Cement Your Neural Patterns

Written on January 29, 2008 at 10:43 am, by Eric Cressey

Q: I have a question about your latest blog post. In the question, that was ask, you talk about Dr. Eric Cobb saying “Strength training ‘cements’ your neural patterns.” How does strength training affect your neural patterns vs. repetitive motion with no weight (i.e., weighted squats vs. body weight squats).

A: Give this article a read:

http://www.t-nation.com/readTopic.do?id=1406720

In particular, pay attention to the Law of Repetitive Motion (#7), which we cover in detail in our Building the Efficient Athlete DVD set. Resistance is the “F” in the equation – and you can use that equation to iron out imbalances in the same way it causes imbalances in the opposite direction (hopefully that makes sense).

Reps are still important – and light weights are the way to go early on when you’re trying to groove appropriate movement patterns. As an example, we can do supine bridges and birddogs to get the glutes firing in our warm-ups, but the real meat and potatoes in terms of ironing out quad vs. posterior chain dominance and improper glute-ham-adductor-lumbar erector firing patterns comes when we add in loaded single-leg movements, deadlifts, box squats, glute-ham raises, and pull-throughs.

Best,

EC