From bosu balls to incline treadmill barbell curling, functional training gurus have been creating a plethora of useless exercise variation for decades. Labelling these “exercises” as “functional”; in the same breath traditional training practices such as squats, deadlifts and presses are considered redundant by the vast majority of functional trainers.
So what is this witchcraft?
Functional training is modernly defined as any exercise which involves training the body for activities performed in daily life. A vague description at best; it leaves anyone to translate it into anything they deem worthy (Swiss ball balance with lateral raise anyone?). Since the early 2000’s the cult-like functional training movement has been going strong. Sometimes better, other times worse; but mostly the exercise prescription deserves an eyebrow raise, especially when there tends to be little to no justification in the exercises chosen. Just because you can barbell curl while on a treadmill while it’s on the incline setting does not mean you should. As everyones needs are different in what they need/want to get good at in daily life, functional training could be deemed as anything an individual wants/needs to get better at.
The current method behind functional training is actually pretty good. (You can check it out here) The guideline is decent as of now, but rarely do you find a single functional trainer following the basic tenets. Why is that? I would put the reason down to a few things. The fact that the descriptors of functional training is simply just training, so anybody that has a good training methodology as a coach simply calls it training, as all well structured plans have “function”, if you want to use that word as opposed to relevant or specific. The ones that don’t are simply inefficient.
Functional training has roots in rehabilitation and an old cult like following¹ that was one part rehab, one part cable training and one part crazy pants-on-head-retarded. Thus the wobble board workout was born, which later was renamed to the bosu ball. Then came the cable rotations in lunge position. Another staple of the functional trainer. Somehow bosu balls and cables make everything more efficient. That thoracic rotation though bro.
Just because something is useful in rehab does not make it useful for functioning individuals. Having awesome thoracic extension is good, but that does not mean that increasing thoracic rotation in absolutely everyone to awesome levels is going to be beneficial in daily life
Before I ram ahead any further with my argument i’d like to let you think for a minute; would being stronger in general make you better at performing your activities in daily life? Everything else remains the same but you would be stronger. Would that not make you better off or more “functional”?
Making an exercise valuable is not about making it tricky or difficult, it’s about making it relevant & valuable to the individual.
If I made you do a deadlift to strengthen your posterior chain and activate as much muscle mass as possible because your goal was to strengthen your entire body as well as fortify your back then that would be a solid choice in exercise selection providing you can do the movement properly. Now let’s say I make you do the same deadlift but on an unstable platform. Same goal, similar movement pattern, but now because you are on an unstable platform you can’t load the movement as much, because doing so may end your life Eddy Gaurdo style from Tekken. Without sufficient load your body will not become as strong, thus taking away from the efficiency of the movement and the entire purpose of it. See it’s fine if I wanted to improve someone’s stability to do some balance work, but again a bosu ball deadlift would not be my first choice if someone has an issue standing on one leg on a flat surface that doesn’t move (more on this later). Unless of course you were testing your insurance policy to see if stupidity was covered.
Exercise selection needs to be about the outcome and how to most effectively get there.
A common argument among most functional trainers would be that traditional exercise has less value or is not worthwhile altogether as they do a poor job in emulating movement patterns that are involved in daily life in comparison to their methods of training. Seriously; how is a bench press useful in life, right? Anything that builds strength would be useful, but we should be assessing value of a movement based on relevance, not on the movement itself, for itself. In other words; want to get better at benching? Then benching is the answer to getting better at bench! A TRX Row on the other hand wouldn’t be the answer to a bigger bench.
Let’s say we do use their original argument for a minute though. I’m not sure, but last time I checked I didn’t have to do a renegade row in daily life or a TRX row. So they use movements that run contradictory to their original argument. Well played functional trainers. Well played. It’s almost as if they ate all of the glue in first grade.
Does that mean renegade rows and TRX rows are useless? Of course not. As I mentioned before, being stronger in general would make you better at daily activities but if you want to get good at something, you have to do that thing to an extent.
The value of a movement is dependent on the goals of the idividual, while serving a purpose. It must be relevant. This can mean preventing injury, correcting weaknesses or basic conditioning. Building on that; nothing is useless but some things are more useful than others. To assess relevance you require context to draw from and a framework to base training off.
It would stand to reason then that functional training, according to the definition is relative and would have certain limitations depending upon age, ROM, training age, time restrictions, to name a few. In order for any training to be appropriate an assessment would need to be undertaken, whether it be a functional movement screen or otherwise. Without an adequate framework to draw upon any training can be inefficient and thus non-functional.
From a sports specific perspective it would be illogical to make a powerlifter who is in their weight range run on a treadmill for 10km a day. In the same instance making a bench press a priority for a marathon runner is equally stupid. For obvious reasons it is neither specific to each athletes needs nor is it preventing injury.
If getting stronger and correcting imbalances for an office worker is a priority then choosing big compound movements that offer the most stimulation and can be loaded the most would be the best choice, because a stronger individual is less prone to injury and more useful than a weaker version of themselves. Barbells do this job best, but other movements are also viable options for variety and injury prevention. They may be good but not best in this hypothetical instance. What would stop you from picking up a kettlebell after a deadlift or squat? Nothing. You have plenty of energy left for light movements that don’t require as much energy. Prioritising movements that yield less return is detrimental to the outcome. Prioritising especially stupid shit is even more detrimental to the outcome. As a bonus, you also look like an idiot, providing entertainment for other gym goers.
