TL;DR

• “Influencer exercises” are those that attempt to do 10 things at once while accomplishing none of them with any degree of effectiveness.
• These exercises are “combination” style exercises which claim to be targeting 1–5 different muscle groups simultaneously.
• The problem? We only get to choose a single direction of resistance when we lift weights.
• And this means that we can only effectively train the muscles that resist that resistance directly!
• Think about it this way: would you try to do biceps curls with dumbbells while lying down sideways on the floor?
• No! Or, at least, I hope…
• Many people that preach these exercises justify them on the basis of training “stability” and “because they’re functional”…but let’s debunk that!

Why Functional Exercise Isn’t Functional

I asked ChatGPT what the “functional exercise” movement is.

Here’s what it said (and why it’s wrong):

The “functional exercise” movement refers to a training philosophy centered around exercises that prepare the body for real-life movements and activities. Unlike traditional weight training that often focuses on isolating specific muscles, functional exercise aims to enhance the coordinated working of muscles in movements that mimic everyday tasks or specific athletic performances. This approach is based on the idea that the exercises should be as practical and relevant as possible to what individuals face in their daily lives or sports.

Functional exercises typically involve multi-joint, multi-muscle movements. They engage the body’s core and stabilizer muscles, improving overall strength, flexibility, posture, and balance. This type of training can include a wide range of activities, such as lifting, pushing, pulling, squatting, and carrying, often performed with the use of equipment like dumbbells, kettlebells, medicine balls, and resistance bands, or simply using body weight.

The movement gained popularity as fitness professionals and researchers recognized the benefits of training the body in a way that supports natural movements. It’s particularly beneficial for improving functional strength, reducing the risk of injury, enhancing athletic performance, and supporting healthy aging. Functional exercise is adaptable to all fitness levels, making it a versatile approach to training that can be incorporated into rehabilitation programs, general fitness routines, and specialized athletic training plans.

- ChatGPT

ChatGPT’s response illustrates all the false assumptions and nonsensical claims the functional movement continues to make.

I’m going to use this response — claim by claim — to debunk the “movement” in its entirety.

Let’s start from the top:

The “functional exercise” movement refers to a training philosophy centered around exercises that prepare the body for real-life movements and activities.

- ChatGPT

False assumption #1 — there are certain exercises that — in absolute — do and do not prepare someone for “real-life” movements.

We have muscles, bones, ligaments, tendons, and joints — and we load each of these tissues during any exercise.

Whether or not an exercise has “carryover” to daily activities is a matter of how an exercise imposes force on the body — not how it looks or how many muscles it involves.

And this is the fundamental error that the functional movement makes — the assumption that, to improve our function as human beings, we need to perform activities in the weight room that look identical to those that we perform in “real life”.

Muscles are dumb (in a sense).

They respond to force based on joint position.

Whether I’m loading my glutes in a leg press or hip thrust, or by doing a loaded carry (which looks like walking), my glutes simply respond to the demands of force.

Therefore, if I improve the contraction of my glutes in a leg press, I improve the contraction of my glutes during walking, running, or any other “natural” activity.

Contraction does not care if you’re squatting down to take a poo or using a hack squat.

Unlike human beings, contraction is impartial to what a movement looks like from the surface.

Unlike traditional weight training that often focuses on isolating specific muscles, functional exercise aims to enhance the coordinated working of muscles in movements that mimic everyday tasks or specific athletic performances.

- ChatGPT

False assumption #2 — that muscle isolation exists.

It does not.

There is no such thing as an exercise that isolates specific muscles.

Joint stability is a byproduct of the “coordinated working of muscles” that the functional movement claims is only specific to multi-joint movements.

Whether I’m doing a leg extension or a single leg bosu ball squat, the muscles that surround my knee, hip, ankle, and spine must coordinate in their contraction to keep our joints functioning properly.

While there is a clear difference between a leg extension and bosu ball squat, it is in the forces imposed on the body — and what rate-limiters are created as a consequence of that.

In a bosu ball squat, our rate-limiter is usually balance.

In a leg extension, our rate-limiter is the quads.

Contraction is fundamentally the same, no matter how you train it — the difference is in the specific forces imposed and how our body must coordinate around them to perform a motion.

This approach is based on the idea that the exercises should be as practical and relevant as possible to what individuals face in their daily lives or sports.

- ChatGPT

False assumption #3 — traditional weight training isn’t relevant to daily life or sport.

Again — contraction is our response to force in different joint positions.

And if you wanted to make the argument that “traditional lifting” doesn’t improve range of motion and mobility as much as anything else, you’d be arguing against a substantial empirical body of evidence that suggests otherwise.

There is nothing more “functional” — especially to the average person — than training contraction in a scenario where contraction is the rate-limiter of performance.

Ironically, functional exercise makes it impossible to create any substantial challenge to one group of muscles.

“Functional exercise” as it’s commonly done is defined by the inability to make any single muscle group fatigue substantially.

Functional exercises typically involve multi-joint, multi-muscle movements. They engage the body’s core and stabilizer muscles, improving overall strength, flexibility, posture, and balance.

