Don’t Be Married to an Exercise
My body does not meet the adequate prerequisites to squat bilaterally. My ankles cannot achieve what I am asking them to do and perhaps I do not have the adequate motor control to be able to present a deep squat. If my goal for myself and my clients is Articular Strength and Neurological Control – where does that leave me? Now what??
If you care about the joint integrity and longevity of your clients, use this approach:
RULE #1: ASSESS FIRST
✏If you are not assessing clients before adding load, you are assuming that an entire room full of sedentary individuals meet the adequate prerequisites to perform a specific movement pattern.
✏Familiarize yourself with some form of assessment (FMS, SFMA, etc)
✏This could be as simple as adding FMS correctives or FRC CAR’s in your warm up and observing your group.
✏Pay attention
RULE #2: DON’T BE MARRIED TO AN EXERCISE
✏You’re a “Strength Coach” – don’t forget what your job is
✏Get people strong but NOT at the cost of compromising the safety and health of your client
✏There are plenty of exercises that we could lateralize to
RULE #3: WORK ON THE “HARDWARE”
✏Make it a goal to work toward achieving the adequate prerequisites to improve or perfect a dysfunctional movement pattern.
✏What is limiting you or your client? Ankles, knees, hips, spine, shoulder? Is it an articular strength or a neurological control problem? Is it both?
🔩 Some exceptions can be made if an athlete is being tested to perform a certain lift**
🔩 If this is the case, do everything and anything to put your athletes in a good position while performing the lift.
🔩 While, also hammering away at “fixing the hardware”
🔩 Outside of this, your adult population does not need to train like powerlifters or college athletes in order to get “strong”