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Common Muscular Weaknesses

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Re: Common Muscular Weaknesses

#91

Post by mindgam3 »

ohaideredevs wrote: post #89
mindgam3 wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean, yeah, beastskills is legit for all the reasons you mention. But it seems like it should be possible to give a shout out to beast skills without needing to disparage CC - they’re clearly working together and share the same core principles on weight training. I can’t speak to effectiveness of towel method yet as I’ve just started it. But I did start out by adding a weight belt to pull-ups and that didn’t seem t…

Beastskills is a superior resource. CC is just a money-grabbing ploy, which is fine, but there is no reason to go with it. As far as adding weight not working for you - you are more likely not eating enough / not resting enough / don't have the right rep/set numbers, etc. The appeal of adding weight is that you can fully control progressive overload, as in, add tiny amounts of weight. Anyway, watch out for bicep tend…

Uh... if CC is a money grabbing ploy, they’re doing a terrible job of it. I have spent a total of 20 bucks for a book with a few years worth of training exercises. The ebook is available for free online with a minimal search. Same for CC 2. I’m down to hear specific critiques of CC, but accusing them of ripping people off is absurd.

Everything else you say sounds reasonable. All the best on your journey, may the strongest strongman win, etc etc

Re: Common Muscular Weaknesses

#92

Post by tgarv »

01100011 wrote: post #31

The site recommends crunches and leg extensions... crunches are not a great exercise for functional ab muscles, and leg extensions are generally verboten due to stress on the knees from the open chain loading. It's good to be thinking of this stuff though. I highly recommend Athlean-X(his free youtube videos, can't say anything about his programs) and Mark Rippetoe's Starting Strength program. Between these two, I've…

I wish I had known this advice about serratus anterior a year ago! I started lifting again about a year ago for the first time since I was a teenager, and started getting some shoulder pain after a few months. Strengthening my serratus anterior has helped so much, plus I can just feel my scapula moving so much more comfortably now when I reach overhead. Definitely good to strengthen these supporting muscles before going overboard with compound movements.

Re: Common Muscular Weaknesses

#93

Post by ThrustVectoring »

I think a lot of these kinds of problems arise because people generally do not learn how to relax muscles and selectively engage only those necessary for the movements they make. The human body has more degrees of freedom than it needs to accomplish the tasks of daily living - you can, for example, awkwardly walk with everything below the hip locked in place (it looks like a penguin waddle). If you can't do things one way, you can often contort yourself to do them another.

How does this cause muscular weaknesses and imbalances? If a strong muscle is pretty much always tensed up, you plan out motor sequences that avoid using the opposing one. This muscle will naturally wind up becoming weak, but that's not really the fundamental problem. It's more that you use too much of the wrong muscles to do things.

The process for learning these skills is not particularly well documented in my experience. I think this sort of thing is the core idea behind both Alexander Technique and Feldenkrais Method, but I haven't read/experienced them in depth and aren't certain about it. Both of these are mostly transmitted through (sometimes literally) hands-on tutoring. I personally picked this up through getting into Blues idiom dancing, and probably got some of the previously mentioned stuff second or third-hand. "Progressive Muscle Relaxation" is also probably relevant?

Re: Common Muscular Weaknesses

#94

Post by sn9 »

modeless wrote: post #29
goostavos wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just as a minor complaint, "Stronglifts" is just Mark Rippetoe's intermediate program lifted directly from his Starting Strength book and shamelessly rebranded. If people are just getting into lifting, you can't do better than Starting Strength[0] for background info and mechanics on the main lifts. [0] https://www.amazon.com/Starting-Strength-Mark-Rippetoe-ebook...

Starting Strength is good to have around for reference, but the nice thing about Stronglifts for me is the app. It's high quality and makes the program very easy to follow. https://stronglifts.com/apps/

Starting Strength also has an app, which includes access to the book and videos.

Re: Common Muscular Weaknesses

#95

Post by herniatedeel »

ohaideredevs wrote: post #2

I really wish there were places that could legitimately analyze muscle imbalances and suggest corrective exercises. The internet only works for the most common ones, such as pelvic tilt, and sometimes you mis-diagnose yourself. A lot of the "great" information online is bro-science, and doctors generally don't care at all, so neither is optimal. P.S. The military uses fancy position sensors to track muscle imbalances…

Also, anterior pelvic tilt is normal for most people. It can of course be excessive as well.

https://bretcontreras.com/current-position-statement-on-ante...

Re: Common Muscular Weaknesses

#96

Post by matwood »

mindgam3 wrote: post #77
matwood wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bodyweight training is great (I often do it on rest days), but don't think that people pumping iron doing powerlifting are not 'practically' strong. When a person is dead lifting 500+ pounds or squatting 400+ they are strong anyway you slice it.

Seems a bit nitpicky to zero in on that one word, but okay, I added an edit. Strength is strength, I just tend to gravitate towards things that could help me in survival type situations.