Of course this can also be taken out of context and a minimalist approach can be as detrimental as much as too much variation. Variation being an alternate movement to a sport specific movement; e.g. incline bench vs flat paused competition bench in powerlifting. Variation and general conditioning is not useless however, it just may not be useful right now but could be more useful in future. It is time sensitive. Categorising a movement as “functional” or “non-functional” is too black and white and even very specific sports like powerlifting use very non-specific exercises to progress on the specific movements of that sport. A perfect example of high variation training in that instance would be the famous westside barbell and the conjugate system concocted by Louie Simmons. How much is too much? When it’s not effectively making you better.
Nothing is new. Everything has been done before. Functional training gurus will lead you to believe it’s the death touch of strength training. Repackaging something old does not make it new or special, it makes it misleading. Functional training is just training. It’s not some secret technique, and it certainly doesn’t make you better than a dedicated trainee doing things the “traditional way”.
Walk into any serious strength gym and you will see implements of torture you have never seen in any commercial gym. From wobble bars, trap bars, bands, chains, ropes, to kegs and prowler sleds. Ultimately all of these things can get someone strong and at the same time provide fun variety that can be beneficial mentally as well as physically. Strongmen from times gone by experimented with practically any movement you can think of and got brutally strong; they settled though on some big primary lifts done with barbells, dumbbells and kettlebells because they offered the most value. After so many decades of strength athletes the movements remain practically the same and have been getting people strong longer than most of us have lived. These people were seen as extrodainary human specimens, able to accomplish more than a regular person. They were considered better physiologically because they could move better, lift more weight than others and look good doing it. They had less but made more gains than most of us will see in a lifetime. In an age where fads, instant gratification and superiority sell its no wonder everyone is looking for the new secret formula. The thing is, everything you need to get strong and move better is in every commercial gym these days. There is no excuse to not be fit for purpose.
Modern functional training is better at developing full body strength and preventing injury. It also makes you better at using your own body weight through a full range of motion. It isn’t like a bench press or a deadlift because we don’t need to pick up huge weights to move better. I don’t want to get big and strong, I want to just feel and look better.
Somehow, through misinformation and effective marketing strategies people have been convinced that modern functional training makes you better than someone who is stronger all things being equal. Possibly because the movements they train are completely alien to most general training regimes such as basic barbell training. From another perspective it’s not necessary to build a brutal deadlift in a regular person but think about it; if you can lift a big weight off the floor wouldn’t that make picking up your child that much easier?
Stronger also means better health. If you had an identical twin and you were stronger, you would have a better chance to withstand muscle atrophy and have stronger bones later in life. Osteoporosis anyone? That sounds like a pretty good deal to me. In regards to body weight training; since when does lifting your body weight constitute as stronger than someone hitting a 2x body weight exactly? A body weight squat is a starting point. In fact, here is a very real scenario; my fiancé wanted to be able to do chin ups, most of her program consisted of barbell rows and lat pulldown. Would you believe it one month later she could do 3 chin ups by herself? It’s simple really, even though the barbell rows were not an exact movement to the chin up they allowed for the most amount of weight to be used to stimulate the back to get bigger and stronger, then the lat pulldown assisted in teaching the movement pattern to her nervous system. In other words: a bigger and stronger back means more chin up power. Because anatomy.
Another thing I wanted to mention was stability training. The bosu ball is such a popular implement among “functional trainers” and is seen as an effective way to train multi-dimensional, multi-planar movement and stability, the thing is it does nothing for stability and effective movement. Dr Mel C Siff PHD; author of Supertraining mentions in an NSCA paper: “Even when present, these anticipatory adjustments appear to have little functional value during rapid compensatory movements. Furthermore, lateral destabilisation complicates the control of compensatory stepping”¹
Traditional training is totally redundant. It must be all of those stability ball exercises and rotations…
But surely in sporting movements it would be beneficial?
“Moreover, the stiffness and nature of the surface involved in ball and other compliant balancing regimes involve motor responses that do not relate functionally to sporting movements, despite claims to the contrary.”¹ Well there goes that theory.
Does that mean all stability exercises are useless? Of course not. The anatomy of the joint you are training and the way it interacts with external force, as well as the purpose of the stability work will determine it’s value. Shoulder training is a good example of where stability training is a viable option in certain situations.
in summary
- Making a movement trickier, multi-planar, doing things on a cable or on a wobble board do not make it necessarily better or more efficient. Better means more relevant to the individuals needs.
- Training is about a better outcome based on relevance and purpose. It is not about superiority of a movement based solely on the movement itself.
- Some movements are more relevant than others; therefore they are better choices
- Movements can still be beneficial by preventing injury or being non-specific yet contributing to what someone needs to get better at. These movements can change and are time sensitive
- Modern functional training when done well is simply training. Repackaging something and marketing it differently does not make it better. It is just misleading.
Long story short: Functional training as a term means nothing, because functionality is relative and a well structured program will be relative, calling it functional means nothing.
Now go pick something heavy up princess.
barbell Samurai 