{"id":306,"date":"2023-11-17T20:16:04","date_gmt":"2023-11-17T20:16:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dayonestrength.com\/?p=306"},"modified":"2023-11-17T20:27:46","modified_gmt":"2023-11-17T20:27:46","slug":"strength-as-the-single-most-important-aspect-of-fitness","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dayonestrength.com\/?p=306","title":{"rendered":"Strength as the Single Most Important Aspect of Fitness"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Fitness is undoubtedly a complex topic.  There are many different aspects to it as well as many differing opinions about what matters.  I\u2019m going to make the case that strength is the single<\/em> most important aspect of fitness.  It\u2019s the most important aspect of fitness for everybody from the 18 year old linebacker to his 85 year old grandmother in the stands.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bodybuilding has done a great disservice to our society by making people think that strength training is the domain of meatheads lifting hundreds of pounds in the effort to get an extra centimeter on their biceps.  When most people think of weightlifting, they think of these large, drug-infused men on stage flexing their spray-tanned muscles for the camera.  This couldn\u2019t be further from the truth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Strength training is for every single person who has a physically intact body.  This is because strength is foundational to our very existence on earth.  Strength is how we interact with the external world.  Most people overcomplicate it – let\u2019s start with a simple definition of what strength actually is:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Strength is simply defined as \u201cthe ability to produce force against an external resistance\u201d.  Every single thing that you do in the physical world requires some degree of strength, and this is something that most people take for granted until they\u2019re forced to acknowledge it later in life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

An extreme example can be found in the 90 year-old who can\u2019t stand up off the toilet because he can\u2019t produce enough force to move his body off of the toilet seat.  Many people have died in ways similar to this because they couldn\u2019t move their body to a place where they could call for help.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you\u2019re reading this, then that scenario probably seems pretty distant.  When we\u2019re of good health, we take for granted everyday things like being able to walk, stand up without help, etc.  These are all displays of a certain degree of strength.  Like most things in the natural world, strength exists on a continuum.  The example of the 90 year-old is on one end of the continuum, just as the strength athlete squatting 800 pounds is on the other end of the continuum.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Most people see only the tails of this distribution and conclude that strength training isn\u2019t important for them.  This conclusion is wrong.  The vast majority of people fall somewhere in the middle of this strength continuum, and they will see immense benefits to nearly every aspect of their lives by putting some effort toward improving their physical strength.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In our world, it\u2019s normal to focus on the tails of a distribution.  Just think about the distribution of health.  Essentially all attention goes to the extremes of health.  Attention either goes toward people who are of such poor health that they need medical attention or it goes toward the top 0.01% of athletes who embody everything that a healthy human body is capable of.  The person of average health just isn\u2019t as exciting (or as profitable).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In fact, strength training is most important for normal people of average health.  These people can see incredible benefits from a relatively small expenditure of time and effort.  The problem is that most people either don\u2019t know what to do or don\u2019t understand the benefits – usually both.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Before we get into the laundry list of benefits of strength training for everyday people, we have to dispel the most pervasive myth that \u201cif I start lifting weights I\u2019ll get bulky and look like a bodybuilder\u201d.  This myth is widely due to the intrusion of bodybuilding on popular culture in the past 50 or so years as mentioned earlier.  The image of a 250 pound man at 5% body fat wearing a thong and boasting a heavy spray tan while doing poses reminiscent of an exotic bird\u2019s mating ritual – that leaves a mark in peoples\u2019 minds.  Most people understandably don\u2019t want to look like that, and since they associate weightlifting with bodybuilding, they decide to avoid weightlifting.  Let me explain why this is ridiculous.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Avoiding weightlifting because you don\u2019t want to look like a bodybuilder is like avoiding driving because you don\u2019t want to race in the Daytona 500.  Or avoiding running because you don\u2019t want to compete for the Olympic track & field team.  This is all to say that looking like a bodybuilder is REALLY difficult.  It requires elite genetics, immense effort, years of dedication, and lots of drugs.  These people devote much if not all of their lives to looking that way.  The photos can also be deceiving as to how those people actually look in real life.  It\u2019s kind of like how actors don\u2019t look as good in real life as they do in movies.  There\u2019s a lot of production that goes into it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Put simply, nobody has EVER gotten bulky muscles by accident.  If you do, then I will personally hire you as my strength coach because you have discovered something that has eluded millions of coaches and athletes before you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now we\u2019re finally ready to look at a short list of just some of the benefits associated with strength training (in no specific order):<\/p>\n\n\n\n