The reason I zeroed in on the word practical is that it is used as a way to put down people doing something different than you. Now you’ve used survival type situations as another way to put others down.

Body weight things are great, but they have limits. The best results are going to come from a mix of body weight, power lifting, and conditioning. Any lifting program I have ever done included pull ups, dips, and pushups. Weighted if possible.

Also, if survival is really the focus, BJJ should be first above all else :)

Re: Common Muscular Weaknesses

#97

Post by matwood »

toss1 wrote: post #49
01100011 wrote: post #31

The site recommends crunches and leg extensions... crunches are not a great exercise for functional ab muscles, and leg extensions are generally verboten due to stress on the knees from the open chain loading. It's good to be thinking of this stuff though. I highly recommend Athlean-X(his free youtube videos, can't say anything about his programs) and Mark Rippetoe's Starting Strength program. Between these two, I've…

Good Advice; here's a bit more detail. Muscles respond to training input much faster than tendons (which attach muscles to the bones) and ligaments (which attach bones to other bones), roughly on a scale of 6 weeks vs 6 months. This is because the muscles have a vastly greater blood supply and connective tendons & ligaments have very limited blood supply. So, it is especially critical for people who are new to weight…

Good comment on type of pain. It’s important to realize that there is going to be some discomfort. Another thing is that the more a person lifts the less sore they get. The most sore I get now is when I come back from a 1-2 week vacation. My strength is always great, but that DOMS is rough.

Re: Common Muscular Weaknesses

#98

Post by djtriptych »

craigzucchini wrote: post #71
djtriptych wrote: post #59

Just here to promote yoga, which besides being a full body workout, grants the practitioner the ability to identify weak links through the flow of prana/inner breath.

While Yoga may be a great way to improve flexibility, among other physical benefits, prana is no more than a quack belief if I were to be generous. Unless you're thinking of something remotely testable/measurable/not rooted in a religious philosophy/not tied to breatharianism

It's a mistake to limit your own understanding the universe to what can be measured by science, while surrounded by perceivable phenomena that science can't explain.

It's at the very least arrogant to reject wholesale the common experience of millions of practitioners over thousands of years. Yoga is not dogmatic. Try it and see for yourself.

As for my specific claim, science has neither proven nor disproven the perception of prana, though you might consider that it has been described in many unconnected sources across the written record of history.

Re: Common Muscular Weaknesses

#99

Post by mindgam3 »

matwood wrote: post #96
mindgam3 wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems a bit nitpicky to zero in on that one word, but okay, I added an edit. Strength is strength, I just tend to gravitate towards things that could help me in survival type situations.

The reason I zeroed in on the word practical is that it is used as a way to put down people doing something different than you. Now you’ve used survival type situations as another way to put others down. Body weight things are great, but they have limits. The best results are going to come from a mix of body weight, power lifting, and conditioning. Any lifting program I have ever done included pull ups, dips, and pus…

Okay, that's a fair point and thanks for clarifying. To be clear, I'm not trying to put down all lifting - I agree with your point that best results come from a mix. My only problem with lifting culture is one particular subculture which emphasizes growth at all costs, steroids etc, which I find super dangerous and unhealthy. But I concede that I didn't make this clear with my original wording.

Also agree about BJJ. Haven't tried it out yet but hope to start training soon.

Re: Common Muscular Weaknesses

#100

Post by kaybe »

craigzucchini wrote: post #71
djtriptych wrote: post #59

Just here to promote yoga, which besides being a full body workout, grants the practitioner the ability to identify weak links through the flow of prana/inner breath.

While Yoga may be a great way to improve flexibility, among other physical benefits, prana is no more than a quack belief if I were to be generous. Unless you're thinking of something remotely testable/measurable/not rooted in a religious philosophy/not tied to breatharianism

Disclaimer: I have no experience with the specific field mentioned here.

I do think these seemingly absurd images have tremendous value for learning. The openly visible motions and postures are easy to teach. But there is more to movement and the feeling of ones own body that that. As I see it at the moment, these images are shortcuts coded in emotion and in-body-experience-feelings to teach the things that are very hard to teach otherwise.

The way eg Ki is described does make it sound extremely unlikely to actually exist, but using the images while moving or just breathing is quite powerful, and one can become aware of things inside the body that are not obvious. (One can often clearly see and feel the difference when someone does or does not do this (during the actions that need them).)

I can highly recommend to try.

edit:

Thinking of examples, the exact tilt of my hip for whatever use is best controlled by emotion. I have control about muscles in my lower body area (?) that do things to the way my body moves and reacts, this works almost exclusively over images and emotion. My posture is subtly different when I use emotion/images to work on it. I can use a lot more force when the images are right (the whole body is used, no joints at a bad angle etc, things that are very hard to do consciously.) Things like this.

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