Every day tasks which usually involve prolonged periods of time sitting in a slouched position, such as driving and working at a computer cause muscles associated with maintaining your bodies posture to turn off and become inactive as they are not being called upon frequently enough,a personal trainer should include these type of exercises in your workout. These are commonly the gluteal muscles and postural stabilising muscles in the core and back although muscles can become dormant anywhere in the body if they are not being used. Ever heard of the phrase “use it or lose it”.
The problem lies in these inactive muscles being far more resilient to switch back on compared to the ease in which they became inactive.
Because the nervous system essentially forgets how to correctly utilise these muscles, other muscles have to take to the burden and perform more work than they naturally would like to, in order to help you stand and move.
A common example of this (not always) is
personal training clients
who complain about having a bad lower back. More times than not it is not the back which is the problem but the fact that some of their back muscles are being over worked and are becoming fatigued due to other postural muscles not pulling their weight.
Muscle Activation refers to tricking stubborn muscles in your body to turn on and do some work during your training session.
By repeatedly stimulating these stubborn muscles with specialised techniques, your body can slowly but surely gain control and relearn how it is supposed to contract these dormant muscles. Helping to eliminate your aches and pains and improve your quality of life.
By tackling these issues in the gym during your personal training sessions, you can combat the downsides caused by necessities and unavoidable tasks of modern living. Check out our Facebook page for more information and upcoming videos on our top exercises .
