Transcript 0:00 Welcome back to the Iron Sights podcast in the Red Dot Fitness Iron Sights podcast studio. It's Ryan, CC, and Steven. This episode, we are talking about muscle imbalances and asymmetries. Do you have one? What is it? 0:12 Does it matter how you train and with it, around it, or for it? And we give you insights and opinions on the, uh, term imbalance and asymmetries from the trainer's perspective. 0:21 So sit back, enjoy this episode with, uh, the Iron Sights podcast crew here at Red Dot Fitness. 0:25 [whooshing sound] If you listen to the show regularly, then you know I always gotta remind you these episodes are brought to you by Red Dot Fitness training products and programs. 0:33 Where do you go if you wanna find out more? I'm gonna tell you. It's rdftrainonline.com. 0:37 When you get there, you can learn all about the things that we offer here at the studio and outside the studio online in, on the rest of the planet. So go visit rdftrainonline.com. That's rdftrainonline.com. 0:49 [upbeat rock music] Welcome to Iron Sights. 0:56 This podcast candidly seeks to create opportunities and deliver impact by sharing the experiences and wisdom of successful entrepreneurs and thought leaders who unapologetically aim to win in health, fitness, business, and life. 1:10 I'm your host, Scott Howell. Welcome to old school meets new school, tradition meets innovation, and imperfection meets excellence. Thanks for listening, and enjoy the show. There's, uh, nepotism going on there. 1:24 I'm not sure you would've made it, man. [laughs] No, no. 1:26 It's just- Those guys always have their sons and their boys, uh- Oh, as far as, yeah, the, yeah, to, to get in as a, as an announcer, yeah, you need to start, like, uh, number one, you're gonna be a play-by-play guy, 'cause color guys have to be former players. 1:37 Yeah. Or, like, personalities, so you're gonna be a play-by-play guy. But, you know- Did you say color guys? Yeah. Yeah. The color. You know, like- Call it color. Yeah. 1:45 There's, like, the color commentator, and there's the play-by-play commentator. 1:48 So there's, the play-by-play commentator is primarily calling the action and what's happening, and then the color guy is filling in the, the context- It's like, "When I played, I-" Oh, okay... 1:56 and telling stories and- "I used to hate pitching-" Yeah... "in this stadium." Yeah. [laughs] Okay. Yeah. Huh, how about that? Yeah. Mm-hmm. You never knew that? No. Oh, that's interesting. 2:03 You didn't know there's, like, two different- No. Oh, yeah. It's- So, so think about that. Yeah, like, like think about that Like, think about the next time you watch any game. Yeah. 2:09 So some of the- There's always one guy, like- Some of the best co- color commentators actually didn't come from sports at all. They came from, uh, movies. Like, um, 2:16 what's the movie with the, uh, with the girls that sing a cappella? What's that thing called? Pit- Pitch Perfect... Pitch Perfect. Perfect. I love that movie. You guys ever see that? 2:23 I know about those movies 'cause, because we have daughters, right? [laughs] Yeah. And I've seen them all. I think there's, like, three or four of them. Yeah. 2:29 The, the com- [laughs] the commentators for those, those- Oh, yeah... politicians. Oh, yeah... with the bank? Yeah, yeah. The guy. Are insane. When they're, like, being satire about... Yeah, yeah. It's great. 2:37 [laughs] And then the other one is the one, uh, Dog Sh- I think it's called Dog Show. I haven't seen that one. You gotta see that one. Jason Bateman, I think- Mm-hmm... is in that one. Yeah, yeah. 2:44 Uh, dude, like, it- Hilarious. Yeah, yeah. For the... F- just fast-forward to those parts where they're doing the commentating. It's so inappropriate. [laughs] And out of pocket. It's awesome. 2:54 Well, Jason Bateman as the, the color commentator in dodgeball. Oh, yeah. [laughs] Exactly. What is it? Uh, Pepper Brooks. [laughs] Oh, God. That's exactly the part. "God needs new shorts." Yeah. 3:03 [laughs] I feel, yeah, I feel like, uh, Steven would be really good at that. [laughs] All right. Oh, yeah, and his sarcasm. Only a little bit. [laughs] He's sarcastic? [laughs] And dry. No, I love it. 3:15 That's one, that's one of my favorite things about Steven. I crack up. Some people don't get it and, and don't get him, and I'm like, "I'll take it all day long." [laughs] That's fine. All right. 3:22 I've been dealing with that for a while. [laughs] Uh, jumping right in. Today, we are talking about correcting muscle imbalances. 3:30 Uh, very popular in, like, the personal training certification world and certainly in big s- big box gyms everywhere. 3:39 I think when you start getting into the field of athletic performance early on, uh, coaches, new coaches wanna talk about this a lot, or they're always looking for all the things that are, people are doing wrong, uh, rather than what they're doing right and how to improve on those. 3:54 And so this muscle imbalance thing comes up, uh, and it's a little annoying, 'cause I think a lot of people spend a lot of time talking about it, and a more time trying to, quote-unquote, "fix it" or fix them, whatever those things are, and we're gonna talk about that today. 