VaultMarq26 wrote:Lax PV wrote:It's kind of a pre-hab thing. Implying if you move one way, you need to be able to move the opposite way too. Think of it this way, the stronger the antagonist muscle is, the better it can eccentrically flex to slow down the movement safely. Some people live and die by it, some people think its garbage... to each his own i suppose...
I understand the reasoning behind it, but that reasoning is flawed. If you are in an event like shot put for instance. You are doing a lot of pushing motions. If you train only pulling motions in the weight room you will become unbalances. There is an overload principle that must be taken into account. The 16lb shot will not overload the body where lifting will. Only overloading one side will cause inequities in muscle size and strength.
I am a little confused now. I agree that the opposite side should be trained, but not to the extent of the side that is going to be used the most. Maybe eccentrics for the opposite side of the body, which is essentially passive concentric motion on the side that is used more.
One thought that I have had is that, yes, a swimmer does not need to be able to power clean well to swim well. However, power cleans are done in the weight room, with the intent of getting stronger, to be a better athlete. One could easily argue to points here, and within reason, I believe both are justified.
1) Why train any part of the body that is not going to directly correlate to performing the task better.
or
2) By training the other side, neurological adaptation occurs, and a "silence" of the antagonist muscles can occur, allowing the agonist muscle to work more efficiently.
In addition, the weight room is the weight room. When do people get "too specific?" You could argue that a quarter miler might want to lift 50% of his squat for 47.5 seconds to simulate a race as "functional" training, but at what point do you have to break down and say, "You know what, we might as well just go and run the quarter mile instead." I think some people take the idea of functional training too far, or specialized training almost to the point of the EXACT movement pattern--which I don't feel is entirely correct. Does that mean people should go out of their way to lift in a way that is not going to help them, no. Simply means that the reason certain lifts are "traditional" is because they are the ones that have stood the test of time, and consistently produced results. 25 years ago we would be having the same argument about open chain exercise machines... but alas, it all returns to similar variations of the same thing.
...I'll get off my soap box... I apologize. haha
What do you think?[/quote]