- ChatGPT

By this definition, all exercises are functional.

There are no exercises that are not multi-joint — at least, in terms of force (which is what determines muscle response).

Every “isolation” exercise you perform involves force through a minimum of 2 joints (and typically many more than that).

Imagine the most “isolated” motion people commonly believe is “non-functional” — a biceps curl.

A traditional biceps curl imposes force through the fingers, wrists, forearms, elbows, shoulders, shoulder girdle, spine, knees, ankles, and hips.

There is no way to pick something up and move it without force traversing through the entire body.

Of course, force at the elbow, forearm, and wrist is more substantial than force through other joints.

But, to perform a curl, the entire body must coordinate some measure of contraction — the difference is in where force is distributed.

There is also no clear link between certain kinds of exercises and what the world calls “posture”.

Posture is a (multi-factorial) snippet of the way that someone looks from the outside — in a single position among an infinite number of potential positions — which tells us nothing about a person’s ability to perform daily tasks.

There is also no empirical link between posture and pain. This is a myth that has long been busted that many are still indoctrinated into believing.

To quote Morgan Freeman: “Your best posture is your next posture”…

which can be translated to: the best posture is the one that’s capable of changing when necessary.

The movement gained popularity as fitness professionals and researchers recognized the benefits of training the body in a way that supports natural movements. It’s particularly beneficial for improving functional strength, reducing the risk of injury, enhancing athletic performance, and supporting healthy aging.

- ChatGPT

False assumption #4 — that some movements are more “natural” than others.

This is related to the naturalistic fallacy, which is the logical error that involves conflating what is “natural” with what is “good” or acceptable.

People tend to think of squatting, walking, and running as “good” because they are “natural”.

But what’s fundamentally “unnatural” about a biceps curl?

Is bending your elbow “unnatural”?

Is doing a leg extension “unnatural”?

Does bending and straightening your knee not seem evolutionarily relevant?

Ironically, many of the motions that we call “unnatural” are essential components of the ones we call “natural”.

Bending and straightening your knee — as in a leg extension — occurs during squatting and running.

Bending and straightening your elbow — as in a biceps curl — occurs whenever picking something up (like picking up a rock, which is more “natural”).

False assumption #5 — that certain kinds of movements are better at reducing injury risk.

We have no evidence to show that this is the case.

Attempting to define exercises as more or less dangerous is a fool’s errand — it is too reductionist of a claim.

The injury equation is incredibly complex and primarily seems related to how loading relates to our tissue’s ability to tolerate load.

In other words, injury seems more related to how much you’re doing something, rather than what you’re doing.

Functional exercise is adaptable to all fitness levels, making it a versatile approach to training that can be incorporated into rehabilitation programs, general fitness routines, and specialized athletic training plans.

- ChatGPT

False assumption #6 — that functional exercise is adaptable to all fitness levels.

This claim is as backward as it gets.

Functional exercise, by definition, involves multiple moving joints.

But what about people who can’t coordinate the motion of multiple joints?

I’ve had clients who couldn’t stand up from a seat without knee pain.

Should I ignore that and try to get them to do squats, or should I use a leg extension or curl to train contraction around the knee?

The prerequisite to multi-joint movement is — ironically — single-joint movement.

Imagine if one of your car tires was flat — does it make sense to try to drive?

Or does it make sense to address the flat tire that prevents the whole system from coordinated motion?

If someone cannot coordinate contraction around a single joint, they cannot magically coordinate motion around multiple joints in concert.

Summary and Conclusions

Functional exercise, by definition, limits our ability to focus on any one muscle group.

It is based on the false premise that, to be functional humans, we must perform movements that look more “natural”.

But all movement is “natural”, and which exercises we choose in the gym should be based on what muscles and joints we’re trying to improve the function of.

“Functional exercises” are those that attempt to improve so many movement qualities at once that they end up improving none at all.

Imagine the following scenario:

You just started a new job.

On the first day, your boss asks you to do a single task.

On the second day, your boss asks you do to a different task.

On the third day, your boss asks you to do a different task.

And so on.

By the time you’ve attempted to learn how to do 10 different tasks, you’ve not learned any of them — at least, not with any degree of high skill or effort.

Eventually, your boss complains to you that none of the tasks are being effectively done, without realizing that they asked you to do 10 different things, each with a different skill demand.

Functional exercise is kind of like doing 10 different tasks at the same time.

You may be able to get decent at 2 or 3 of the tasks, but ultimately, none of them get done with higher volume or effort because your focus is distributed across too many different goals.

Lifting weights works the same way.

Rewind to the leg extension versus single leg bosu ball squat example:

In the single-leg squat, you’re required to coordinate a substantial amount of contraction through the feet, ankles, knees, hips, and spine.

You have to figure out how to balance over a single foot through a large range of motion that you may not be remotely prepared to handle.

You must also coordinate balancing through the foot as you attempt to contract all the other tissues that primarily move the knees and hips.

In the leg extension, you’re required to hold yourself down into a seat as you move your knees.

Which of these tasks do you think you’ll be able to accomplish more effectively? The one asking you to do 1–2 things, or 10?