How to Train Your Weaker Side

Approximately 90% of the world is right handed. Those people are writing, brushing their hair/teeth, throwing, reaching, and grabbing almost exclusively with their right hands for their entire lives. With this unilateral dominance in dexterity comes deficits between the halves of the body. Obviously, the use of one hand thousands of times per year results in a stronger right side.

Da Vinci's Vitruvian man is symmetry goals...

As ambidexterity or cross-dominance is quite rare (only ~1% of the world population), we will inevitably end up with a strong side and a slightly weaker side. This is even more apparent in sports that require repetitive movement with unilateral sports (baseball, tennis, rowing, etc.). Over thousands of practice hours, the athlete is going to develop exceptional strength on their dominant side, while their opposite side gets minimal attention. Exaggerated asymmetry can, at times, result in some postural issues down the line.

This brings me to answer a question that I receive often: how does one target the lagging side of the body? Do you start to only train the weaker side? Do you do more reps on the weaker side?

First, I want to explain the potential downfalls to significant imbalances from side-to-side.

Bell et. al. tested the influence of muscular symmetry on power and force development. They used a force plate to measure any incongruities in force generated between sides of 167 Division 1 athletes. While all of the athletes obviously had asymmetry to a degree, those with "greater than 10% power asymmetry resulted in decreased jump height of nine centimeters (approximately 3.5 inches) and was associated with large effect size when compared to the other groups." Furthermore, they hypothesized that "the normative data in this study ... reveals that a small number of Division I athletes are considered 'high risk of injury' using an arbitrary cut off level of 15% asymmetry." Not only do athletes with more asymmetry lose out on potential gains in power development, but they also have an elevated risk of injury.

There are other interesting benefits to training your weaker side. One study done on soccer players sought to improve motor control of the non-dominant leg. "Three soccer performance tests were carried out, using either leg ... Two standardised foot-tapping tests were performed, using the preferred and the non-preferred leg consecutively, indoors in a separate testing room with only the test administrator present." They found that

"[enhanced] training, which uses the non-dominant leg, improves soccer-specific skills in the test where the subjects use this leg, a finding that stands in contrast to the results of a control group ... That the training group also showed statistically significant improvements over the control group when using the dominant (right) leg was in line with the second hypothesis. The results show an improvement in performance when using the dominant leg after a period of emphasising training of the non-dominant leg."

In effect, the experimental group noticed an improvement in performance markers on both the dominant and the non-dominant sides. Even though the program was intended to train only the non-preferred leg, researchers saw a reasonable transfer of increased efficiency in the preferred leg, as well.

Okay, so now that I've belabored the idea that it's important to work towards a more symmetrical build, it's high time I explain how to achieve that.

When you use barbells, your body will immediately rely on the stronger side to move the weight. Dumbbells should become your new best friends. With dumbbells, there is no cheating. You will notice right away how much your stronger side compensates for the weaker side.

Generally, I recommend starting with your weaker side first, and taking note of just how much of a difference you feel. You don't need to try to do heavier weights or even more repetitions on your weaker side, but the goal is simply increased awareness and equal training. Dumbbell presses, bench press, rows, single leg deadlifts, single leg hip thrusters, Bulgarian split squats, lunges, lateral lunges, step-ups, leg curls, biceps curls, frontal/lateral raises, farmer carries, waiter carries, Turkish get-ups, and so on, are just a few movements that will bring some attention to your lagging half. Try to implement 1-2 of these exercises into every training session.

Additionally, you can perform some isometric contractions with your weaker side prior to exercise. I like to get my left glute firing by going into a single leg bridge, with a 3-5 second pause for about 10 repetitions. You can try some side planks for your obliques/shoulders as well. This will "wake up" your motor control center and remind the brain to use those muscles.

As an anecdote, I've started trying to use my left hand to do other activities, like brush my teeth and hair, just to give it some more use. It's strange, initially, how foreign your opposite side can feel!

Of course, it's perfectly normal to have one slightly stronger side. It is impossible to be completely balanced, as even our anatomy isn't perfectly symmetrical (the spleen sits in the upper left side of your abdomen, while your liver sits on the right side). Athletes with sport-specific strength disparities will have even more of a delta from one side to the other. There are also injuries or other structural factors that could cause asymmetry (scoliosis, uneven limb length, etc.). It is important, however, to minimize those imbalances that are correctable and try to focus on your weaker half in training.