4:08 And I think it gets in people's heads, and I think there are some things that people can address. When you think about the word or the term imbalance, what does that actually mean? 4:16 I mean, I'm pretty imbalanced in a lot of ways- [laughs]... physically, emotionally- [laughs]... psychologically. Like- There's some emotion in that laugh, CC. [laughs] I'm pretty imbalanced. We all are. 4:26 [laughs] So when we talk about, like, muscle imbalances as it relates to, let's say, human performance, what, and- Yeah... I, let's just stick to the physical side of things. Uh, what are we really talking about here? 4:38 So again, I mean, some of these, like, certifications, and I've been to a lot of them, uh, in the last 27-ish, 28 years. 4:47 Uh, and as well as, like, in the institution of education, university, and things like that, you start to hear about this stuff. 4:53 And e- I think the longer you go, the more you recognize, like, what, what are we really talking about here? Uh, okay, this person is challenged. Does that mean they have an imbalance? 5:04 Uh, so I wanna talk, you know, it j- it, the right side's stronger than, or stronger than the left side. Their dominant side's stronger than their non-dominant side. Does that mean they have an imbalance? 5:13 What the hell does this even mean? 5:14 And then with that, I've seen entire workout programs, protocols, um, models of how to train people, uh, based around correcting muscle imbalances, and then it, it, to the, to the ex- extent where we hear the term corrective exercise, which I've been very cautious about using even on this show. 5:33 I think there's things to help people get better at things. Does that mean we're correcting them, or we're just making them better? I think there's a, there's two ways, two sides to that coin in how you're looking at it. 5:41 So, uh, people have probably heard from somebody at some point that they have a muscle imbalance, or they have an imbalance somewhere. 5:49 Uh, and it's not that I've never used that word before, but I think when I, when I use that word, and I think when this team uses that word, they're v- it's very specific. 5:59 Um, but it can also be Looked at as like a buzz term or a buzzword or something that gets an emotional rise out of somebody, uh, to either insult them [chuckles] or make them have a fear or some type of an insecurity, which also drives them to maybe make a buying decision. 6:15 And so that term gets used a lot. 6:17 So anyhow, um, if you've ever been told you have an imbalance, a muscle imbalance, or some type of imbalance physically, like what does that mean and, and how has that impacted you psychologically, emotionally, and then from a behaviorist perspective, uh, in terms of how you approach your programming? 6:33 So anyway, that's what we're talking about today, and hopefully we can clear this up for people. Um, I'm sure we're gonna hurt a few feelings. Um, and when I say... Sorry, when I... 6:42 I guess when I say if you've ever heard that, um, if you've ever been to a chiropractor or a physical therapist or maybe even an ortho or again, your personal trainer that's on the floor at the gym, you may have hear- you may have, have heard this or been told you have one. 6:59 So let's talk about it, and maybe you can reassess what that really means for you and what it doesn't mean for you. Where do you guys wanna start? Mm-hmm. I think we did... Let's start with defining, like- Yeah... 7:11 what does imbalance mean? Yeah. Are we saying imbalance to either side of the body, like left to right? Are we saying imbalance of like- Are we saying a- asymmetries or are we saying muscular strength? 7:21 It's all good questions. Yeah. But- Man. Yeah, so let's define it. What do we, what do we wanna talk about it as? Do we... Because I feel like that's two different directions we can go in this, so. 7:29 I, I think you're absolutely right, and I think that's where the confusion starts to lie. So- Yeah... let's start with the term asymmetry. Mm-hmm. 7:36 So I think largely speaking, like making a blanket statement, when we think asy- asymmetries, we think of hypertrophy being different or muscle size being different- Girth... in one... Girth. 7:47 Yeah, uh, in one area of the body over the other. One of the things that we look at quite frequently and we see an asymmetry is in somebody's glutes as an example. Mm. Big, powerful muscles, back of the hips there. 8:00 Uh, and we see that, you know, their dominant side or their non-dominant side may have a little bit more muscle t- on, on it, a little bit more hypertrophy. 8:09 Let's put it that way, hypertrophy, so muscular size and volume, not necessarily more muscle tissue, or excuse me, more muscle fibers. Fibers are the same. How they've been impacted could be different. 8:20 So you may have a bigger butt cheek on one side than the other. That's one, one of the ways I, I look at asymmetries. 8:26 Yeah, so I see asymmetries aesthetically like you just mentioned, but then I also see asymmetries as far as within movement patterns. 8:33 So as far as, let's just say putting y- both of your arms overhead at the same time and you're standing behind somebody while they're doing this, and you're looking at their shoulder mechanics and looking at their shoulder blades. 8:43 Are their shoulder blades moving similarly in comparison, um, to the other side? So what I'm saying is, are their shoulder blades moving outward and up the back and downward and together at the same time? 8:59 So there's an asym- When there's... Sorry, when there's overhead motion with the shoulder, when you're going up and then when you're bringing your arm back down. So there's an asymmetrical movement pattern, right? 