Fit For Print

Functional Training or Performance Enhancement Training is a classification of exercise that involves using one’s own body-weight to perform specific movements that target the core muscles of the abdomen and lower back, while training the body for the activities that are very similar to those performed in daily life.

This style of training gets its origins in physical medicine and rehabilitation, as physical therapists developed exercises that mimicked what patients did at home or at work, in order to help them return to their lives or jobs after an injury or surgery. Thus, if a patient’s job required repeatedly heavy lifting, rehabilitation would be targeted towards heavy lifting, if the patient were a parent of young children, it would be targeted towards moderate lifting and endurance, and if the patient were a marathon runner, training would be targeted towards rebuilding endurance.

Fitness facilities such as ours do use a wide variety of free weight and weight training machines that target and isolate specific muscles, and they do hold a place within a well-rounded fitness program. It has long been known that weight resistance training will help to increase muscular strength and endurance, as well as slow down the effects of osteoporosis, but their fixed patterns rarely mimic natural movements and focus the effort on a single muscle group, rather than engaging the stabilizers and peripheral muscles. Restricting movements to a single plane of motion is mechanically unnatural to the body and can potentially lead to faulty movement patterns or injury. The benefits that arise from Functional Training emphasize the body’s natural ability to move through three anatomical planes of motion.

Today, it has been noted that an exercise program that includes Functional Training can lead to better muscular balance and joint stability, possibly decreasing the number of injuries sustained, while increasing an individual’s performance in daily activities as well as in sport.

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