Text Neck: Checking Your Phone While Sparing Your Posture

This is not sexy.

Your phone buzzes. You pick it up to see a new text message from your friend. As you read the message, you look down at your hands like the Hunchback of Notre Dame.

Unfortunately, some of us spend the majority of the day in this position, at a computer desk, scrolling through Instagram, or even reading a book. As a result of these recurring movement patterns, the anterior muscles become excessively tight and chronically active, while the posterior muscles are long and under-active. This is the start of neck pain and potential cervical disk herniations down the line. (No bueno.)

Any type of corrective exercise you do to improve your posture will be for naught if you do not change your daily habits, as well.

This is serious business. Don't end up like the last guy.

There are a few different alternatives to combat this and create lasting postural changes. Here are two different ideas of how you can stay "on the grid" while simultaneously sparing your neck!

1. Hold your phone higher, or use a standing work station. Instead of looking down at the screen, you can get a nice little isometric exercise for the shoulders by holding your phone at eye level. If your office allows for it, buy one of those standing desks so that you don't have to slouch in a chair all day.



I prefer to write all of my blog posts in the Cobra pose...

2. Try the Cobra position if you're at home (or if you have a really low key office where your coworkers won't look at you like you're a complete lunatic). This allow you to actually reverse the conventional hunched position and get some extension in the thoracic spine. Plus, this position is great for building a foundation of shoulder stability.

Both of these positions allow you to maintain good posture as you read your e-mails.

Don't spend hours doing hundreds of corrective exercises, expensive physical therapists or chiropractors, and then proceed to look down at your phone all day. You will undo all of your (and your manual therapist's) hard work.

Remember that your body remembers patterns and repetition, so the position in which you spend the majority of your time is the one to which your brain will revert. You can crack your neck and stretch until the cows come home, but none of those changes will have any lasting impact without first considering your day-to-day habits and positions.

Where Does Your Knee Pain Really Come From?

The knees are the largest joints in the human body. Unfortunately, these large joints also seem to be an even bigger area for pain and injury. In the U.S. alone, surgeons perform around 700,000 knee replacements annually--that's a lot of bionic knees! Other knee-related injuries include ACL tears, MCL tears, patellar tendon tears, patellar tendonitis, dislocated patellas and osteoarthritis. In my opinion, many of these surgeries or injuries are easily preventable. With the proper training protocol, you can avoid knee pain and inevitable surgery down the line.

We use our knees for a lot of different activities from walking and running to jumping, squatting and lunging, and therefore they withstand a lot of impact. It is incredibly important to prioritize solid movement patterns to avoid any further stress.

I should warn you, that this post will be fairly heavy in anatomical jargon. Brace yourself.

The "knee" covers an area of four bones: the femur, the fibula, the tibia, and the patella. As a hinge joint, the knee can only flex and extend. Though its actions are simple, the muscles around it are vast and complex. Some of the important muscles that directly help the movement of this joint are the hamstrings complex (semimembranosus, semitendinosus, and biceps femoris), the quadriceps complex (vastus medialis, vastus lateralis, vastus intermedius, and rectus femoris), the calf muscles (gastrocnemius, popliteus, tibialis anterior, and the peroneals). If you feel overwhelmed with the laundry list of muscles I just mentioned, fear not! I will elaborate.

Now, we need to remember that the body acts as a chain. One part of the body reacts to the feedback of another part. What are the two major joints near the knee? If you guessed the hip and the ankle, high five! We cannot just consider the knee in the case of knee pain, but rather, we must think about how the surrounding joints are compromising the integrity of the knee. If you have poor hip or ankle stability, the knee is going to work a lot harder to compensate for the lack of stability elsewhere.

Let's start from the ground up, at the ankle. The ankle can plantarflex (point), dorsiflex (flex upwards), invert/supinate, or evert/pronate. Check your feet. Are your arches exceedingly high or collapsed? What happens to them as you squat or jump? Ideally, we want to strive for a perfect balance between pronation and supination when standing. Both of these two movements are completely natural ankle movements when walking or running, but we do not want either in excess.

If, for example, you squat and your ankle collapses (pronates) completely, you will likely experience some collapse of the knee with it. The muscles on the inside of your leg (adductors) are over-active or tight, while the antagonists (abductors) will be lengthened. Do you often feel pain in your IT bands? Well, you may fit into this category of people. Your IT bands may be tense because they're working really hard for some other guys. Think about how this position is going to effect the ligaments and tendons in your knee!