9:07 And then there's asymmetries in terms of muscle girth, size- Mm-hmm... if you want. So that, those are two different things. Yes. Could they impact one another? Sure. Uh, we'll talk about that. What... 9:17 Were you going somewhere with the asymmetry thing? I, I, I mean, I, I don't know. I... It's in... 9:20 I think for me, just my, my opinions on this has gone so back and forth over the years as a coach, 'cause I think I went through the stage of like, you must correct imbalances at all- [laughs]... at all costs. 9:30 But then, you know, we, you mentioned athletes at the beginning of this, like, good luck, you know, St- we, we've talked about Steven being a pitcher, like, okay, well, Steven always pitches with his right hand, so what are you gonna either have him pitch with his left hand or try to do rotation always the opposite direction? 9:43 And you're... Good luck trying to out-perform or out-v- um, volume that side- Mm... that he's constantly pitching on. So like, I think that's kind of come back [laughs] full circle. 9:52 [laughs] I was literally doing an exercise yesterday- Yeah... and noticing that to this day, more than a decade later, my right delt is still significantly larger than my left delt. Oh, for sure. And, and that... 10:02 When, when you're in- doing, moving that way during your dev- developmental years, like you're gonna have things that are structurally different about your body at this point, 'cause you had that repetitive motion, and whether it, it, you know, the motor pattern led to the different musk- muscular development, like there... 10:18 You can... So how I... Honestly, my big statement on this is I teach people how to manage asymmetries if it leads to something that, that we don't want, so either pain or a big... Or it's from an aesthetic point of view. 10:30 Like, if there's a big discrepancy, you're like, "Hey, my right pec is way bigger than my left pi- pec, and I don't like how that looks." Yeah, there's things managing that, but you're... You know, humans are weird. 10:39 We walk around doing things with one hand most of the time, most people, right? They're... We're pretty dominant on that. So good luck trying to like find complete symmetry in your body. Yeah. So that's a great point. 10:48 I wanna come back to that, but let's talk about the word imbalance- Okay... right? As it compares to asymmetries. What do you wanna say about that? Are they the same? Are they different? So I would say asymmetry versus 11:04 imbalance. If we're talking about imbalance, muscular strength imbalance- Mm-hmm... that's one thing. That doesn't necessarily mean that you're gonna have a, a phy- a, I guess, movement asymmetry. Great point. 11:18 But you could, but it doesn't necessarily mean that you are. Okay, so this is where we're getting into a very objective evaluation. Yeah. 11:24 Because then it also comes to as far as like, well, are you loading or are you unloaded when you're doing this? So this goes, again, very objectively, we have to look at this and go, "What is imbalanced? 11:33 What do you mean by that?" And so that was a really great descriptor of, okay, so you have more muscle on one side than you do on the other in this particular thing. Is that a bad thing, right? 11:44 D- how is that impacting you? Why... Is that a problem? 11:48 Uh, and if you're trying to, quote-unquote, "fix it," or you mentioned the word corrective, or cor- corrected, I said corrective, but if you, if you use the word cor- correct, like what are we doing and why are we doing it? 12:00 Mm-hmm. So again, just because you have a imbalance of something which is very similar to an asymmetry, and if you- The, the words I think can cross over a lot of times. They don't necessarily mean the same thing. 12:12 We need to evaluate, like, just because it's bigger doesn't mean it's imbalanced, right? Does, does... Is, is that a problem? And to your point, it depends. 12:21 Because if it cr- if it's creating a problem, this was your point as well, Ryan, if it's creating a problem, if it's creating pain, if it's setting... 12:28 If it's affecting other things within the, quote unquote, "chain," right? That could be problematic, then we may need and want to address it. 12:36 Sometimes it's just, it's not about correcting anything, it's just about keeping up with it. Mm-hmm. Yep. Right? So I wanna go ba- So I think that's a good way of looking at it. 12:43 Like, an imbalance could be, could be a couple of different things, but it doesn't mean, necessarily mean it's a bad thing, and it doesn't mean it needs to be corrected. So let's just start with that. Mm-hmm. 12:52 And then going back to w- what Steven was saying there about his, his right side, you know, versus his left side with his strength and... Or w- specifically with his muscle size or muscle girth on that one side. Like, 13:04 why wouldn't it be? Specif- specifically, and you mentioned, like, as you're, you're an athlete, like, calf, like, gastroc, right? And, and soleus girth, right? When you're looking to lower leg. 13:14 Like, if you are a, if you're a j- if you're a power athlete, a jumper, or like, say, you're a basketball player, right? 13:20 And you're constantly leading or you're powering off that right side all the time, it's really natural to think, like, think about this, this makes sense. My right calf's gonna be a little larger than my left calf. Why? 13:31 It's getting more work, right? There's more volume, there's more... There's likely a little bit more intensity there that's going on on that side. Those are the things that start to build more muscle, right? 