I am a big fan of unilateral training, both for upper and lower body exercises. Especially for lower body. I also work with bilateral exercises as I believe they are also an important part of a balanced training program. But I think a program without unilateral training is missing something.

The primary reason that I love unilateral training is that it helps to identify strength and flexibility differences from side to side. I see these across all types of people, but especially among those who play a sport that uses one side more than the other. If you think about it, this is almost every sport with the exception of running, swimming and cycling (If I missed one please let me know in the comments below). Even those sports will tend to have a unilateral element to it: Read more…

I love the deadlift. It is my second favourite exercise, behind pullups. Pullups I love because they feel so incredibly amazing. Particularly for women, who tend to find them very difficult. Once you accomplish them, I think the feeling of awesome is increased.

But deadlifts are a different kind of awesome. They are functionally awesome. Everyone deadlifts. In life, that is. And because everyone deadlifts in life, virtually all of my clients deadlift in the gym. Whether you are 16 or 76, if you train with me for long enough, you will deadlift. And odds are, you will probably love it. In fact I have one client who drew a sad face on his workout sheet because there were no deadlifts that day.

Everyone deadlifts in life?
Read more…

The $99 TRX knock-off seems to be a hot product these days. In fact The sales person at a fitness store that is part of a national chain tried to sell me one, to which I politely declined. I must admit that I thought it was pretty bold to be selling knock-offs in a retail setting next to the real ones. They seem to be more frequently sold by individual trainers, coaches and via websites.

I’m not writing this to pass judgement about whether or not you use or buy knock-off products, but rather to get you to consider whether there are safety implications if you do.
Read more…

Corrective exercises have become a popular training tool for many personal trainers in recent years, but do they work?

The corrective exercises are often found in programs in the movement preparation part of the workout, which I like to jokingly say is just a fancy way of saying the warm up. In fact it is a specific warm up, one that literally is intended to get your body prepared for movement. Some of the corrective exercises are basic stretches and activation exercises that manual therapists (I use the term manual therapist to refer to any of athletic therapist, chiropractor, massage therapist, osteopath, or physical therapist) have been using for years. Others are more integrated, born of functional training philosophies, such as the Functional Movement Screen. Read more…

Now that we have some snow up here, I thought it would be appropriate to bring this snow shoveling article out to remind everyone that shoveling is actually hard physical work, that really should be done after a warmup, and with some caution about form.

Did you know there is an increase in cardiac incidents following snowfalls?

It turns out that shoveling is both frustrating and dangerous.  This is likely due to otherwise sedentary people heading out and suddenly doing intense exertion – that snow can be heavy!

And did you also know that there is an increase in back injuries following snow storms? 
Read more…

…you probably have anterior pelvic tilt (APT). That is, your butt probably sticks out a bit. In some cases, the upside may be that it’ll make your butt look great. Although it doesn’t always look good…

Looks aside, for many people, it can cause or contribute to low back pain, either on a regular basis, or while trying to perform ab exercises. Raise your hand if you yourself or any of your clients have complained that they feel planks in their low back more than in their abs. Read more…

Shoulder packing. Yes, that’s right: shoulder packing. It’s really a thing.

It’s a concept of how we should position our shoulder when doing any sort of lifting with our arms. Now some will say that this is ridiculous – we just move our arms and that’s how they should move. I could get behind that line of thinking. Except for one thing: many of the people that come and train with me don’t actually position their shoulder properly when moving their arms, and then they complain of pain or discomfort in their shoulder or neck when doing exercises like pushups, rows, and planks. But when I help them to position their shoulder properly, they proceed to exercise without pain or discomfort.

That’s pretty convincing for me. Why does this happen? I’d say it’s a fair bet that your computer is the culprit. In fact take a look at your shoulders right now. They’re rounded, aren’t they? Read more…

When it comes to exercise, most people either do too much or too little. I think this applies beyond exercise, but let’s stick with that for the moment.

Those of us in the fitness and nutrition fields write a lot about those who do too little, in the hopes of helping fight the growing obesity epidemic. Today, however, I am going to talk about the other end of spectrum: too much exercise.

We laud those around us who maintain a healthy lifestyle, and are motivated by, and impressed at their the feats of strength and dedication. I recently read about a man who has run everyday for the past 40 years. I’m sure most of us who read that were inspired, and impressed. But is that actually a good idea? In his case, he seems to be enjoying a great and long life, which is all we can really ask for. But is it because of his excessive dedication to running, or in spite of it? Read more…

If you’ve read my stuff before, then you know that I am, well, a big geek. I think I probably took fitness geek to a whole new level with my bench press assessment article, talking about the work value of a bench press based on arm span. I think this article will further raise the bar on geek in the fitness industry.

This article is about what typical problem areas I see based on the Functional Movement Screen (FMS for those who like to keep things short) assessments that I perform. Not familiar with the FMS? Check out functionalmovement.com, or read on for a brief overview. Then follow the article to see an overview of the results I’ve seen in terms of what functional movements tend to cause the most problems, and how the results are different based on gender and whether someone is an athlete.

Lastly, I’ll share my take on what this should mean for your training (or programming for trainers) if you do not have access to the FMS or other assessment options to help guide you.
Read more…

I have an online client who mentioned that he was not feeling great with the front squats in his program, but he was pretty confident he was doing them well since he is an experienced lifter. He is smart and self-aware, so I tended to think he was probably right. But I asked him to get someone to video his front squat because I have a pretty good eye for small details (I’m a ski instructor – if you can find small faults as someone launches past you on a ski hill, standing still on flat land is a piece of cake) and I just wanted to see what was up. Partly I just wanted to be sure that it was good form, because that would impact what exercises I would give to him.

He did, and before I even got the link he noted that he could see one major flaw in his front squat and that he was confident that I’d be able to help with it. I saw the video, which his son uploaded to youtube, and he is correct! The front view of the squat looks great – shoulders look great, the knees don’t cave in, and no lateral (side) shift. This is the view that you would have if trying to watch your own form at the gym if you had a mirror in front of you. Then came the side view, which lets face it, we don’t get to see. When you’re deep into a squat with weight on your back, you really don’t want to be turning your head to the side to check form. It could lead to bad things for your neck or back. But in fact, the side view showed the big flaw in his squat: his knees move way too forward as he comes down and his heels rise up slightly.
Read more…