EEI Physical Wellness Institute

I am a cyclist. Well, that’s to say that I enjoy cycling. I like my time on the bike, wind in my hair, the freedom to roam. Back in the day I did some competitive rides, some centuries, and the “Tour de Blast” which is 88-miles (round trip) up to the crater of Mt. St. Helens.

Cycling is great exercise. It builds strong legs and heart muscles, but is that exercise improving my function as I age? It depends. Cycling doesn’t necessarily translate into doing stairs and one day when I’m “older” and expected to get off an airplane without the jetway I’m going to wish that I had practiced stairs.

A client recently told me that he now understood the difference between strength and function. I’ve seen plenty of patients that could break your arm with a twist of their wrist, but they couldn’t get up-and-down from the floor, and certainly couldn’t outrun a rabid raccoon. In fact, I worked with a guy that looked like he was a main character in a romantasy book. Wide built shoulders, abs for days, a perfect upper body specimen. But when I challenged him to some very basic core exercises he couldn’t do them! He literally could not use his internal core muscles for basic balance. He looked pretty, but there was no substance.

So my question to you is, “What do you want to do in the coming years?” Let’s talk about how your workouts will enhance your function now and in the future. Let’s focus on exercise that keeps you moving, motivated and excited for life. Let’s do exercise that will help you to be able to crawl through a hay-maze with your grand-daughter, swing golf clubs into your 90’s, ride a century for your century and make life pretty damn good.

Strength, Endurance, and Flexibility are all vital skills that we test in our 30-point assesment (FAST), but most importantly is the answer to the question: What do you really really want to do?

This post is AI free – it’s all us