posture. Basically, the boards reduce your natural base of support to stimulate your centering reflexes and you instinctively align your body from the ground-up or you can’t stay on the center of the boards. It’s that simple! 
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02.23.07
Posted in General Info, Neuromuscular at 5:16 pm by Fit Guy
A joint needs to have stability, prior to mobility, right? Yes, unless it doesn’t! The joint integrity or optimal balance between mobility and stability needs to be ensured, but after that it’s not so straightforward. Often time’s mobility precedes stability or how else could a baby to learn crawl and walk? It’s no different than how the body NEVER stays still and a postural sway always guides are stance or in other words mobility is providing stability. The matter is complex like everything else to do with the human body and it’s not as simple as memorizing one way or the other, but it’s a matter of applying critical thought to each situation.
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02.16.07
Posted in General Info, Neuromuscular at 5:45 pm by Fit Guy
Dr Mel C Siff
Biomechanics and Movement Science listserver
Mon, 1 May 2000 23:18:21 EDT
The therapeutic and fitness training worlds still seem to place a heavy emphasis on an isolationist approach to physical testing and conditioning, without carefully identifying the situational limitations and scope whenever such as approach is used.
The therapeutic and fitness training worlds still seem to place a heavy emphasis on an isolationist approach to physical testing and conditioning, without carefully identifying the situational limitations and scope whenever such as approach is used.Attempts are made to test and train muscles individually. Few days pass without comments being made on isolating the upper or lower abdominals for training, selectively training the core of the body, activating transversus abdominis to ’stabilise the trunk’, testing for weaknesses or imbalances in certain muscle groups or explaining poor performance or injury on the basis of imbalance in some isolated system of the body.
The therapeutic and fitness training worlds still seem to place a heavy emphasis on an isolationist approach to physical testing and conditioning, without carefully identifying the situational limitations and scope whenever such as approach is used.Attempts are made to test and train muscles individually. Few days pass without comments being made on isolating the upper or lower abdominals for training, selectively training the core of the body, activating transversus abdominis to ’stabilise the trunk’, testing for weaknesses or imbalances in certain muscle groups or explaining poor performance or injury on the basis of imbalance in some isolated system of the body.
The body constitutes a linked system and, unless the scope and limitations of any given isolationist approach is meticulously identified, it is misleading and unwarranted to use and extrapolate findings based on isolationist methods. If one unquestioningly applies isolationist methods, then it is being assumed that the isolated area concerned constitutes a closed system. This implies further that this isolated system is not affected by or does not affect what happens in adjacent or other linked systems, or at least that any such interaction with other systems is insignificant.
The trunk, abdominals, lower extremity, knee and so forth are not closed systems and any action involving these subsystems influences what is happening in all parts of the body and the body as a whole. It is vital that the body be regarded in terms of a systems theoretical approach, rather than one which makes very tenuous assumptions about the closedness of conveniently isolated subsystems whose apparent isolation from other systems invariably is based entirely on convenience or convenience.
Even if one attempts to apply a systems theoretical approach, it may still be inadequate to regard the entire body as the superordinate closed system, as is implied, for instance, by the current somewhat simplistic emphasis on so-called “core training”. The limitations of the latter concept may readily be noticed if one observes that it is very rare in land-based sport for core stability to be manifested in the absence of contact with the ground or external objects. Peripheral stability, which usually is reliant on solid contact between the extremities of the body with some surface, is essential before core stability becomes implicated in a given sporting action on land.
Without adequate peripheral stabilisation, the functional capabilities of the “core” are meaningless. The entire body or the body-surface constitutes the appropriate closed system for our attention. Thus, if terms such as “core stabilisation” are to be used, then they need to be carefully applied within the appropriate context.
In this respect, articles such as the following (and the many references provided by this article) are most relevant:
Zajac F E & Gordon M F (1989) Determining muscle’s force and action in multi-articular movement Exerc Sport Sci Rev 17: 187-230
This is not to negate the value of approaches that use isolationist approaches for valid therapeutic or analytical reasons, such as those involving EMG mediated biofeedback, “Kegel” exercises, and post surgical respiratory exercises, but it is to stress that the unqualified application of isolationist approaches to sports conditioning needs to be viewed with careful circumspection.
If we do so, then we may also become far more careful to avoid referring rigidly to certain muscles as stabilisers, movers, agonist, antagonists, flexors, adductors and so on, instead choosing to refer to the stabilising, moving, agonistic, antagonistic, flexor and adduction roles of a muscle during any given phase of a specific motor action.
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02.12.07
Posted in General Info, Neuromuscular at 5:31 pm by Fit Guy
Bilateral transfer refers to the phenomenon of improvement in function of one limb by working on the opposite limb. What’s often overlooked is that muscle imbalances, connective tissue adhesions, and injuries throw off this contralateral function. The topic of motor control is very multifaceted and improving balance and postural habits is best done through cognitive thought, movement therapy, and bodywork.
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02.09.07
Posted in Neuromuscular at 5:20 pm by Fit Guy
A muscle’s capacity to produce force depends on the length at which the muscle is held with maximum force delivered near the muscle’s normal resting. In laymen terms: a muscle imbalance will decrease your ability to contract the right muscle at the right time and will lead to other muscles picking up the slack or in other words it’s an injury waiting to happen.
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01.29.07
Posted in Neuromuscular at 3:53 pm by Fit Guy
Hilton’s Law essentially states that the nerve root supplying a joint supplies the muscles attaching to that joint, as well as the overlying fascia and skin. Looking at this from a different perspective it means a joint dysfunction, often times originally caused by a muscle imbalance, is now in a cyclical relationship that doesn’t necessarily allow the muscles to heal properly. It’s all connected….
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