There are many varieties of training styles that you can participate in when you are looking to fulfill your personal fitness and overall health goals. Functional strength training is the current trend in fitness culture – and for good reason. This style of exercise allows your muscles to build strength in ways that you can utilize and benefit from while participating in your everyday life tasks, hence making your day to day functionality more easy.
If you are looking to enhance efficiency in daily activities and improve your overall fitness, keep reading to learn the answer to the question “What is functional strength training?” and find out how you can benefit from this form of training.
What is it?
As we mentioned above and to put it simply, functional strength training is a style of fitness training. It is a category of exercise that is focused on total body conditioning through functional movements that emulate everyday activities. When participating in this form of training you can expect to incorporate movements such as: pulling, pushing, climbing, squatting, bending, walking, and running.
Helps us enhance our comfort and agility in routine activities such as:
- Getting in and out of bed
- Mowing the lawn
- Carrying groceries
- Getting up off of the floor
- Picking up children/heavy items
- Reaching to place items on the shelf
By participating in these exercises you will build lean muscle, burn a considerable amount of calories, and increase your overall endurance. You will also improve balance, agility and coordination.
Some typical examples of movements include:
- Squats (this may include Jump Squats, Front Weighted Squats, Body Weight Squats, etc) – an important movement that helps with standing, walking, running, and climbing stairs by strengthening your lower body.
- Lunges (this may include Jump Lunges, Lateral Lunges, Reverse Lunges, etc) – this movement helps with picking items up off of the ground, stepping forward, and also promotes flexibility.
- Shoulder Press – this movement helps with placing items on or taking items off of shelves by enhancing your upper body balance and strength.
- Deadlifts – this movement helps with picking weighted objects up off of the ground by improving lower body strength and promoting proper form.
- Loaded/Farmers Carries – this movement helps with carrying and transporting heavy objects in your hands.
What are the benefits of Functional Strength Training?
Functional strength training has numerous benefits. This variety of training proves as a great way to improve endurance, heart health, and overall strength.
To highlight a few benefits :
- Burns unwanted fat
- Boosts your mood
- Expands your range of motion
- Improves your athletic performance and endurance
- Corrects your overall posture
- Strengthening your muscles
- Enhances your coordination skills
- Builds on your mobility, power, and speed
Who is Functional Strength Training for?
If you’re looking for an effective way to get healthy and lose weight, improve your balance and mobility, stay strong or reach new strength goals, or just looking to improve your energy levels throughout the day, chances are that you will love to participate in this style of strength training.
Regardless of your age or fitness level, functional strength training has the capability to provide you with an expansive range of health benefits. All in all, this form of strength training is for everyone. With the help of professional hiit trainers, we will make sure to accommodate your body type and fitness level so that you can participate at your own rate.
Ready to get fit, improve your health, and feel fantastic? Sign up to join in on our classes at Circuit Works LA.
You’ll participate in total body conditioning through functional movements that mimic real-life activities. We utilize many different types of equipment to support functional strength training to enable you to improve your balance, coordination, and agility through invigorating and dynamic classes!
Contact us to get started or level up on your fitness journey today.
