Balance

For the past decade, I have been involved with the training routines of the elderly, currently have seven clients that range in age from 85-95. And while it differs greatly from the training of world-class athletes, there is a degree of satisfaction that is no less meaningful. The elderly have reduced egos, few specific training goals and are more appreciative. If they can return for the next workout and maintain mobility, they are grateful - which does not diminish my efforts. As a trainer, however, I am bombarded with the challenge of "I need to improve balance" - a common request of all trainers. So, as good Samaritans, we run our elderly clients through a series of balance activities that are supposed to improve balance for daily living. I was never comfortable with the scenario.

First, I was not schooled in balance activities and felt inadequate despite devouring several books full of 'balance-improving' activities.

Second, I was not convinced that improving balance at specific tasks had any positive transfer to other activities, such as the daily-living ones we were trying to improve. So I read, and read.

Brian Johnston put it together nicely in his book Systems Analysis, in which he critiques various forms of popular exercise, including "functional" training. Johnston classifies balance as an innate ability, not subject to change. You have it or you don't. The improvement in the performance of skills specific to balance (those generally administered by trainers) were just that - skill improvement through practice. Balance improvement occurred specifically to that skill, with no transfer to other non-specific skills . "Other" skills were different - almost the same, similar to - but they had their own set of specifics, their own input of balance, an input different to that practiced in the gym.

Aside from making the elderly feel better about their balance (a psychological factor) and the effort made to improve balance by trainers, the fact remains: Balance cannot be improved as an ability. It can only be improved specific to a skill.

With apologies to the elderly, balance is innate.

Fat Guys Rule

A female client asked an interesting question the other day in the fitness center.
"Did you watch the Masters?"
"Certainly," I replied.
"Well," she stated, "The three guys in the playoff looked fat and out-of-shape. Tiger Woods, on the other hand, looked incredibly ripped and Phil Mickelson more fit than ever. Do you think Woods and Mickelson (neither of whom made the playoff) have overdone fitness to the point that it is hurting their game?"

The question caught me off guard. I grew up in an era when strength training for golf was taboo. Gary Player was the only professional, an outcast, who dared train with weights. I recognized the value of strength for athletes in my 2005 book, In Arthur's Shadow, stating, "...professional golf would embrace strength training only when a Mr. Universe won the United States Open title." I was wrong. Mr. Universe hasn't come through yet, but Woods is a reasonable substitute.

THEN: When fitness was first adopted by the professional golf community, I waited for the first sign of skill deterioration to trigger a blame on 'lifting weights.' I worked with enough pros and amateurs who hopped aboard the fitness train to realize that most were looking for an out. They never tried it long enough to produce an effect, just as the majority of today's fitness novices.

NOW: Professional golfers generally recognize the value of strength training and fitness, having been bombarded by a commercial monster over the potential benefits to improve performance. Suddenly, 'lifting weights' is OK for golf.

How much seems to be the issue. Some training is good, but too much is not. The reported workouts of Woods and others reflect the same errors made by bodybuilders when they first arrived on their scene - more is better. Really? More exercise is often the cause of lack of progress among many trainees, but hardly in the case of golfers. Most players are afraid to get strong enough to make a significant difference. They tiptoe in just to say they're part of the movement.

My answer to the female client, before I stray too far, was as follows. Golf is a high skill game in which strength plays a minor role. When a skinny runt outhits you by 60 yards, you'll soon discover that skill and timing have more to do with success than strength. Strength protects you from injury and improves power production, but the fact remains, the most efficient way to improve golf is to improve your swing through proper skill training. Nonetheless, if strength represents 5% or 10% of golf success, one must fill that percentage to reach one's potential. According to Nautilus inventor Arthur Jones, "A stronger athlete is a better athlete, short of checkers and chess." He found few professional athletes strong enough for their sport.

As I see it, too much strength and conditioning in golf is rarely, nor likely to become, the problem. It remains, however, a viable scapegoat on the horizon.

THEN: Golfers did nothing.

NOW: They're doing too much?

