Over the past decade the term "functional" training has gained a ton of momentum to point it's considered its own fitness category and one of the leading trends in the fitness world. What is functional fitness and why it is so important to the fire service?

 Functional fitness at its core is a type of exercise that supports everyday life. Functional fitness includes walking, pushing, pulling, squatting, bending, lunging and core. In essence, this type of training is rooted within us with the intention of having all of our muscles work together in harmony to support each other to accomplish certain movements. This type of training is blend of traditional and unconventional training methods by utilizing different equipment and movements to prepare us to perform any physical activity related to our job and everyday life. 

As first responders this is 100 percent the way of how we "functionally operate" on and off an incident. If we think of anything we do as responders, we can see the key areas of functional fitness in them.

Walking = with and without PPE & SCBA

Pushing  = forcible entry

Pulling = ladder raises 

Squatting = patient removal

Bending = picking up tools

Lunging =  hose advancement

Core = everything

Benefits of Functional Fitness 

• Improves everyday life 

• Greater muscle memory of movement is increased as the brain's memory is boosting from the regular training of functional fitness workouts.

• Increased mobility comes from the balance, coordination, flexibility, strength and agility performed in the components of training.

• Improves posture and balance by training the muscles to manage weight properly therefore reducing stress on the body. Further, improving posture.

• Reduces risk of injury by mimicking the movements done in everyday life. 

A great way to become more versatile with your workouts and ways to encompass more functional style workouts is by using sandbags.  I've been using sandbags for years now and found them to be not only functional for all the styles of workouts I do but affordable, versatile, built tough and are truly great for overall stability due to shifting of the sand throughout the bag. 

To help improve your body's stability, sandbags do a great job at providing a dynamic resistance - also known as unstable or uneven load training - which is similar to moving a patient or downed firefighter across terrain without the use of a stretcher. The dynamic resistance the sandbag provides (sand shifting throughout your movement) our ability to stabilize and hold an odd object in place throughout movement. Lifting and carrying is a great way to strengthen the hips and torso. In strengthening these areas, it will allow for our bodies to facilitate greater force transfer in movements in other exercises or our work.

The benefits of functional fitness especially with the use of a sandbag of any size is greatly impactful to our bodies as first responders and as functioning humans. Get a sandbag and open the doors to conventional and unconventional styles of training for all.

Until next time; work hard, stay safe & live inspired.