Why train, Lina?

Well, for one thing, it's good to look nice. It is even better to feel
 good. You think more clearly when your head isn't fuzzed up
 with negativity.

  Exercise has been found over and over
  again to be one of the
 best preventions of situational depression.

Sports.
Obviously, sports are a huge incentive to exercise. Even so,
some sports do not necessarily promote healthy self oriented fitness. Disagree? OK, how about Sumo Wrestling? Grant me that one?

Watch what high school wrestlers do to themselves in order to cut weight. Hmmmmm? Not good. How many athletes take drugs to get a "winning" edge?  Win what? Points, not health. So a guy with strong biceps? Yeah, I like that. But a hulking guy who weirds out at any small statement he can't grip? A steroid wacko who goes animal for nothing? I'll take the regular guy.
Sports training ought to engender promote physical well being.
 The thing that makes one sport go well,
 like a blazing fast ball pitch , might not
  require generalized
  physical fitness.

  Training can be used to round out
  that focal prowess, and turn an athlete
  into a better total package. Also, powerful performance muscles, like those that make a pitched ball rifle past the hitter, those need to be offset by equally strong muscles of opposition, the ones used in the wind up. That is very important even though their power isn't called upon to get the performance edge (strike!).

 Why? It has to do with joint stability. Joints are not hinges.  There is no metal pin holding them together.

The opposing joint surfaces can and do slide. When the muscles on one side of a joint are overdeveloped relative to opposition muscles on the other side, a joint tends to shear. That means it tends to shift and distort the axis of its own movement which causes wear. If the surfaces migrate, then stability falls off. That causes greater wear.

That is why so many baseball pitchers get "subluxed" shoulder joints. Their recovery muscles, and deep stabilizing smaller muscles, which score no points, when neglected, become unable to do their important job of keeping the joint centered during the moments of power. Joint shape centered stability is what makes a joint last. Prevention of breakdown is important. It isn't about a single performance in a single game but about how many seasons of play an athlete will last before his machinery falls apart.

So, athletes require training to sustain joint stability because the sport itself seldom produces it. The pitfalls they must avoid in training and exercise are peculiar to each sport. You need somebody who knows what exercises and movements to avoid as well as what to do.

Another example? Well, physical training body sculpts. Swimmers can train badly and become leg heavy and lose the ability to float level. They become water plows. Not enough body fat turns swimmers into stones - which sink. Some body fat is good.

Are you aware that many vitamins are stored in body fat? When women over train and lose all body fat, they can't process those vitamins. Despite all their exercise, they can wind up with poorer bone than a couch potato. I know a quite a bit about food. Maybe we'll get into that in another discussion, maybe at one of my restaurants.

And, besides, everyone isn't a jock.
Some guys and gals just want a high school letter. It isn't really their desire to go pro. So? One problem is that they may get faced on the field with an ogre who eats trees for snacks and who is kept chained in the basement for the safety of his parents. You know the type. Goons like that can do real damage. And every school wants one.

Or, maybe, you really really like basketball, but.... uh... the ball just does not go in that hole for you. That doesn't make you a bad person, just a marginal player. Then what? Hide? Don't play? Play, but maybe just with select friends? So what if you run well, but never win or swim well but never take the prize or dive nicely but can't do a half twist no how no way? What can you do that fits you? You could find a really unusual sport that nobody else ever heard of and pretend to be into it.

But how about karate, judo, or physical training. These endeavors are individualized. In marshall arts, opponents are paired by skill level and not their grade in school. They also mature well - beyond school years. There are others. We will look at training.

Bulk up? The boys certainly can and typically want to bulk up. But girls simply cannot bulk unless they take certain drugs. Yuck. Training can slim or firm or for the guys turn them into buldging towers of power. You get to choose. It isn't about throwing or catching or speed or even power. It's about you and what you want.

What's funny, is that I know exactly what I want --- and yet --- when it came time to actually doing it, I could easily find a reason to let it slide just this little bit. Mmmm. That's why you train with a partner. You need somebody who knows your number and isn't shy about telling you what your excuses sound like.

Once you get into regular training you will find that you become annoyed with things that interfere with your trip to the gym. That's when you know you've made it. Wecome to healthy living. And eating! You can eat when you work out!!!  

Girls.. you c a n  eat!