Look at the relationship between his knees and ankles in the squat.

Conversely, if you drive your knees out too much and shift your weight laterally (supinate) your feet, the opposite will happen. Your adductors are going to be lengthened while your abductors will work over time. I was one of these people. The lateral areas of my knee always caused me pain, because I was nearly rolling my ankles as I squatted.

Obviously, the ankle position will effect the knee and hip mechanics, and vice versa.

If one lacks sufficient strength in the gluteus medius and the peroneals, the lifter will, again, revert to a valgus (collapse) of the knees. Weak gluteus maximus will result in an abuse of the quadriceps complex, which is going to pull onto the patellar tendon for dear life. Put more simply, if your glutes aren't strong enough, your knees are going to pay the price.

As I said, we want to maintain a balance in how we shift our weight as we move. Too much outward shifting of the hip or ankle is just as counter-productive as shifting too much weight inward. True strength comes from a balance.

Some of these inefficiencies may be a matter of learning. You might not understand what a proper squat should look like, and there for cueing and repetition will go a long way. If cueing has not helped, then you need to follow a strengthening and mobility routine. The exercises I've listed below will be tremendously helpful.

Now that we've made it through the meat of this article, it's time to learn how to correct these faults. Figure out where you lie on this spectrum of movement dysfunction, and correct your mechanics as necessary.

Here are some great ways to mobilize the hips and the ankles:

• Subtalar eversion and inversion
• Resisted half-kneeling ankle mobility
• Soleus and gastrocnemius release
• Gluteus medius release
• Plantar fascia mobilization

Once you've mobilized, the next step is to strengthen the targeted muscles:

• Single leg RDL
• Banded squats
• Ankle step downs
• Squat off of box
• Banded eversion
• Banded inversion
• Barbell hip thrusters

Where there is pain, there is weakness and dysfunction. You don't have to "accept" being in pain. Strengthening the hip and ankle muscles are vital in perfecting your mechanics and preventing unnecessary stresses on the soft tissues of the knee. Pay attention to those stabilizers and you will save your knees for many years of heavy lifting to come.

How Bigger Hamstrings Will Improve Your Athleticism and Prevent Injury

Let's talk about everyone's favorite chain: the posterior chain. So many songs have been written about it, but yet, some people oddly neglect to sufficiently train the glutes and hamstrings.

With this overwhelming abuse of the quadriceps complex, it is important that lifters prioritize isolation of the hamstring muscles to balance out the discrepancy in strength. Hamstring strength can play a role in improved power output, running economy, and may even reduce the risk of injuries like ACL tears.

As much as I love squats (and believe them to be one of the most beneficial exercises), the squat does not actually activate the posterior chain as much as many people think. In fact, many people squatting are quad-dominant, and under-utilize the gluteus maximus.

Before I elaborate, we need to review a little bit of anatomy. The muscles we refer to as the "hamstrings" are actually three separate muscles: the biceps femoris (which has a long head and a short head), the semimembranosus, and the semitendinosus. These two joint muscles work together to flex the knees and extend the hips.

Now that that's out of the way, we can talk about how these muscles affect performance. Since they act as hip extensors, strong hamstrings are going to be crucial for a high jump and a fast sprint. A 2007 study on sprinters concluded that "[...]the muscles mainly responsible for forward propulsion in full speed sprinting are the hamstrings, the glutaeus maximus and the adductor longus. The hamstrings are singled out as the most important contributors to produce highest speed levels." Essentially, an athlete with well-developed hamstrings will be able to horizontally accelerate much faster than an opponent with weaker hamstrings. Each stride will allow him to generate greater hip extension, getting more power as he straightens his legs. While quadriceps strength is necessary, it is the posterior chain that allows him to push harder off of the ground.

Similarly, another study found that runners with a smaller hamstring-to-quad ratio, meaning that there was not as big of a strength/size disparity between the two muscles, had a better running economy. This balance between the quadriceps and the hamstrings allowed the runners to be more efficient in their cadence. It was deduced that "runners should consider implementing hamstring exercises to improve their f-H:Q (hamstring to quad) ratios."

Usain Bolt has some serious hamstring pump.

