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So, the big ol’ catchphrase in the trainer world is “functional fitness“. It’s been around for a while, and the idea is that exercises should strengthen you in ways that will serve you in daily activities. Often (but not always) that means doing free weights, not machines that isolate smaller muscle groups, and using movements that engage many muscles at once. For example, a weighted squat might be functional because we often have to lift things, requiring strong back, ab, arm, and leg muscles, and we need to use body mechanics that will avoid strain and injury. Your muscle groups need to know how to work together, blah blah blah.

Now, I am a big fan of this whole thing, not just because I’m so determined to be healthy in my life. I’m also LAZY, and I like multi-muscle exercises because it’s more bang for your whatever. But when I’m selling the specific exercise to people who find it silly or difficult or just don’t really trust me to not make something evil up with the sole intent of fucking with them, it’s important to demonstrate how you could use the movement and the strength gains in your life.

A few examples:

1. Lateral shuffles. Lateral movements are very important for sports like tennis and soccer. So say you are kidnapped by a rebel group and they tell you either your family will have to pay a million dollars in ransom, or they’ll kill you. But then they give you a third option: Play tennis against the leader of the rebel movement and if you win, you can go free.

You, however, have been working on lateral speed. You zip all over the court, making shots that would thwart a less-functionally-fit individual. You win the match against the rebel leader, and they kill you anyway for humiliating the leader. But at least you kicked his ass first.

2. Push ups. Push ups help develop the arm strength that can help you break a fall or push an object off you. So you are walking down the street, minding your own business. A clown car drives up, and you are attacked by a swarm of angry clowns, irate because, well, wouldn’t you be if you were a clown and had to cram into a tiny car and ride around being scary? One particularly terrifying clown with a red wig rushes at you. You quickly tighten your abs and shove him hard. He flies back, and the rest of the clowns decide to leave you alone because, deep down, clowns are wussies and even though they are always looking for trouble, they know better than to mess with you.

3. Pull ups. In your secret agent job, you end up doing battle with the evil villain on a flying helicopter. Why is it you always end up in the helicopter with the bad guy with the swanky suit and snooty accent who is bent on launching a missile into downtown New York? Why couldn’t you, say, end up doing battle in a mattress factory, wrassling on a bed of soft, comfortable and non-allergenic snoozy goodness? But no, it always has to be on a moving train, on a motorboat, or on the damn helicopter. Of all the badass gadgets your agency makes you, they ought to throw in a rabbit’s foot because you clearly are unlucky in the battle department. Anyhow, the villain pushes you out of the copter, blah blah, you grab onto those bottom landing thingies and manage to pull yourself back up into the craft while dangling above the Golden Gate Bridge. Thank god for those pull ups, or you’d never have the upper body strength to do that, and there would never be a damn sequel.

4. Squat to press. While walking through the jungle, a gigantic boa constrictor drops out of the foliage and lands on your shoulders. Are boas the really big ones? Are anacondas just a kind of boa? You could google it, but boy fuck howdy, you are lazy right now. Anyhow, the snake weighs far more than you could ever lift with just your arms, but luckily you have the awesome power of your well-toned legs to help, so without thinking you quickly drop to a squat and explode up, pressing the snake over your head and then immediately dumping it just like you do with a barbell. You sprint off in the other direction, and unfortunately take a giant step into a bog of quicksand. Squats won’t help you there. Oh well, if you are gonna suffocate to death, quicksand is better than being eaten by a snake.

5. Level changes–burpees and sprawls. This one is a bit outlandish, but bear with me as we suspend disbelief for a second. You have the house all to yourself for the first time in maybe ten years. Naturally the first thing you do is play very loud music as a background for your little chores and stuff. You also walk around in your underwear. Why? Because you can now, and you are a little drunk with all the freedom. At some point you are, well, dancing—you can’t help it if you are the music—and maybe you just subconsciously tore a page from this pop culture classic (though just shoot you if you ever play Bob Seger, and frankly, your moves are waaay more fly). Midway through the funkiest of numbers, you look up and see that in all the giddiness, you did not realize the curtains are open and the people in the restaurant parking lot outside your house can probably see you. Because you have worked on movements that incorporate level changes, you are able to quickly drop to the floor and scooch out of the vision line of the crowd without injuring yourself. Too badly. Though you did get a little bruise. You’ll tell people you got it rescuing a kitten from a burning building or something. Cough.

This entry was posted on Monday, November 3rd, 2008 at 11:38 pm and is filed under blah blah, body building, exercise, expert advice, fads and facts, healthy crap, injuries, new moves, sanity, sports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.