Get Back To The Basics
Hey Welcome back to the Academy :) today we will be discussing basics, how they work and what they can do for you in the way of making your fitness journey more effective, and even more efficient. Let's first look at the basic exercises that are also VERY functional
Push Up’s
Bench Press
Seated Rows
Pull Ups
Seated Rows
Squats
Deadlifts
Dips
Lunges
These four exercises are vastly forgotten in the time of need vs want, people are too busy looking for the fluffy stuff that isn’t practical or even functional. Refer to the list below
Leg Curls
Bicep Curls
Sit Up’s
Crunches
Planks
Bent Over Rows
So we can compare the lists in a brief over-view, the first list of four are very functional in do to day life because as you begin to master the first four you’ll find that all the other muscle groups that you attack through the fluffy list will also become stronger in the process of doing push-ups.
If we break down the push up you will begin to understand why I love the basics, the push-up is a simple effective exercise that also requires help from your biceps, triceps, shoulders, rotator cuff muscles. This is why we can assess this and see how much more effective a push-up can be opposed to walking into the gym and hitting the bicep curls to get 20” pipes for the girls right fella’s that's why we curl aye ha-ha. But why not just hit the Chest Press and The Push Ups to maximise the return on your workout.
So what makes the push up more effective ? Well from the bodies point of view the push up relies on more muscles to perform it, therefore increasing the amount of hormones and endorphins is tenfold as the Chest is a Large muscle group and requires a handful of assistants to help get your chest off the ground through each repetition. We know that the by increasing more lean muscle in the big key areas Chest, Back, Legs we flip our bodies MBR and turns it into a fat burning. Almost every client I have or had has literally battled with weight for a long period of time and when we go back to the basic methods of building lean muscle through heavy exercises they see far greater results than previously. As well as being effective its very safe for the average person long term.
Whereas if we look leg curls or even the Sit-up’s lets look at these both in comparison to squats and or lunges. When you perform such exercises as the Leg Curl you place more tension on areas that you shouldn’t be as in ligaments and tendons and you also place the knee joint under extreme pressure that during the motion of the exercise it becomes unstable… think of a crane trying to pick 25 tonnes but it's rated to only pick up 10 tonnes what do you think will happen over time to the joints and bolts in the crane arm? Do you think the tension will inevitably cause the crane to snap, buckle or even tip over? This very thing can and does happen in the knee joint during the leg curl, it might not happen the first time, might not happen the second time but eventually it will happen, worst case scenario is that it happens over time and you break your knee down and when you get into your 40’s or 50’s and you have no cartilage, walking around in pain from arthritis that's worst case scenario because the best case would be you bust your ACL, PCL or MCL and learn your lesson the first time. So heed the warning signs you’ll feel them as your body was and is designed to be looked after. Compare this to just sucking it up and doing squats and lunges, when we focus on doing these exercises we require to be in the upright position as we were created and this allows us to engage our abdominal muscles to stabilises our core and hips as well as engage our big engines in the legs to push through the squats. Squats allow us to be in a less vulnerable position with our knees therefore reducing the risk of long term injury or short term pains like ACL tears etc. Crunches and Sit-ups are very much the same in theory when it comes to leg curls, the issue you face is that you hit a common injury site in the back your L4/L5 and this issue can be detrimental to your physical capabilities, work capabilities and downright fucking living life, once you wreck your back that's it and the vast majority of people are unaware of this and continue to believe that these exercises are beneficial to the success of their health and fitness journey when indeed they will be hindered later in life and doing simple tasks may even seem impossible.
So when you walk into the gym when we are able to, remember that for success you do not need to pull the fluffy stuff off the rack, you simply just have to apply the basics and each session increase resistance via adding weight through progressive training. The key is to exhaust your muscles in as little time as possible and as effectively as possible, so reserve a set for warm up, muscle memory and mental awareness then hit your max effort set at 80% of your capacity until you can not lift that weight anymore! Remember your muscles can not and will not count, they will keep working until you exhaust them and tear them.
So lets stick to the basics and become masters of them, so we can have far greater success in the gym :) Thank you for reading our new blog stay tuned we have more to come!