13:40 It's the same as doing weight training. Does that need to be fixed? It depends, right? Are we having issues on our left side? Right? I- is it... 13:48 And again, going back, like, okay, well, if that's the case, like, you're a sprinter and you're, you're in the blocks the same way every time, like, getting a little bit more from one side versus the other side at different points of your start, right? 13:59 If you're a football player and you're constantly playing on the right side, if you're an offensive tackle, and you're playing on the, uh, uh, and you're, you're the right tackle, offensive tackle on that team, or, or guard or whatever, and you're constantly moving from the same position the same way, it's natural to think you're going to have some, number one, asymmetries, and it could create an imbalance in terms of your performance somewhere. 14:21 But we need to know what imbalance are we seeing, and what, and how do we measure it. Mm-hmm. 14:26 Uh, and so what are we objectively actually identifying here as a c- as a potential or, quote unquote, "problem" that's already arrived somewhere? 14:35 And then how do we kind of unwind the sticky web of, like, okay, well, what do we need to do here? Um, so again, y- people here are like, "Oh, I've got this imbalance in my shoulder." What does that mean? 14:46 You mentioned in the last podcast about rotator cuffs, like, "I've got a r- my right rotator cuff has a problem." Is it your rotator cuff? That's a whole other question. Yeah. Like, how do we know, right? 14:57 Well, and I, I think that my brain now is going to where there's comparing, you know, bring up the calf size or, you know, we think comparing left gastroc to right gastroc, so there's that kind of muscle imbalance. 15:07 But then when we talk about something like the shoulder, a lot of the more, the asymmetry or the imbalances that we see are, are these, these muscles that need to fire in ways that create a good, uh, mechanic at the shoulder. 15:18 So, like, we've talked about a rotator cuff issue might be an, an imbalance in your engagement of the mo- muscles that move the scap, like the rhomboids or the serratus, things like that. You know, I, I keep... 15:28 My brain is also going to, I've mentioned that I had a little bit of a knee issue that I've been dealing with for a while, and I finally really figured it out that my lateral quad on my left side was overdeveloped, and it was actually making my patella, my kneecap, track laterally, and it was getting to where it was articulating, it would literally click, and it was getting to where it was getting a lot of swelling. 15:47 So a lot of my rehab has been finding more balance by working on my medial quad. 15:52 So that's something that is different, where finding symmetry around a joint and how it moves is different than making my right quad as big as my left quad and that being the focus, so. 16:01 Oh, man, that's such a great point. That's a good point. [laughs] Overactive, underactive. That's kinda what I thought when you guys-... mentioned muscle imbalance. For sure. So two different things. Yeah. 16:09 Uh, but, uh, let's, let's, let's work from the platform of these are very natural things. Mm-hmm. And so, uh, y- again, w- we've talked about n- uh, nature versus nurture and how we can, w- we can impact things. 16:21 Like, naturally, you're going to be that way. Uh, good luck outdoing all of that, all of the nature. Like- You mean naturally one size is gonna be a little bit larger than the other? Yeah, naturally, yeah. Yes. 16:32 But you can nurture it in a way where you can train things, obviously that's what bodybuilders are doing constantly, right? Yeah. 16:37 They're always trying to find symmetry from the, the upper body to the lower body, from the right delt to the left delt, from the left pec to the right pec, all of those kind of things. 16:46 Like, that's what they're doing, and they're, they're picking very specific movements and, or, quote unquote, "exercises" in order to do that, right? And, and, and focus on those in a different way. 16:56 That's very different than somebody who, when we're looking at them mechanically, right? And how they're, how they're performing. 17:02 So I think you gotta back it up and go, like, "Okay, well, I have an asymmetry," or, "I have an, a quote unquote 'imbalance.' How is that impacting me? 17:10 'Cause if it's not impacting me negatively, and the, and, and I'm s- performing at a very high level, what is the risk versus reward of trying to over-correct this thing- Mm... 17:21 uh, for the sake of feeling better about having a bigger right pec or a similar sized left pec as I do a right pec?" Um, you have to make those decisions. I can't make those decisions for you. 17:32 But what we could measure is maybe how that's impacting your performance in some way through doing a very objective evaluation, which has some very specific parameters that we can repeatably test and track and get some data on so we can... 17:46 Is that what people are doing out there? That's not what they're doing out there. No. 17:50 Like, there are some strength and conditioning coaches or human performance coaches that are certainly doing that to help people perform better, but it's not, it doesn't start with correcting imbalances. It starts with 18:03 the, the larger picture, which is like, "What is my strength? What does my movement look like?" Number one. Like, what does my... How, how- How do I do that? Then, what does my strength look like? 18:13 That's the foundation for all the things that we're gonna be doing from, in terms of expressing those, the movement and the strength through, like, things like speed and power, right? 