Did you ever notice when training that you favor one side over the other ? This is a common issue that occurs a lot when you are weight training if you are not training unilaterally. In order to ensure there is proper balance among the muscle groups, adding in unilateral training can help you become stronger and equally balanced on both sides of your body. When it comes to weight training, your goal is to have both sides equally as strong as one another.
The total strength of both of your limbs used together is actually less than the sum of the strength of the individual limbs. While this seems strange studies have confirmed this phenomenon of “bilateral deficit”. Everyone has a weak and strong side. If you take notice to it when training you will see that your body works more effectively with certain exercises on certain sides. There can be as high as 25% difference in strength from one side to the other . Bilateral training allows your dominant side to compensate for your weaker side, hiding imbalances that could later cause injury. This is why unilateral exercises allow you to train away these asymmetries.
When doing exercises that train your body in sections, start with the weaker side. Once that side hits fatigue, then repeat on the stronger side with the same number of reps.While you won’t be working to fatigue on the stronger side, you’ll be bringing the weaker side up to meet it, enabling you to strengthen both sides equally as you go forward.
Doing unilateral exercises are great for working into that core stability. Unilateral exercises keep you off balance, which causes you to recruit the deep stabilizing muscles of the body to engage and pull you back to center. Developing these core muscles is important for developing balance and stability, protecting your spine, and cultivating integrated, functional strength.
If you take a second to think of all the things you do that require you to work unilaterally outside of the gym you will find that you perform a lot of daily activities using one side over the other. Think of things like grocery shopping, play sports outside or even just carrying odd objects. You force that training without knowing it. Adding in training that taxes your muscle from each side as individual movement patterns can help create stability throughout your body.
When you have the chance to train, choose exercises that force you to use separate sides such as kettlebell thrusters, one arm rows or even pistols. You will learn what movements your body has been neglecting and where the missing pieces are to your training. Train through the tough spots of lagging muscle groups and you will see how much easier it will be to accomplish lifts that require both side recruitment!