Lift The Bar

From moment arms to resistance profiles and whether all exercises should just be performed to 90º angles. Exercise mechanics has certainly become a very popular ‘thing’ in the fitness industry over the last few years (even if it’s been about for far longer!).

So what is it? Exercise mechanics is an application of engineering and physics to understand, implement, and deliver exercise (Michael Goulden, 2024). When we, or our clients, do exercise force is applied to the body. These forces, in turn, are what our bodies respond to to grow more muscle, strength and all the positive benefits we know of exercise. If you go down the road of studying exercise mechanics - you’ll begin to learn more about the anatomy and structure of the body and how to manipulate the forces being applied to a body in order to elicit the response you want from training.

Now, I’m sure you’re thinking that all sounds pretty important to know and it’s hard to argue that it’s not important to know - it’s served me pretty well as I’ve been studying it for the last 5 years (and will continue to). BUT - Did I know it for the first 7 years of my Personal Training career? No. Did I manage to serve my clients well, help them to enjoy exercise, get stronger, lose weight, feel fitter and be healthier? Yes. I want to highlight this because I’m noticing more and more trainers both within Lift The Bar and online beginning to worry and feel disheartened because they don’t have this knowledge.  

From the moment you qualify from your level 2 & 3, you have more knowledge than most of the general public in regards to exercise, nutrition and how to be healthier. Meaning, your ability to help serve others positively is high. Teaching someone how to lift weights, without knowing the exercise mechanics behind the movements, can help turn somebody’s life around. So please don’t let your self worth as a trainer decrease just because you don’t know as much as somebody else. Within LTB you have access to a wealth of information about how to coach and perform exercises to further improve your skill as a coach. Make the most of these before you worry too much about specialising in complex topics, such as exercise mechanics.

Now, I’ve made the case for why you don’t NEED exercise mechanics to be a great trainer. Let me put forward some information for why you might WANT to have more exercise mechanics knowledge. As mentioned - it’s something I continue to choose to study.

Having more knowledge around joint structures, muscle functions and the things you may hear like ‘moment arms’, ‘lever arms’, ‘resistance & strength profiles’ and so on have helped me navigate client scenarios when the foundational knowledge I had didn’t make sense. Why does one of my client’s arms not move exactly the same as the other? Why does one of their hip joints not feel comfortable when squatting? Why can’t they keep their torso more upright when squatting?

By understanding the little intricacies of exercise mechanics, it has opened up a new world of exercise for me and my clients. I’ve begun to be able to make small adjustments to exercises, whether that’s changing a client’s joint positions or manipulating angles of machines or making use of pieces of equipment like cuffs and daisy chains. Aside from problem solving, it’s helped me keep creative in the gym so, if pieces of equipment were busy, I had more alternatives in my tool box I could use to keep my client experience high in a commercial gym even at the busiest of times. When you’ve got clients for several years, it’s nice to be able to teach them new things even 7+ years into working with you to keep things exciting and fresh.

So all-in-all, yes, exercise mechanics is great and can serve you very well if you’re interested in it and have the urge to learn more deeply about exercise. But, if studying and learning deeply about these things doesn’t tickle your pickle - don’t stress. You still have more than enough ability to serve your clients extremely well, get them great results, and build an incredible personal training business.

LTB Members can check out the Exercise Mechanics Webinar by Michael Goulden and the Accessory Exercise course by Jake for more on this topic.  

If you are new to LTB why not sign up for the 2 week free trial and have a look at all the available resources.