18:22 So, you know, when you start to break all this stuff down, like, again, I think it gets looked at with... There's too much of a blanket statement being made there. We have to actually look a little deeper. 18:32 And if you don't have the ability to do that, 'cause you don't have the knowledge or the education, uh, to do that, then I think people get, start to get lost in the sauce of, like, what's the right exercise to fix this thing in the, in the gym or when I'm in, in the weight room or on the field or, or whatever else. 18:47 I mean, I, I, I think people get lost, and I think that's kind of what's happened with the term imbalance, muscle imbalances. 18:55 Again, to the point where we've got entire training models being built around fixing this stuff and, and what are we leaving on the table, uh, for somebody who's trying to, number one, just be healthier, um, number two, maybe it is an aesthetics goal, or number three, maybe it's more of a longevity, or, or excuse me, a performance goal. 19:15 Like, I'm just trying to, I'm trying to get better at this specific thing, and I know I'm gonna be better at that thing when my time improves or, you know, or my, my numbers improve or whatever. 19:25 What is the objectively are we trying to, trying to get out of this? And so when... Again, looking at imbalances, is it really that big a deal? Is it really that big a deal? 19:33 So, uh, again, if, if I've been told I have an imbalance, where did that come from? 19:39 Where, like, where are clients coming in or people that we work with, where are they, where are they coming in, uh, uh, self-identifying or maybe they've id- somebody else has identified for them? 19:48 What are some of the things that come up? I mean, I think that's just, like, a very, like, um, I can't think of the term, but some- you know, someone sell- trying to sell a product. 19:55 That's a very big thing of, I've even seen people comment in things on online and stuff of like, "Oh, I'm waiting to lift because I have imbalances that I need to fix." 20:02 So there's people selling programs of like, "Fix your asymmetries, fix your imbalances." And so it's like this catchph- this catchall phrase that people see a lot, and so they're either self-identifying... 20:12 And w- I've had someone DM me too saying, "My hips are imbalanced. What do I do about it?" 20:18 And, you know, and I think it creates a lot of fear around movement, and it creates a lot of, um, like, ignorance around- Anxiety. [laughs] Anxi- anxiety, for sure too. 20:27 And I've, uh, honestly, if I think about it, I've gone through that in the past where I, like, I'm kinda hyper-aware of my movement. 20:33 And so I've, I've gone to where like, oh man, I really, my right shoulder is stronger on this, so I'm, every time I pick up a weight, I'm gonna make sure I pick it up with my left. 20:40 Like, I've been that kinda like anal retentive about it. [laughs] Like, like I've been very specific about that in the past, and it's built anxiety and hindered my progress, hindered my performance in the gym. 20:51 And so I think a lot of people see that and they get scared by either reading it online or some professional telling them. So I, I think that's where a lot of it's coming from. 20:59 I think some of the other places it comes from is, is, well, I had this injury- Mm-hmm... at some point, which cr- Yeah. Yeah. [laughs] Oh, that's [laughs] yeah. Yes. Which created this thing for me for a while. Yeah. 21:10 And as a result of that thing, now I have an imbalance. Mm-hmm. 21:14 Uh, and okay, so before we start getting into correcting whatever you think your imbalance is, we have to get back to the root of what was that injury in the first place. Mm-hmm. 21:24 And can we identify, like, how that happened, what happened, what exactly happened, where were you at that time, and what have you done since then to get here? 21:31 Because a lot of times I see this corrective exercise to correct imbalances as the culprit for why somebody is further down the path of having this, quote-unquote, "imbalance" in the first place, to your point. 21:42 Like, "My hips are, my hips are imbalanced." What does that even mean? Yeah. How did, how did we evaluate this? What, objectively, what are we talking about? 21:52 I mean, some people do a, you know, a static, like, FABER test on, on your hip. Like, this one has more external rotation and more internal rotation. Weird. 21:59 Which, which, uh, almost every person has a, a varying degree of internal and external rotation on their hips. Like, almost everyone you're gonna see has some degree of that. 22:07 And just because you have that, does that mean you're not going to perform well or going to get hurt or injured? And you should not lift a, a weight until you fix that. It's ridiculous. Yeah. Yeah. 22:16 I mean, we're laughing about it. Like, we have, so we have a- But we've seen it, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Go ahead. 