Get Strong, Improve your Performance & Prevent Injury

By Dr. Susan Nori, NSA’s Physiotherapist, Chiropractor & Sport Conditioning Coach

We live, work and play in a 3 dimensional world that requires us to move in different planes and in multiple directions. Yet most youth and adult fitness programs involve jumping onto cardio machines that go nowhere and then performing strength training exercises on machines that lock your joint into moving in one dimension only. This is Ok if all you’re training for is sitting at a desk, driving a car or laying on the couch watching TV. However, if you want to have the strength and ability to effectively perform your sport and do so without injury, than this type of training is not going to cut it.

Most of us are weekend warriors. This often means skiing double black diamonds, competing in masters, mountain biking, playing soccer or just trying to keep up with the kids. Does your workout plan during the week fit the level of performance needed for these types of weekend activities? Not usually! Injuries are not just likely to occur, they are inevitable.

The objectives of an effective training program should be three pronged: to get strong, to improve your athletic performance and to prevent injury. For most weekend warrior clients, you should be undergoing the same type of training program that an athlete does – just less intense, less volume and with a more gradual build. A well thought out program can meet these objectives with as few as one to two, 1 hr sessions per week. The following are guidelines to build a solid program to help ensure that your conditioning program results in athletic success while minimizing chances of injury:

1. Train body weight before external resistance
   Many programs make the mistake of having you head straight for the weights. This usually ends up causing injury. No one should be lifting weights if he or she cannot yet safely stabilize their joints against the weight of your body. Your strength program in the beginning stages may actually include no weights whatsoever. Do not rush to lift heavy loads. Being able to first support, and then move, your body weight through progressively more difficult levels of exercise is far more important. This is how your body learns efficient and effective movement patterning. Once this muscle and joint control becomes well integrated, then the addition of weights can be safely added.


2. Train on your feet
   Most of your exercise program should take place ON YOUR FEET, in the standing position. Your sport takes place in standing position, therefore, so should your training. That way not only are the muscles that move your joints being trained but so too are those muscles that stabilize and support that joint during movement.


3. Don’t use machines that lock you into one position during exercise
   These machines limit your joint range of motion and prevent the muscle from training in a functional manner. What is a “functional manner”? You need to train muscles in the way that the body uses them. As stated above, that includes not just the prime movers of the joint but also those muscles that support against, and assist with, that same movement. Moving a joint through space is a group effort. To be effective, your training equipment should allow you to keep those muscles working together harmoniously in many planes of movement, not just the one plane that some machine dictates you move through!
   
4. Use multiple joints when training
   Rarely during sport do you flex a knee without also simultaneously flexing the same ankle and hip. Joints work together to produce movement. As you navigate your way down a ski run or over a log while on a mountain bike, are you using only one joint? Never! So if sport demands multiple joint movement then so should your training program. Equipment such as BOSU balls, stability balls, elastic bands, free weights, kettle bells are all used to provide multi-joint, multi-planar strength training. Any conditioning program worth its salt utilizes this type of equipment.


5. Train with Balance
   When you include equipment that requires you to lift a load or perform a movement while maintaining your balance on a piece of balance apparatus – two things are happening. You are more closely mimicking the unpredictable and chaotic environment that you perform sport in AND you are challenging the brain to up the ante during its efforts to condition itself. Talk about effectively training all those body systems that start to deteriorate with age. Training with balance equipment does this! Why do we break hips as we age? In addition to becoming weaker, we also experience reduced feedback from the small receptors in the muscles that surround our joints and help us counterbalance the effects of gravity during movement. I don’t need to remind you – if we don’t keep these sharp, we lose them.... along with our balance precision and our ability to perform sport effectively.


6. Last but not least – TRAIN THE MUSCLES BEHIND YOU!
   What does this mean? It means that almost everything we do throughout the day is done in front of your body. Therefore, most movement utilizes those muscles that are located at the front of a joint. These guys tend to remain strong just by the sheer volume of what we do with them daily. The poor little guys at the back of the joint certainly don’t get equal time. An imbalance develops that if not addressed, can lead to injury. We don’t need to further contribute to this imbalance by what we do in the gym. The goal should be to create balance in your strength and conditioning program. That means training the muscles located in the back of the body almost twice as much as those located in the front.

So remember, the greatest athletes in the world are not those who bench press the heaviest weights. The greatest athletes have an ability to produce useable force in many planes of movement with many different joints simultaneously in an environment that is constantly changing. A good strength and conditioning program keeps these goals firmly in mind and looks to improve overall athletic performance, not just pure weight lifting numbers.