When you think of weightlifting, what image comes to mind?

Likely, you see a large, windowless room with fluorescent lighting, black rubber flooring and lots of hard, iron structures and round plates littering the floor. It’s probably hot and humid, and smells like gym socks, moldy protein powder, and gold bond. Hard, angry, metal music is obviously thumping through the cheap sound system. Massive, sweaty, scantily clad beefcakes strut around grunting, yelling and throwing chalk all over their bodies, stopping only to give themselves heart attack aneurisms in order to move plate-laden, bars which are bowing under the massive weight loaded on either side.

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Or maybe that’s just me….

What are those guys doing anyway? It would be easy to say they’re crazy, and some of them probably are, but when you look at weight-lifting as a sport and through a movement science lens, what they’re doing is actually pretty incredible and can have implications for how we all, as humans, can and should move.

What weightlifting really is, is progressions on basic human movement patterns. Would you like to sit down? Drop into a squat. Stand back up? Push out of that squat. Pick something up off the floor? Deadlift. Put something onto a shelf? Better press it up there. Push open a door? BENCH IT, BRO!!! So while we may not think of these everyday movements and weightlifting as the same, they are – just in a regressed form. In order to optimize and maximize our function in daily life, we practice by simulating these movements in the gym.

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You start at your baseline, meaning how you move now. If you don’t have the mobility to touch your toes or the strength and control to squat to parallel unassisted, we regress the movement until you can. Some regressions may look a lot different, but they’re the same basic patterns. Failing to regress when necessary will result in compensated movement, meaning your body (wanting so badly to please you and get the job done) will utilize alternative methods which can lead to tissue overload and increased potential for injury; both traumatic and overuse. Once you do show control and competency in the basic patterns, we can further challenge them by adding weight, repetitions, and other tortuous methods. Enter: the weightlifter from the first paragraph.

So, while your grandmother may not be canoodling with the meatheads at the local barbell club, she probably would like to carry her own groceries, sit in her favorite chair, and open/close any doors in her way. So – she should deadlift. And squat. And push. And pull. Because she’s a human. And that’s what humans do.

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And if she or you are thinking of starting an exercise program and would like to see where you stand with respect to competent human movement – come see me. I’ll check you out, give you some advice, and get you on your way to optimal movement and function.

By Claudia Burns, PT, DPT

Back in Motion® Physical Therapy – South Portland, Maine