22:20 Oh, I was just gonna say, you know, depending on, I don't know, the injury, where you are in life, y- uh, as far as age and exercise history and all that stuff, and then what your rehab process was like if you had an acute injury, let's say an ACL. 22:34 Uh, depending on how you, you rehab that, it could be you know what, you might never have the symmetrical look at, at your quadriceps. Like, they might not ever look- Mm-hmm... the same. 22:47 But that doesn't necessarily mean that you can't perform and that you can't ski, that you can't run, that you can't lift, or you shouldn't lift weights. I mean, you can still have strength. 22:58 It's finding the balance, finding the balance to be able to- Ah-ha. [laughs] Balance... have longevity and do the things that you wanna do. For sure. Right. 23:06 And, and so what ends up happening is, is then it gets complicated, right? [laughs] It gets really complex. Like everything... [laughs] Steven and I were just talking about this. Mm. 23:14 Everything turns into a single arm, single leg, you know, looks like circus tricks out there on the, on the weight room floor to try and fix something that doesn't need to be fixed- Mm-hmm... 23:23 and probably isn't ever gonna get fixed 'cause it's not broken. That's the thing. Like, you're not broken, right, because you have an asymmetry or, or this imbalance. You are normal. Mm-hmm. 23:34 So how do we work in your normal, right? And, and it, so I'm not saying, we're not saying that there aren't issues, right? Like, and, and issues can't be created from having some type of a muscular or strength imbalance. 23:47 But if it's not, if it's not an issue and you're not doing things over t- it's not an issue now, and your, and your goals are, are such that you're doing, you're, you're forced into maybe, like, a training program or movement patterns that could, where this could manifest into something, uh, different, then why are we worried about this? 24:06 Why are we having this anxiety? Like, why are we, why are we fearful and why do we think we need to divorce ourselves from these basics, these basic foundational movement patterns, these basic things, these basic-... 24:19 principles that we end up violating basically at the end because we don't have time, or we don't have the bandwidth, or we don't have, we're just fearful, uh, that we have to do these other things first or for so long, or it has to be this huge part of our pro- You still need to be squatting and- Yep... 24:35 hinging and pulling and pushing, and you need to do that with two feet, fucking feet on the floor. You don't need to be on a BOSU, single arm, single leg, all this bullshit. 24:45 There may be, there may be some value in that for you somewhere, but it's never gonna be more than the foundational stuff. And it should be a piece of the puzzle. It should be a part of the training. 24:55 And I, I really wanna go back to the point of a lot of these asymmetries, especially if we're looking from the lens, like we're kind of talking more about, of like dysfunction. 25:02 That t- term gets thrown around a lot as well- Oh, yeah... dysfunction. But let's say pain, it's managing these things. So it's not to say, we've see a lot, and CC and I have talked a lot about this- Mm-hmm... 25:11 with different clients, of like you can get out of pain a lot of times by finding a little bit more symmetry. And if we even think about symmetry, again we go back to my example of my quad. 25:20 I had an imbalance in my musculature on my quad, and that has made it where I do not have pain now because I have fixed that imbalance on left to left of a different musculature. And, you know, but it's managing... 25:31 Like, I even think about that CC had, we were talking about a client off, um, off air that she's had for a very long time, and I remember I've, I've worked with this client before, and she always knows, she's like, "Okay, and just watch his right knee on, when he does that squat because he shifts to this side." 25:44 It's not that she's saying don't ever let him squat, but you don't wanna let that asymmetry get carried away to where every time you're squatting, your butt's shooting out to the right side. 25:52 You're managing these asymmetries, and that can keep you out of pain, but the, the ship is always moving forward. 25:58 You're repairing the ship, and you're managing it that you don't go off, you know, off the cliff or whatever, but you're ne- you're never stopping and can, and completely, um, you know, just getting off board, let's say. 26:08 [laughs] Yeah, no, I think that's a really good point. And to that point, that client we're talking about, how long have you been training that client? 26:13 Or are we talking about the one that's- The one we were just talking about... been going on like 19 years? 19 years, yeah. [laughs] 19 years. Yes. 26:18 Does that mean, does that mean that everything that CC's been doing is wrong because he still shifts? No. No. Mm-mm. That's the th- I know goddamn well she's, she hasn't done it wrong. Yeah. 26:28 It's, that's how that dude functions. Yes. Like, it is. Like, I can tell him, "We can work. I could do all the single leg, isolated band work, BOSU, Dyna-Disc- [laughs]... uh, Ex Mat, Ex Pad- Mm-hmm... 26:42 bullshit that you wanna do, and it's never g- it's just not gonna change." We may make some improvements, but he's still going to have that. 26:49 And to your point, it's about knowing your client, knowing yourself, right, if, if it's yourself that you're applying this to, and understanding how to work through it so that you continue, you can continue to build strength, you continue to build muscle. 