Functional Fitness

Build Real-World Strength: Functional exercises target multiple muscle groups, improving your overall strength and stability. Enhance Flexibility and Mobility: Our dynamic workouts help you move more freely, reducing the risk of injury and improving your quality of life. Boost Endurance and Agility: Increase your stamina and quickness, making daily tasks feel easier and less exhausting.

Ready to experience a fitness program that works as hard as you do? Get started today and see how Functional Fitness Training can make a difference in your life! Transform your fitness. Transform your life. 

Prepared by the editors of Harvard Health Publishing in consultation with Elizabeth Pegg Frates, MD, President, American College of Lifestyle Medicine, Assistant Professor, Harvard Medical School as well as Michele Stanten, Certified Fitness Instructor at the American Council on Exercise. 53 pages. (2024)

About Harvard Medical School Guides

Harvard Medical School Guides delivers compact, practical information on important health concerns. These publications are smaller in scope than our Special Health Reports, but they are written in the same clear, easy-to-understand language, and they provide the authoritative health advice you expect from Harvard Health Publishing.

The body is supported by an interconnected system of bones, muscles, tendons, and ligaments that enable you to move. When one part moves, it creates a chain of events that affect the other parts of the body. This concept, known as the kinetic chain, originated in engineering and was then later adapted to human movement and rehabilitation. When all parts are optimally functioning, 
the kinetic chain flows smoothly. But when there’s misalignment, weakness, stiffness, or instability in one part, it can lead to dysfunction or injury in another.

Most obvious is the cascade of events that can happen when you injure yourself. For example, if you sprained your right knee, you would likely place less weight on your right leg when you walk, shifting more of the burden to your left leg. This would involve changing your body position somewhat to accommodate your new gait. These changes would enable you to walk, but the combination of force and misalignment could trigger problems or pain in your left foot, your left hip, or even your lower back.

Less obviously, problems can arise if certain muscles are tight or weak. Tight hip flexors can contribute to pain in the lower back and changes in your gait as you walk, which then affects how forces move through your body, creating problems or pain up or down the kinetic chain. 

Weak leg muscles can change the tracking of the kneecap, which then affects muscles and joints above and below it. In all of these cases, other problems can zigzag up and down the body, making you susceptible to further injuries, especially if muscles supporting the other joints are weak.

 The body functions as a unit, which is why it should be trained that way. Functional fitness training places a high priority on training the body as a whole.

• What is functional fitness training?
• How does functional fitness training differ from other types of exercise?
• How aging affects functional fitness 
• Age-related changes
• Measuring your functional fitness
• Benefits of functional fitness training
• How functional training can improve your life
• Safety first
• Should you talk to a doctor first?
• Tips for safe exercise 
• Posture and alignment
• Creating a workout plan
• Start with a warm-up
• Terms to know
• Ready, Set, Go Workout
• Chair Workout
• Build Your Basic Skills
• Walking Workout
• Crossing the Street Workout
• Climbing Stairs Workout
• Balancing on Uneven Surfaces Workout
• Standing Up from a Chair Workout
• Getting Out of Bed Workout
• Bending Down Workout
• Getting Up off the Floor Workout
• Lifting Things Overhead Workout
• Using Your Hands Workout
• Stretches
• Up Your Game

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