Muscle Engagement During Exercise – 3 min read
We’ve talked a lot about the structure of your workouts in recent blogs. Now, let’s dive into something super important that often doesn’t get enough attention – muscle engagement during exercise.
Everyone’s heard about good form, right? Coaches are always saying to keep your back straight, knees tracking your toes, and so on. But muscle engagement? That’s a bit of a hidden gem. We’ve talked about mechanical loading and injuries before (if you want more details, check out our previous blogs on soft tissue injuries), but muscle engagement is just as important for performance and muscle growth.
Think about the leg extension machine. It’s all about your quadriceps. Use it regularly, make sure you’re feeling that muscle fatigue, and boom – your quads will start to adapt and get stronger.
Now, take exercises like deadlifts or squats. These need a bit more thought and understanding. By tweaking things like your hip or knee position, you can change how your muscles engage. For example, if step-ups are killing your knees, try shifting your hips back a bit. This small change can move some of the load to your glutes, easing that knee pain almost instantly.
Knowing the ins and outs of each exercise can really help you nail muscle engagement.
Let’s focus on two key areas: your hips and shoulders. While all joints and levers play a role, your hips and shoulders are like the MVPs for muscle engagement in most exercises.
Shoulders: These guys are crucial for almost any upper body move. Pay close attention to where your shoulders are during rows, bench presses, or push-ups. Adjusting your shoulder position can change which muscles are doing the work. For instance, pushing your shoulders down and back can really fire up your rhomboids, lower traps, and lats, while lifting them up can get your upper traps and neck muscles involved.
Hips: Often underused but so important. A lot of people don’t use their hips effectively, which can lead to soft tissue problems and poor muscle engagement. Your glutes are super powerful and play a huge role in big lifts like squats and deadlifts. Learning to use your hips right, especially in moves like the deadlift, can make a massive difference in your lower body workouts.
If you’re struggling with muscle engagement or if you’re in pain, it might be a good idea to get some professional help. But for most people, learning how to use your joints as levers and getting them in the right position can really boost your muscle engagement.
We’ll get into specific exercises in the next blog. Hope this helps you crush your training goals!
Thank you for reading our blog post, we hope the information was helpful.
Please comment below or get in touch if you have any questions.
Disclaimer: If you are currently experiencing severe/chronic pain, then you should be consulting an allied health professional (physiotherapist/osteopath etc.)