How can you win?

How We Learn

Somebody once asked Ben Hogan for a golf lesson. His reply, "You can't teach golf. You can only learn it." Hogan wasn't arrogant, just giving an honest opinion. To learn golf, you must practice until an efficient and effective motion is ingrained in the nervous system and the muscles they feed. Timing, control, balance, feel, rhythm - the muscles and nervous system must figure things out. It must be precise, specific, exactly the same - swing after swing - to reach the pinnacle. Things almost correct will likely retard the process, insert roadblocks, promote negative results.

Yet, this insertion is exactly the essence of sport-specific or performance training. Do something (an exercise or movement) that resembles a sport-movement pattern; then assume there is a positive transfer to the sport itself. Poor assumption. The motor learning principle of specificity is violated every time - something coaches and trainers don't get. They continue to train athletes under false assumptions and beliefs, then argue that they produce results. They have the studs in the barn to prove it. Doing something will produce a result, not the best result, a result.

Why do coaches and trainers not get it? Your guess is as good as mine, but one thing is certain. The alternative, old-school thought, is unattractive, not hip, not functional. Strengthen the muscles needed in the sport, independent of 'how' they are to be used. Then, take the new muscles out to the ball game. Let the nervous system piece the new structure and strength together in the only way possible - by practice of the sport itself, specifically, with no added weight or opinion. Practice the sport exactly as you would in competition.

Let's put the current sport-specific training approach where it belongs - the nearest trash can. The nervous system is capable of improvement with the proper signals - signals not confused by extra weights that trigger patterns similar to, but not exactly like, that encountered in the sport.

Strengthen muscles; practice the sport. Anything else is insanity, fraud or both.

Get it?

New Equipment

Something new in the field of exercise. It's been a while. Equipment. Equipment that focuses on what Arthur Jones once emphasized, the negative phase of exercise, lowering the weight. Jones built a number of prototypes in the early 1970's called "Omni" machines (shoulder and chest presses, biceps and triceps) that allowed trainees to lift weight with the stronger muscles of the legs, and lower it with the weaker muscles of the arms. Besides the "Omni" series, he developed techniques (negative accentuated and negative emphasis) that emphasized the lowering phase of exercise. Some techniques required outside assistance; others, not. Nonetheless, Arthur's approach pointed in one direction - fatigue a muscle beyond normal by adding resistance as weight is lowered.

A Swedish entrepreneur with the help of automotive designers has come up with a new way to emphasize the lowering phase of exercise. Instead of adding weight to the lowering, as did Arthur, the Swede has reduced the resistance on the lifting phase and restored it during the lowering phase. This is accomplished by tilting the weight stack (a motorized system) to approximately 45 degrees as weight is lifted and returning it to vertical as weight is lowered. The return to vertical is a half-second process. In plain English, resistance increases by 40% during the lowering phase. Since muscles are 40% stronger lowering than lifting under fresh conditions, trainees experience the same difficulty to lift - but a new ballgame on the way down. Hard on the way up, equally hard on the way down. As a result, fatigue occurs more quickly, inroad into the muscle's reserve system is greater, and repetitions and training-time are reduced. More efficient workouts, less frequent workouts as recovery time is increased. Eight exercises. Twice a week. More results. Sound familiar? A commercial? This is for real.

Yet, the concept is not new. I trained on a version of the same, a line of equipment introduced by LifeFitness, more than 20 years ago. The machine tested strength, selected an electronic weight, and challenged the lowering phase by increasing the load by 40%. But all was not roses. One problem lay in the testing. The strength test was neither accurate nor safe, typical of all dynamic test efforts. Another problem lay in the execution. The transition from what the muscle felt during the lifting phase to what it experienced while lowering was rough - a sudden jolt, dangerous. Let's hope the Swedes have that down.

Kudos to the new equipment, called X-Force, and to the emphasis on negative training.

Only one thing remains. When will someone take on another of Jones' innovative concepts - the return of Double machines - so that pre-exhaustion can again soar to the forefront of muscle training?