Weight lifting training can be very effective for improving an athlete’s postural balance. The body is a lever system controlled by muscles that lift and lower the levers. The body was designed to have a balance with the joints of the ankles, knees, hips, shoulders and the head all stacked on top of each other. There should be no excessive leaning forward, backwards or side to side. The body does not work well when this alignment of joints gets out of line. The body is also like a teeter-totter. If one side of the body has stronger or tighter muscles it will pull the other side towards it. This will cause the weaker or looser muscles to become tight and weak due to constantly working to pull the body to its natural state of being straight up and down.

By having an understanding of what muscles oppose each other and what a tight muscle is you can strengthen and stretch muscle accordingly to create muscular balance throughout the body.

Common weak muscles are the muscles of the upper back, neck and hamstrings. Common tight muscles are the chest, and many of the muscles in the hips. Following the workouts in my online training program will help shore up many of these problems.

By incorporating stretching and muscle balance exercises you can prevent many injuries and actually become quite a bit stronger. Weaknesses can actually become strengths and aid stronger muscles to push or pull harder because they are not fighting each other.

Another reason your strength will improve by becoming muscularly balanced is that the body naturally protects movements that involve weak muscles. For example a baseball pitcher may not realize his body won’t throw as hard as it could because there are weak muscles in the upper back and rotator cuff.

By strengthening these muscles the body will recognize more of a balance and realize it is all right to throw a fast pitch because the force of the forward motion will not tear the rotators cuff muscles of the upper back and shoulder.

Here is a video for strengthening some of the important muscles in the upper back

This will also happen for athletes who want to bench press maximal weight. Weak upper back muscles will not allow an athlete to stay in the shoulder back power position necessary to keep a shorter range of motion that helps a great bench presser.

The weak muscles of the upper back can’t hold back the shoulders as the chest pushes forward and pulls the arms with it. This increases the range of motion and makes the body have to push the further to finish the movement. A strong upper back that aids in a shorter range of motion is a huge factor for being a good bench presser.

I have seen some of my athlete client make tremendous gains in their bench press just by designing a program that focused on the muscles of the upper back and nothing else. Just bench pressing once weekly and then focusing twice weekly on specific upper back muscles showed almost a 50 pound improvement in six weeks.

I would advise getting with someone who understands muscular balance and can guide you on what muscles are tight or weak and focus on those areas. I have included videos in the online training area that help with different areas of the body for increasing strength in commonly weak areas.