Any form of fitness has health benefits, but each type has its own unique characteristics. If you want a way to apply what you learn in the gym to your daily activities, functional fitness training is the answer.
What is functional fitness training?
A typical strength or cardio workout ends in the fitness center. Functional training is unique in that it is a category of exercise that improves your strength, endurance, flexibility, and mobility based on the activities you regularly perform. For example, people who participate in functional training believe that squats, weightlifting, and lunges are necessary to maintain balance when walking up and down stairs or carrying heavy groceries.
Training focuses on imitating real-life movements to improve performance on tasks. Each set and rep of your workout has a purpose and corresponding application.
Benefits of Functional Fitness Training
A unique element of functional fitness is that exercise classes are personalized based on your goals and the results you want to achieve. Coaches will consider your overall physical abilities to develop an effective and comprehensive training program. The exercise sets chosen are designed to ultimately improve your functional independence.
Here are the benefits of functional training if you’re considering giving it a try:
1. Improve ADL’s autonomy
Basic and instrumental activities of daily living, or ADL, refer to your daily tasks, such as walking, cleaning, and cleaning the house. While it’s perfectly okay to ask for help from others when a large package arrives, moving it yourself when you can will increase your confidence and independence in performing the duties at hand.
A functional training program that includes lifting barbells, dumbbells, or kettlebells will build your strength and endurance, ultimately allowing you to lift heavy weights with ease.
2. Prevent injury and support recovery
A serious injury can end an athlete’s career. Functional training can help in two ways—as a preventive measure and as a rehabilitative intervention.
As a preventative measure, it can help you avoid injury when doing activities that require strength, endurance, or speed, such as if you are a parent holding your baby for long periods of time. Some daily tasks involve the use of force. A targeted training program that strengthens the muscles, ligaments and tendons needed to gain strength can reduce the risk of injury.
3. Improve sports performance
A study of elite football players determined whether functional training can have a positive impact on their physiological and biomotor abilities. The first group performed traditional training for eight weeks, while the second group performed the same training but with 20 minutes of additional functional training.
Although there were no significant differences between the two groups after adjusting for post-test means, functional training showed beneficial effects on the physiological and biomotor properties of the players based on pre- and post-test values.
4. Enhance core strength and stability
Balance is an important part of functional fitness and can be achieved if you have enough core strength and stability to support your overall body weight in a variety of postures.
Functional fitness exercises—such as single-legged dog pose, kneeling arm extensions, and arm raises like fire hydrants—can help build core strength to pull, push, and lift objects from the floor. Such tasks often put you in awkward and injury-prone situations.
Functional training comprehensively covers core exercises because it is the center of the body and helps maintain balance when standing, bending, or sitting. Fitness experts always recommend engaging your core muscles when performing activities.
5. Long-term health and well-being
Functional training is a form of total body fitness, which means it has the same or even more significant benefits for your physical and mental health than stand-alone cardio or strength training.
One study compared psychological, physiological, and psychosocial outcomes among college students who performed traditional and functional resistance training. The results showed that the levels of anxiety and enjoyment before and after functional resistance training were higher than those of basic training. Anxiety was significantly reduced after functional resistance training compared to traditional fitness.
Functional fitness training can be very beneficial
The advantages of fitness training include overall health. This is an alternative form of exercise for people who want to tailor their fitness regimen to daily tasks or activities. Functional fitness can increase your independence and autonomy in completing tasks, prevent injuries and positively impact your physical and mental health.
