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Primitive Initiative™- The Movement for movement!

March 18, 2015 By Garrett

In my near two decade fitness career I have had the pleasure of working with many clients of varying ages, abilities, dysfunctions, and goals.   In that time span I have worked with many Collegiate Athletes, budding youth athletes, obese and overweight populations, post-rehab/surgical clients, elderly populations, medical populations, the generally healthy, and even an Olympic athlete.  With this wide spectrum of clients I began to find one common problem within each demographic: the lack of movement within their training programs.

I am sure that it is not a surprise for some of these groups, but it may come as a surprise for other groups.  In my experience modern life has made us less and less likely to move.  As the human race has evolved we have developed lifestyles of efficiency.  Unfortunately this efficiency of life has made us inefficient operators of our bodies.

When we are brought into this world we are a blank slate, ready to absorb as much as we possibly can.  Everything we learn is through experimentation and exploration.  It is trial and error.  The more error there is the quicker we learn.  It is an amazing time in our lives.  Everything is a new experience.  We learn to smile, laugh, talk, crawl, walk, and run.  We learn to interact with others.  We learn to interact with and manipulate objects.  We learn to play.  Our play is wide and vast, almost limitless.

At some point in our lives we take one of two tracks.  We either become sedentary or we become specialized.  We may choose to play video games and watch tv instead of going outside and running around playing.  We may choose to play organized sports.  If we do play sports we start to specialize very early.  Many sports have become year round with the school season sport, AAU sport, Travel leagues, and sport specific training.  Our wide and vast movement patterns that we once had begun to disappear.

As we grow even older we go to college and take jobs that have us bound to a desk, hunched over a computer.  If we have the time and motivation to go to the gym, we pick select exercises that are inefficient and may cover only a very few of the movement patterns that are woefully missing from our lives.

Due to this slippery slope of non-movement, as we age we are unable to perform certain tasks efficiently.  Picking things up off the ground, reaching for a seat belt, getting up off the floor all become arduous tasks.  Our joints begin to get immobile, sore, swollen and broken down.  Sudden movements become risks of severe injury.  If an injury occurs it will take nearly two to three times as it once did to recover fully from it, if at all.  Chances are there will always be a limitation from the injury which ultimately will cause a compensation pattern. This will put undue stress upon another system or joint until there is another injury.  Once this injury cycle is entered into it is hard to escape.  Quality of function and ultimately quality of life is severely diminished.

It has been said that exercise is the only singular thing that reduces the risk of every known disease and illness and prolongs life.  I submit that movement is the only singular thing that will enhance and extend functional capacity, reduce injury, and increase quality of life.  My aim is to add movement back into fitness and into people’s lives.

Because of this I have created the Primitive Initiative®(notice the that I trademarked it!  That’s how strongly I believe this is the direction that the field should be and is going). The Primitive Initiative® is a movement oriented training model based on 14 fundamental movement patterns arranged in a specific sequence to maximize results.  It combines biomechanical training with energy system sequencing to provide real life fitness for real life movements.  Whether you call it athleticism, mobility or functionality, Primitive Initiative® enables the human body to operate in all planes of motion, in all positions of center of gravity, at all levels of intensity, in varying bases of support with efficiency and proficiency.  The Primitive Initiative® aims to add real human movement patterns back into fitness and exercise.  This is the movement for movement, and I am excited to share this technique with you over the next several blogs!

 

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Filed Under: assessments, certification, functional assessments, functional movement, fundamental movement patterns, human movement, movement, nutrition, periodization, personal training, running, sports performance, strength and conditioning, Uncategorized, vacation fitness, weight loss Tagged With: beginnings, functional assessment, functional movement, fundamental movement patterns, health and fitness professional, human movement, movement, nutrition, origins, periodization, personal training, program design, running

The Value of Functional Assessments

March 11, 2015 By Garrett

A couple weeks ago I made mention in my periodization blog about how functional assessments are so important and that I would expand on it later.  Well, later has come.  I feel functional assessments are an essential part of program design.  A functional assessment is basically an assessment of one’s movement quality.  It will help the trainer identify the following:

Tight or Shortened Muscles– Muscles can become tight/short a many of ways.  It can be a product of repetitive motion or non-motion.  For instance, a person who sits all day for their job may have tight hip flexors and hamstrings because those muscles are rarely lengthened throughout the day.  On the other hand, someone who is on their feet all day while they work may develop tight calves because they use those muscles so much.  Either way, if a muscle is not able to lengthen properly it will affect a person’s ability to move.

Weak or Lengthened Muscles– Muscles general become weak/lengthened when they are underused or placed in an extended lengthened state.  Those who work at a computer may have lengthened and weak muscles of the upper back because they are constantly rounding forward.  This position underutilizes the muscles of the upper back, but also keeps them in a lengthened position.  If a muscle is over lengthened and underutilized it will definitely affect movement.

Postural Dysfunctions– The combination of the above two issues will general result in postural issues.  Posture includes the entire body.  If some muscles are tight/short and some muscles are weak/long it will cause the body to look a certain way.  For instance a tight chest and a weak upper back will have a person slouching forward in appearance. The more postural dysfunctions one has the more movement dysfunctions they will have.

Movement Dysfunctions– Movements are a product of the muscles that are responsible for the movement.  When we move most all muscles are involved somehow, someway all the time.  When there are muscles that are either tight/short or weak/long they are not operating properly.  This generally means that movement patterns are not efficient.  Forces are not able to be produced or absorbed properly.  When this happens at the very least we are as effective in out movements and at the very worst we become injured.

Compensation Patterns– Many times, movement dysfunctions are caused because we have developed compensations patterns.  That is to say, we have developed a way that we can make certain movements possible by not using the muscles that are supposed to make those movements possible.  This becomes an issue because we start to over load the muscles being used and they can become damaged or dysfunctional.

Movement Ranges-   There will be certain movement ranges that are possible without dysfunction or compensation, but as a movement moves past a certain point the body will compensate.  A perfect example of this is a squat.  Everyone can do a squat to a certain depth.  Some can go hips to heels with no dysfunction, while others may only be able to get a slight hip drop before dysfunction occurs.  There are ranges to still train a client that are safe while you continue to work on the dysfunctions themselves.

Functional assessments will give the trainer so much valuable information.  The biggest thing is for the trainer to identify and deal with areas of restriction.  Restrictions will hold back the client form truly becoming better.  Without the assessment, it really is a guessing game.

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Filed Under: assessments, certification, functional assessments, periodization, personal training, sports performance, strength and conditioning Tagged With: functional assessment, health and fitness professional, periodization, personal training, program design

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Latest Blog Posts

  • Healthy Lifestyle vs. Busy Lifestyle
  • Primitive Initiative™- Climbing Progressions
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  • Primitive Initiative™- Crouching Progressions
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Latest Blog Posts

  • Healthy Lifestyle vs. Busy Lifestyle
  • Primitive Initiative™- Climbing Progressions
  • Primitive Initiative™ Jumping Progressions
  • Primitive Initiative™- Crouching Progressions
  • Primitive Initiative™- Getting Up Progressions

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