Week 6 - Functional Fitness and other stuff

On Friday night, I had my monthly stats taken:
Weight: 191 lbs (down 1 lb from last month)
Body Fat: 32% (down 3% from last month)

While you would expect that my weight should have dropped by more than 1 lb, I managed to drop a miraculous 3% fat within less than one month. I'm excited! Muscle weighs more than fat, so my body weight is taking into account more muscle. Having muscle means I have a much greater ability to burn fat.

When I began working out the trainer last month, one of my goals was to improve my mobility and flexibility. Well, in an unfortunate way, my progress here was put to the test quite severely the other night.

I went down to the CNE the other night after work. Around 9 pm as I was leaving a building and walked down a dark walkway beside Ricoh Colliseum toward the streetcars, my running shoe caught a rut in the pavement and went down almost face first into the concrete, body slamming to the ground. My backpack flipped over my head.

Well, after falling hard to the ground, a man ran to my assistance, but within 20 seconds I was back up on my feet. I was none the worse for wear. I scraped both knees, but that was it, other than being a little shook up.

In the past, I would have been down for the count much longer. My recovery to my feet would have taken longer. I owe my quick recovery to my conditioning and work with my trainer. Some of the exercises that he has been teaching me revolve around what is known as Functional Fitness.

I was reading about the benefits of functional fitness in a book that I received from an anonymous sender a few years ago. I tried to send the book back and tried to inquire about the sender, but no information was revealed to me. As it turns out, this book called "The Great Physician's Rx for Health & Wellness" by Jordan Rubin has changed my life.

According to the author, functional fitness is getting more attention because it does not focus on isolating specific muscle groups during exercise routines. Rather, functional fitness focuses on training movements in order to improve balance and build up the body's core muscles. You may not develop killer abs after a functional fitness routine, but you'll be in a better position to tackle life's daily activities.

Functional fitness does not involve exercise machines. It involves movements solely by the body. For example, I've been training on squats, push ups, etc. These are just a few examples of exercises that involve functional fitness.

I believe passionately that other people who live with physical disabilities of any kind can benefit from functional fitness. It doesn't matter whether the person uses a wheelchair or a crutches to aid in mobility. An exercise program involving some functional fitness will really help the person.

Functional fitness can help someone to transfer easily from their wheelchair to another chair or to their bed without assistance. After all, it goes without saying that we really enhance our lives when we can accomplish daily tasks without the assistance of others.