How Does Your Body Adapt to Balance Training?

Balance training can have a direct impact on sport performance. In the game of football, for example, you are always off balance while making tackles, making blocks and jumping up in the air. Balance training can help you adapt to these on-field demands. One simple way to do this is by lifting weights on one foot. Progress from one-foot weight lifting to weight lifting while standing on a BOSU (a half-sphere of rubber) or wobble board.

Lateral side steps on the BOSUThere are a lot of sports that take a lot of lateral balance and agility, including racket sports, basketball and soccer. Specifically doing training for this motion can really improve these skills. A good example of this would be working out on a BOSU doing lateral side steps. The body will adapt to this feeling in an unbalanced environment. Then when this movement is translated into the game, the body will have a good sense of awareness, which will increase performance.

Postural control is very important, especially in elderly adults. Everything from getting up out of a chair to reaching over to pick up a hat off the floor takes balance. As you age, your muscles start to deplete and your bones start to weaken. This can lead to bad postural control and being off balance. In the elderly, the body will adapt to doing things such as one-foot balances, one-foot balance and reaches, and even some one-legged weight training exercises. Then when they are faced with an unbalanced situation such as stepping on a rock, their bodies will be adapted to this environment.

One of the biggest benefits of balance training is injury prevention. No matter who you are or whether you play sports or not, balance training will strengthen the connective tissue around the joints of the ankle, knees and hips. It will also work smaller muscles located in the bottom of the feet. This all adds up to better overall body awareness and injury avoidance.

Balance training can also cause adaptations when rehabbing from an injury. Take rehabbing after knee surgery, for example. Your body has to readapt to the feeling of walking and even standing up for that matter. Standing on balance air pads or a BOSU, and even just standing with one foot flat on the floor, can make these adaptations happen.