27:01 And, and if you wanna work the speed and power and the capacity pieces, you're doing all that stuff. But again, like after 18 years of this stuff and all the... 27:09 There's, there's not another coach in here that I've worked with, quite frankly, that can work to the level of depth to potentially fix an imbalance or an asymmetry like CC has. Yep. 27:21 And that guy is still doing the same thing he was doing 18 years ago. And guess what? Plays golf every day the same. An asymmetric sport. [laughs] Yeah. The very ex- exactly. Yeah. 27:31 Goes out and he plays golf four or five days a week. Still does the same thing. He can still get, bend over and pick up his grandkids, right, at 70 years old, right? 27:39 He can still go out and enjoy himself and, and, and be active. Comes in here, gets a great workout and, you know, stays healthy, got great cholesterol numbers. [laughs] Right? His heart, his heart rate's good. 27:50 [laughs] Like, you know, he's got all this, all these things- Yes... are going for him, and he shifts when he does a fucking squat. Yeah. Like, all, none of... 27:57 A- a- again, at the end of the day, I just think people just get so lost in this. And, and I get it. Like, at first you start with like the basics, right? 28:04 And then the further you go, a lot of times in education, obviously the, the layers start getting peeled back, and you dig a little deeper- Yeah... 28:11 and you're like, you start to understand a little bit more, and you start to think about how your clients or your patients or, you know, your, your people on your team are functioning. Like, "Oh, maybe that's why." Yeah. 28:20 Right? And, and that's a good place to go. Yeah. Like, for sure, that's a great place to go. But at the end of the day, like, how deep do we go here? Yeah. Because we still have to do the thing. It's a deep rabbit hole. 28:31 [laughs] It's a very deep rabbit hole. Yeah. And I th- and y- I think you, the me- the word you mentioned is ignorance. Mm. 28:37 And you can get ignorant the further along you get in your path because you've forgotten the basics somehow. Yeah. Right? And, and those things, those things always apply. 28:46 And the basic premise there is, is like, look, that's just who you are. That's how you are. That's not to say we can't improve things, but I think more what you were saying is kinda, kinda managing things. 28:57 Um, Steven had some recent experiences. 28:59 I just wanted to turn it over to him for r- real quick, just with kind of going through some programming and being able to examine that programming a little bit, and how much focus was there, and based on your experience, all the experiences you've had, kind of some of the things that popped up for you along the, along the way through this experience. 29:15 Well, I mean, I guess it was just, yeah, it was a, uh, a very well-known, uh, training certification. 29:20 And as I was going through some of their recommendations for movements, as I've already been, you know, working on the floor as a trainer for a year, basically, a lot of their recommendations, the first thing I was thinking was like, "My- none of my clients can do this." 29:32 [laughs] E- even ones that are, you know, the, the more fit ones, and it was a lot of, yeah, like single leg balance movements, and it was just kind of... 29:40 The assumption was that these movements were a lot more accessible for a much broader population. So that was, I mean, that was the big thing that we were talking about- Yeah... 29:48 was that was, I was like, "This doesn't really apply- And, and-... to a lot of people." Yeah, and in that model, aren- don't they, um, kind of preach that they should be able to do these things? 29:57 It's like a, um, gate- It's a prerequisite... gatekeeping, right? A prerequisite. So where you get the prerequisite before you should do these things, they must be able to do these things. Yeah. Yeah. 30:04 No, it was- Stand on one leg for 30 seconds. Yeah, fail. Like a, like, I mean- Fail... 30:08 to get very specific, yeah, was, you know- That you should be doing a, a single leg squat assessment as part of, like, your initial assessment with a client. Yeah, absolutely. 30:16 I'm gonna have somebody do a single leg fucking squat- Good lord... for their initial assessment. [laughs] Yeah, somebody who's completely deconditioned, who can't stabilize bilaterally. Yeah, yeah. 30:24 And yeah, I'm, I'm gonna see how you're doing with your single leg squat brand-new deconditioned client. Like, it's, you know, yeah. 30:31 We have clients who've been training here for years who are strong and can still maybe do one single leg squat. Yeah. They still struggle doing a set of 10. Yeah, yeah. And they've been here for years. Yeah. Yeah. 30:40 That's the point. Like, that's the point is, like, it, the, the layers of the onion got peeled so far back, they forgot what the onion looked like in the first place. Mm-hmm. 30:48 And so if you're one of those people that's been told you have an imbalance or you recognize somewhere you have an imbalance, dig a little deeper to f- to, to understand what that is and, and what that means. 30:57 If you've got, like, if you have an injury, right, or you have a, um, some type of a limitation mechanically, like, y- your range of motion sucks, you know, on one side versus the other or something like that. 31:06 You've identified that. Like, does it suck? Like, let's, what does sucking mean? Yeah. Right? In, in that sense. 