Find out how to fix muscle imbalances with these tips from Jeff Nippard.
Jeff Nippard is a natural professional bodybuilder and fitness coach who shares tips and training programs on his YouTube channel.
When one side of your body is stronger than the other, you have a muscle imbalance. That is more common than people might think. However, some imbalances are bigger than others and the ones that are noticeable are the ones you definitely should work on to mend.
Muscle imbalances can occur if you use predominantly certain types of machines for your strength training, or simply use the barbell a lot since you are able to compensate a weaker side by pushing through with the other.
Check out 3 tips and things you can do to understand how to fix muscle imbalances.
Source: Julia Larson on PexelsHow To Fix Muscle Imbalances
There are a couple of things you simply cannot change that might look like muscle imbalances. For example, the shape of one bicep might be different from the other, even though they might be similar strength-wise.
Nippard’s 3 tips on how to fix muscle imbalances focus on things you can actually change. They are:
1. Mind-Muscle Connection With Weaker Side
You should work on improving your mind-muscle connection with the weaker side of the muscle you are focusing on.
There are two ways to do this:
- Focus on your non-dominant side when performing an exercise
- Pre-activation exercise – do a light isolation exercise before moving on to a heavy compound exercise only on your weaker side
2. Don’t Do Only Bilateral Movements In Your Program
Nippard’s second tip on how to fix muscle imbalances is to incorporate unilateral movements into your training.
Source: Andres Ayrton / PexelsThere are many training programs that do not include single-side movements. If you are doing barbell bench press, pull-ups, squats, or deadlifts – all these exercises are great, but they don’t leave room to work on each side of your body individually.
Include unilateral movements into your training routine such as dumbbell presses, lateral pull-ins, single-arm row, dumbbell curl, and so on.
3. Film Your Sets
Or get feedback from someone in the gym. Look back on your footage and analyse your form to see if one side is dragging or one side is pushing faster than the other.
Once you’ve identified the problem, then it’s a matter of figuring out where that issue is coming from – it could be a mobility issue or a bad habit.
And that was Nippard’s tips on how to fix muscle imbalances. If you want to see his full explanation on the subject, simply click on the video below.
VIDEO – How To Fix Muscle Imbalances
With these tips on how to fix muscle imbalances, you can repair any problems you might have. If you are a big lover of compound movements, remember that you can do them unilaterally – instead of the front squat, you can do single-leg squat; instead of barbell bench press you can use a dumbbell and lift one arm each set; instead of the overhead press with a barbell, use dumbbells and get a feel of which muscle gets tired faster.
Check out more content from BOXROX that might be useful for your fitness goals.
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How to Make Muscle Gains At Every Level
Top Training Programs to Gain Size and Mass
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Image Sources
- Triceps Shown: Julia Larson on Pexels
- Single Dumbbell Exercises for Full Body Muscle: Andres Ayrton / Pexels
- Barbell fail: Roman Odintsov on Pexels