You’ve probably heard the term “functional fitness” thrown around like a buzzword in gyms, on Instagram, and by trainers who claim to have the “perfect” program for making you move better.
But the thing is, most people have it all wrong!
Functional fitness isn’t about standing on a BOSU ball doing bicep curls or using a resistance band in some fancy-looking exercise that never translates to real life.
It’s about training your body to do precisely what it was designed to do! Run, jump, squat, hinge, push, pull, carry, and move with power, strength, and endurance.
One thing worth remembering is that Function Means Functionality. The word “functional” gets overcomplicated, but its meaning is simple. Functioning well as a human.
Your body is built to move in specific ways. When you train those movement patterns under load, with speed, and across different time domains, you become stronger, more capable, and most importantly, more reliable in time of need.
That means:
- Picking up your kids without throwing your back out.
- Carrying groceries without struggling.
- Running after your dog without feeling like your lungs are going to explode.
- Being able to do physical work without needing to “warm up” for 30 minutes.
But most people get it wrong because they avoid what makes them function better.
If you want to be functionally fit, you must be willing to lift heavy objects, run long distances, and expose your body to a variety of movements.
Strength matters. If you can’t control heavy loads, your body isn’t as resilient as it should be.
Endurance matters. If you gas out from a 400m run, how valuable is your fitness in the real world?
Variety matters. If you only train in one way, your body becomes rigid and limited.
Life is unpredictable, and how you train for it should be, too. Without doing stupid stuff to compensate!
At Vasse Strength and Conditioning, we don’t waste time on gimmicks. Our programming is built around proven movement patterns that create real-world functionality.
We squat, press, pull, hinge, run, jump, and carry heavy things. The stuff that works best, especially when it comes to functioning better.
So the answer is we need to make sure we stay off the BOSU ball. Avoid using unstable surfaces or any other weird shit that will only make you capable when you have to squat on a boat or lift one hand and one leg when all you have to stabilise yourself is a survival buoy in the ocean (because the likelihood hood of you needing this kind of skill is zero!)
Keep train to get actual results!
Training that gets you stronger, faster, and fitter. Train to become more capable. Humans who move well feel better and can use their fitness outside the gym, not falling for the weird gimmicks or missing the functional fitness part of training for functional fitness.
Get up. Get after it. Become Extraordinary.