The muscles activated in jumping are very similar to those we recruit in sprinting. While sprinting is unilateral, jumping is a bilateral movement. The extension of the hips, knees, and ankles, however, is much the same.

A four week study on males (with no strength training experience) found that the Nordic hamstring exercise (which I will show you later in this article) "[produced] favourable neuromuscular adaptations for the possible prevention of hamstring injuries while enhancing performance in athletic, untrained males." Using this exercise, on average, their vertical jump heights increased by about 6.3 cm in a month! That's pretty substantial. Granted, these are untrained individuals, but athletes could still reap some benefits from building the hamstrings.

I am a firm believer that a stronger, all-around, individual will be more resilient to injury. There is a decent amount of evidence to support the idea that hamstring strengthening can prevent the incidence of hamstring pulls, ACL tears, and other such injuries.

Askling et. al. tested hamstring injury in high-level soccer players. He put the players on an eccentric hamstring strengthening protocol 1-2 times a week for 10 weeks. "The results showed that the occurrence of hamstring strain injuries was clearly lower in the training group (3/15) than in the control group (10/15). In addition, there were significant increases in strength and speed in the training group." So the players got stronger, faster, and stayed injury free. What more could an athlete or a coach want!?

Here's the part you've been waiting for--the exercise section:

1. Russian leg curls
2. Good-mornings
3. Hip extensions (add weight if necessary)
4. Single leg RDL
5. Barbell hip thrusters
6. Stability ball leg curls 
7. Single leg sliding leg curl (advanced)
8. Slow eccentric RDLs
9. Reverse hypers
10. Stiff legged deadlifts

Not only will you have a better-looking rear-end, you'll be stronger, faster, and more injury resistant. Sounds like a win, win, win to me. Build those posterior chains!

Is Stretching Really Helping You?

Of course, for every great workout, you need to make sure you have a solid warm-up and cool down--I've written about why both of these things are crucial in any exercise routine. Foam rolling, stability exercises and activation work are all necessary to help you recover and keep you injury free. What about stretching?

There are a few different types of stretching:

1. Ballistic stretching
2. Dynamic stretching
3. Active stretching
4. Passive (or relaxed) stretching
5. Static stretching
6. Isometric stretching
7. PNF stretching

For the purposes of keeping this article short and sweet, I will only be covering static and passive stretching today. A static stretch is when you hold a position for a significant amount of time (30 seconds or more): think of your quad stretch, pigeon stretch, etc. A passive stretch is somewhat similar, but it involves the help of someone else who is forcing you into a greater range of motion.

Please, don't ever stretch like this...

Many people stretch in attempt to release tight areas, either before or after exercise: surely you have seen runners pulling their foot behind them to stretch their quads before a jog. While you may feel a bit looser, research has showed that static stretching before power or strength related activities may be counterproductive.

One study in the Journal of Athletic Training found that "both static and proprioceptive neuromuscular facilitation stretching caused similar deficits in strength, power output, and muscle activation" on the leg extensions machine. Similarly, another study tested the effects of stretching on balance, reaction time and movement time. They found that "[an] acute bout of stretching

impaired the warm-up effect achieved under control conditions with balance and reaction/movement time."

Before exercise, stretching may actually have a negative effect of a wide range of performance markers.

Another problem I have with static stretching is that it does not really address the cause of the muscular tightness. Tension in a muscle is the result of weakness and instability somewhere else. For example, someone who has chronically tight upper traps probably has weak lower and middle traps, under-active lats, and poor shoulder stability. An athlete with tight hamstrings likely has weak glutes and a dysfunctional core. Stretching your hamstrings into oblivion is never going to strengthen your core. Instead, you must find out what those weaknesses are and address them as necessary. Stability exercises would be much more practical in alleviating hamstring tightness than yanking on your leg for extended periods of time.

While stretching does have its place, it is important to consider why you are stretching that area, and make sure it doesn't hinder your performance.

6 Ways to Overcome a Plateau and Start Getting Stronger Again

In fitness, as in life, we are always looking to move forward. If you're putting in the hard work in the gym, you should only continue to progress, right? Well, ideally, yes. Many, unfortunately hit a plateau somewhere along the way that may leave them feeling unmotivated or discouraged. If you approach your workouts the right way, however, you will only continue to progress and grow.

Here's a really helpful (not) diagram of a plateau for science.