31:12 And then how are we working, how can we continue to work through our program to address it through the other things that we're doing versus abandoning your program and thinking you have to go through this other thing for so long? 31:22 Because I guarantee you, here's what's gonna happen. You're gonna stay in that thing for a very long time. 31:26 You might get some benefit out of it, but what have you left on the table in the short amount of time that we have on the Earth- Mm-hmm... 31:33 right, to be able to do the things that we wanna do, that we like to do, and that we need to do. 31:37 So anyway, this whole topic, again, came up a little bit about, um, off of a discussion that we had, uh, Steven and I had, but also on some stuff that I saw some, you know, some other people kind of posting about that I really liked. 31:48 They were really badmouthing the whole terms. And, and I was like, th- they're not wrong. 31:52 Like, they're not, they're not wrong about this because I've been, I've done this a long time, and I got caught up in that at one point, too. Yeah. You know? 31:58 Th- as things started to, you know, got a little deeper into it. I was like, "Oh, man. Well, maybe we should be, we should be spending a little bit more time over here." 32:05 And then what you end up recognizing is, is you don't have that much time anyways, and that doesn't, that doesn't give you an excuse, you know, to sign off on, you know, your shit doesn't work right. Right? 32:16 However, what does working right actually mean? And think about, like, a, you could just, you're that person, right? So it, there's no one solution to any of these things. 32:26 But if we can identify what your issue is, do you r- first off, do you have an issue and what is it? Number, uh, number two, like, is this issue affecting you somewhere, and if so, where? 32:38 And then if we wanna see improvement in this somehow, do we need to see improvement in this somehow? And then lastly, how are we gonna know if it's actually improved or not? 32:48 And then will that, again, will that arrival point or that result that you're looking for, if that doesn't get to where you want to, want it to be or you think it should be, what is it, what does that mean? 32:59 And so for you as the, as the consumer or the person that's, that's applying this stuff to yourself, think about how that impacts you. 33:06 More importantly, if you're paying somebody [scoffs] to give you programming and take you through this stuff, what does that mean for them if they've fixed you? Right? 33:16 And how does that play into the business part of this and the, the, the, the, uh, attachment or the dependence that they have on you, um, as a, as a coach or that you have on them because you're paying them to get you this thing that they told you, or get past this thing that they told you they have. 33:32 Think critically about this, right? 33:34 And just understand that, you know, imbalances, asymmetries, these are very natural things, and they, they don't have to stop you from doing anything, and it doesn't mean you need to abandon your program. 33:43 It doesn't mean you can't, you know, do power lifting or do Olympic lifting or go out and do speed training or endurance training. 33:50 Understand that there are, the, the basic things are the things that you need to be focusing on. Movement. Movement, strength, right? 33:58 The, there, there's likely gonna probably be, or you're gonna wanna improve on some speed and power things 'cause you're gonna get a lot of benefit from that at a lot of different levels. 34:05 And then how long can you do it for? The longevity piece where you can look at that as, like, capacity. Like, how long can you do the thing you wanna do the thing for? 34:12 Dude's still playing golf 18 years later, and he's doing it better 'cause he's stronger, right? He's more efficient. He moves faster through his golf swing. He has less pain. These are all good things. 34:25 Like, if he wasn't doing these things, even with the fucking asymmetries, like, he might not be because he had been stopped when he fu- when he initially came to you, right? Yeah, and, and I think he has a SLAP lesion. 34:36 [laughs] Yeah. Yeah, his, so his shoulder's fucked, right- Yeah... like mine and everything else, and he's still able to do all this stuff. 34:41 So anyhow, at the end of the day, without beating it up anymore, like, okay, asymmetries, imbalances, totally natural. What are yours? Do they matter, right? Uh, do you have to fix them? That depends. 34:54 And, uh, you know, and at the end, are they causing you issues? And if, if you think the answer is to that is yes, then what is the issue? 35:00 And all, if all you can say is, "Well, I have an imbalance," you haven't dug deep enough, and we need to have a deeper discussion on that. So anyway, have a look at your programs. Have a look at yourselves. 35:11 Like, I think it's always good to check in, um, and sometimes it's good to check in with other people, and hopefully this helped you check in with maybe the thing that you think is such a bad thing that needs to be corrected isn't such a big deal after all. 35:23 [upbeat rock music] Thank you for tuning into this episode of Iron Sights. 35:27 If you enjoyed our conversation, you can support our mission by hitting the subscribe button, leaving a review, and sharing the podcast with a friend. I'll see you on the next episode.
