Most people who train are looking for improvements, whether it is dropping body-fat, increasing strength, just wanting to look good naked, or all of the above. Getting strong, however, is not as simple as it seems, as all those brutes reporting to the physios’ office will testify! It is all very well being strong in the lifts and muscles that will directly enhance performance, but something that is often overlooked, is the importance of being strong in the muscles that support these lifts and keep you injury free.

Take my work with academy level rugby teams as an example. When all the young athletes come in for assessment, the ones I am most concerned about are the ones with enormous bench presses and squats. The reason being is that all the effort and sweat needed to deliver these big lifts, and their concentration on them, will often lead to neglect of other equally important muscles. I can almost pinpoint the guys with potential shoulder and hamstring/ knee problems from the size of their primary lifts This susceptibility to injury is something known as structural imbalance.

There are three main areas where structural imbalance is most common among general gym users, and the corrective work to restore balance focuses on the VMO, the Scapulae Retractors, and the External Rotators.

The Vastus Medialis Oblique (VMO)

This is the tear-drop shaped quadracep that crosses the knee and is one of the key areas to target when increasing jumping and sprinting performance, but also in reducing the chance of knee injury. The main reason for the general weakness is a lack of ‘deep squatting’, and the paranoia that surrounds it. The knee is designed to operate at these levels otherwise all sport would be outlawed and every professional weightlifter you see will be on their 10th knee replacement. The problems often come from not developing the requisite flexibility or technique to squat properly (with out rounding the back) from the early stage of exercise development.

Targeting flexibility around the hips, knees and ankles will drastically improve the efficiency of the squat, and adding specialist exercises like an elevated split squat and Petersen Step-up will help develop the VMO to higher levels. Superset VMO work with hamstring actions for both the knee and hip, and stability around your knees will dramatically increase.

Scapulae Retractors

These are rhomboids and Trapezius muscles which act to pull your shoulder-blades back, and counteract the work of the chest and shoulders, which dominate most gym goers’ workouts! The reason these muscles are so often neglected is that they are the opposite of ‘mirror muscles’, being firmly on your back. Most people when training like to see the muscle they are working, hence the obsession with all that is chest, shoulders, biceps and abs. However, spending a bit more time on the ‘retractor muscles’ will actually improve your appearance by pulling your shoulders back, giving you better posture, and enhancing that much sought after V-shaped torso.

A really good exercise for this would be a seated rope row, where you pull the rope to neck level, keeping your elbows high, and squeezing your shoulder blades together at the focus of the move. Alternatively, try it as a single arm version, keeping your torso square and elbows high, with a split stance position.

External Rotators

These are the Teres Minor and Infraspinatus which are key in combating shoulder injuries from too much internal rotation work. Everybody who is serious about lifting weights needs to incorporate some of these moves into their routine, regardless of how ego-battering it is to wonder over to the basket of 2-5kgs dumbbells. I would recommend both a high external rotation (either Db or Cable) and a low external rotation (either Db or Cable) for 2-3 sets, twice a week as a minimum. This will bulletproof your shoulders, whilst simultaneously rocketing up your bench press. Check out my article series ‘Shouldering the Burden’ for more information on how these principles can work for you!

Very few people, including all the top level athletes I have worked with, are balanced, so book in for an assessment at your club, and reap the rewards of being both structurally sound and perfectly balanced!