Here are 6 reasons you aren't progressing in the way you want:

1. Intensity- Are you giving your workout your all, or are you texting in between sets? Each week, you should try to add more weight or increase the number of reps you're performing. If you just continually squat 135 lbs week after week, how do you expect to get stronger? If you're not gasping for air at the end of your sprints, you're not pushing yourself hard enough. The only way we can create adaptation is to give our bodies something to which it can adapt! It's important to make sure you enter your sessions in the gym with 100% effort. (Well...most days, anyway. We all have our "off" days...)
2. Variation- It's nice to have a set split or program and follow that week after week, but if you're only doing the same handful of exercises ad nauseum, it can get pretty dull. Every once in a while, add a few new exercises into your routine and get rid of a few of the older ones. Not only will it keep your workouts interesting, your body will find a completely new way to challenge itself with a new task.
3. Muscle imbalances- A weak or underactive muscle might be preventing you from advancing as you'd like. Let's say you have really strong quads, and you can squat 300 pounds for reps. Just imagine how much more you could squat if you actually learned to use your butt! When our muscles work together in force couples as they're supposed to, beautiful things happen.
4. Program- Maybe it's time to either ask a friend for help programming your workouts (preferably one with lots of experience) or do some research online. Unfortunately, strength doesn't progress linearly, so it's important to make sure you account for that when you write out your program. Play with the number of sets, reps and the amount of weight you're using and find out what works best for you.
5. Planning- My father always tells me "If you fail to plan, you plan to fail!" You need to set real, tangible goals for yourself. For example, one of my goals is to deadlift 300 lbs before the end of the year. As you can see, I gave myself a set number and a date by which I want to achieve it. Your goal might be to lose 10 pounds by June. Whatever those goals may be, make sure you've clearly articulated them to yourself and written them down so you can hold yourself accountable.
6. Recovery- Perhaps you're not giving yourself enough time to recover between workouts. Make sure you're eating enough food to sustain your activity level and drink a lot of water. A lot of people I meet have a tendency to deprive themselves of the food their body so desperately needs to rebuild and repair itself. Remember: food and water are fuel!

When you start to see a flatline in your progress, it's time to step back and reassess your approach.

"Insanity: Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results."

-Albert Einstein 

Why You Need to Have a Big Butt

Having a big butt is certainly preferable for models twerking in rap videos, but it's also extremely important in athletic performance. Weather you're a soccer player, a running back or just simply working out to maintain a healthy lifestyle, you need to make sure you're giving your butt the attention it deserves.

I know what you're thinking: "But Arianna! I can squat 250 pounds. My glutes are really strong!" In a perfect world, you would achieve glute activation in the back squat, but many of the back squats I see people execute in the gym make use of the anterior quadriceps muscle and recruit minimal activation from their posterior chain. The truth is, if you are a predominantly sedentary person (meaning you sit for 4+ hours a day at home or at work), you probably don't know how to correctly activate your glutes because you're not using them for the majority of the day. Fear not--you are part of the American majority who sits at a desk job all day. It's no wonder that we don't know how to activate the right muscle groups considering we don't use them as often as we should.

Underactive or weak glutes can cause a ton of problems, including lower back pain, knee pain, IT band syndrome, and a whole slew of other maladies. Your quadriceps may be strong enough to squat 250 lbs, but guess what? If you learned how to activate your glutes properly, you would easily squat over 300 lbs.

The gluteus maximus (one of three muscles that make up what we collectively call the "glutes") is the biggest muscle in your body. Now, if we learn how to properly employ the strength of this tremendous group of muscles, we are going to see some real magic happen. Whether we're doing a deadlift, a squat, a box jump or a clean and jerk, we need to learn to properly harness the power from our glutes in order to move the most amount of weight and avoid injury.

In order to utilize the strength of the ever-powerful gluteal muscles, we must focus on activating them. Some great exercises can be found in my previous article about warm-ups, but I'll list a few more that I really like here:

• Single leg or weighted glute bridges
• Banded walks
• Reverse hyper extensions
• Single leg Romanian deadlifts
• GHD raise
• Bulgarian split squats
• Reverse lunges
• Side plank with abduction

Once you learn to properly engage your posterior chain, you will see tremendous gains in strength while simultaneously protecting your body from injury. If you have humongous quadriceps and a small butt, that should be a red flag to you that your glutes needs some more attention. Channel your inner Nicki Minaj and start building a bigger booty!