If you could run faster to the finish line with less effort, would you? What if I told you there’s a secret no other book, blog, coach, or trainer will teach you? Our head says we should work harder to get better. Our body says hard work feels good. Our head tells our body how to move but our body moves through the path of least resistance.
We all know:
Better Technique = Better efficiency. More Speed. Unprecedented Endurance. Less Injuries.
We need to understand:
Better Technique = Clear pathways between joints.
Better Technique = A road planned, paved, and travelled through the body.
Better Technique = Teaching the body to drive the best route, without directions.
Most of us think of technique as something we can think our way to changing. We know how to reach our hand further or lift an elbow higher. We can lengthen our stride and do butt kicks with the best of them. We practice pushing a peddle faster and pulling up smoother. But where does that movement come from? Does your body know the best way to get that movement?
The road to reaching, lengthening, pushing, pulling, and every technique we try to implement, is series of joint actions and reactions. With over 600 muscles crossing more than 300 joints in seemingly random angles, our bodies need to learn how to make the right turns at the right time, movements that are specific to a each technique. Each joints follows the detours a life activity (or inactivity) creates. Disparities in strength, flexibility, and balance all affect how your unique body moves. Sometimes, this results in failure to engage the muscles in a pattern that produces peak performance.
A movement program designed specifically for your body constructs new roads that teach the body quicker, safer, stronger, and faster ways to get from one point to the another. Flexibility, stability, and strength can reinforce these pathways but only when the navigation is clear. Stretching, yoga, bootcamps, and gym workouts are all awesome as long as they’re not reinforcing or creating detours in your movement. Know your body, then define YOUR workouts. How well do you understand the path of least resistance that YOUR body travels? All of us have detours, what are you doing to pave new roads to YOUR performance?