If you have ever seen "The Karate Kid" you may remember Mr. Miyagi saying the title of this blog to Daniel-san. Well, the balance I'm referring to is not the kind of balance found in martial arts, but balance in the overall development of one's physique in order to improve performance, aesthetics, and to reduce injury.
Too many times i see people exercising in a manner that's to focused on specific muscles while others are neglected. A couple of good examples of this are the guys you see with fantastic upper body development, with legs like twigs. It's to the point they have to wear long pants on a 90 degree day. Or, the person with great pec (chest) development with little in the way of any back development........only training the muscles they see.
When setting up your program, be conscious of the balance of training your body in a manner that's 'balanced" from top to bottom, front to back, and side to side.
If the pecs are over developed in relation the traps and back, there will be a tendency for the shoulders to round forward. If the abs are trained constantly, but no attention is paid the the low back.....low back pain could be in your future. Too much force generated by well developed quads without strong hamstrings to balance that force out could be a knee injury waiting to happen.
Athletically, if all training is done in a linear (straight line) manner without anything being done side to side (laterally), if nothing is done in a rotational manner, or everything is done bi-lateral (both legs at the same time) vs uni-lateral (one leg at a time) the benefits of your training program in hope of improving your performance will be reduced.
Some body parts are not always fun to train, and some exercises are not always fun to do, but if you remember to maintain "balance" in your training program it will help give your results the "punch" you're looking for.
Sincerely,
Scott Fleurant ACE - CPT
scottf@sacofitness.com
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