What I know
I read many websites everyday looking to expand my base of information both for physical training and for life in general. Today I read one of the later wrote about speaking on things you now about, and not about what you think you know about. Speculation and discussion are important and great, but as leaders we should focus on what we know when disseminating information. So I have decided to write a synopsis about what I know to be true from research and experience about the physical training of the human body. Now this is not meant to be a compilation of all that is true about physical training, as that would be assuming I knew it all, but rather this is what I know, I know.
Physical training is hard. Whatever your goal, the work to achieving it is hard. Working hard is not the only ingredient to improvement, you can work really hard at doing something completely useless, but it is a vital ingredient. Without it you are just going through motions and not accomplishing much. Going for a walk through your neighborhood is not exercise, unless you are so deconditioned that it is making you huff and puff and sweat it is not exercise. Now everyone has a different physiological and psychological tolerance to intensity and your tolerance can be trained, but if it is not intense your not increasing your work capacity. One way to check this is to ask "When was the last time you made your "exercise" harder?". If the weight or reps are not increasing or if the time it takes you to complete it is not decreasing then you are not working hard enough.
Improved function comes from training movements not muscles. Your exercise should mimic closely the movements you make in life. You get up and down off the ground, you pick things up off the ground, you put things over our head, you carry things around, and you push and pull stuff around. Just about everything you do in your life fits into one or more of those categories, however most of us have been taught that the way to work out is to isolate a single muscle and work that until fatigue then move onto the next muscle. You NEVER isolate a single muscle or muscle group in real life so your training shouldn't either. If you are training for a specific sport or activity then some movements should be done more frequently than others, but the broader your base fitness the higher you'll be able to build your sport specific skill through practice. Most of you though are not professional athlete's and are simply looking to be happy healthy individuals who want to be able to move in and manipulate our environment so you should be looking to broaden your capacities to as many domains as possible.
Form is key for long term development. Proper form lends itself to increased safety, increased force production, and increased function. Because you are training movements and not muscles your anatomy and gravity determine the safest movement patterns, and if movements are learned properly and loads are appropriate then your body will not allow you to perform movements that are going to injure yourself. Accidents will happen and pride and competition will lead you to force ourselves beyond safety, but that is part of why you work with others and preferably with a coach to help shepherd you through those. These natural movements are also the most powerful way to move because they are the most efficient way to move. Your body learns how to interact with and overcome gravity at a very young age, most of you could walk before 18 months of age, and you never stop learning. The shortest distance will always be a straight line, proper form will always follow that efficient path, and more efficient equals getting more done in less time, aka more powerful. So if you are getting more done and you are getting injured less then you will by necessity be more functional, however because you are moving through your full Range of Motion (ROM) you will be stronger in more places than just in the wight room. When objects you need to manipulate are in less than ideal positions you will still know how to handle them because your body has used it's full effective ROM before. Your reliance on those around you will decrease as you are able to complete more of your activities on your own, and you will increase your ability to help others as your own ability and confidence increases.
Gains come while your resting. As stated before you will not get better if your not working hard, but if your working hard you need to rest just as hard. The activity is primarily the stimulus that is necessary to cause your body to change. However, once you have done the work your body needs the opportunity to act upon that stimuli and cause those changes. The main opportunity your body has to do this is when you sleep. Besides the mental clarity and acuity that comes from proper sleep, it is well documented the hormonal activity that takes place when you are getting restful sleep that is necessary for proper cell repair, muscle gain, and fat loss.
Finally your performance is only as good as your fuel. Your mother telling you are what you eat is a bit simplistic, but is true nonetheless. You should be eating food. Food is something was grown in the earth or once ate things grown in the earth. Food is best when it has been run through as few processes as possible. The more food is processed the fewer micro nutrients that will be available. Food that has been mixed with synthetic chemicals to make it last on a store shelf will at least have diminished nutrient content if not be down right hazardous. The smaller the amount of food you can eat and still maintain lean body mass and energy levels the longer you will live and the more disease free you will be. The food you do eat should be a balance between protein, fat and carbohydrates, with most of you carbohydrates being from food with a low glycemic index.
