The vast majority of people start training because they want to lose weight and get in shape. Almost all new athletes who walk into the gym say the same thing, and it’s understandable because functional fitness is a great way to change their bodies. However, functional fitness does not work like most traditional weight loss programs. This article will look at the research on functional fitness, and give you, the new athlete a solid idea on just what kind of body transformation you can expect.

Advantages of Functional Fitness

First, I want to say that for new athletes functional fitness is a great choice for changing your body, and really your whole life, but it is not the only path. Plenty of people have lost weight doing bodybuilding, running, cycling, zumba, you name it.

However, functional fitness has some key advantages both physiologically, and culturally. I’ve found that it is much easier to walk into a functional fitness gym when you know your friends will be waiting for you, and regardless of the workout you’ll at least get to hang out with them.

Physiologically there is no direct competitor to functional fitness for a number of reasons which we will delve into throughout the article. But suffice it to say that hard work and intensity are key’s to changing your body, and you will find both in any functional fitness gym.

Fat Loss and Functional Fitness

As a coach I always highlight the fact that weight in and of itself isn’t really that important, and weight loss really doesn’t matter. What we all want is fat loss, and if possible muscle gain. Keep in mind if you lost 10 lbs of fat, and gained 10 lbs of muscle the scale would say that you made no progress, but you would actually look and feel much different!

functional fitness Research on Fat Loss

This study examined the effects of functional fitness on aerobic fitness and body composition. They chose 23 men and 20 women and put them through 10 weeks of functional fitness programming and examined the changes to their aerobic fitness and fat loss, as well as the amount of muscle gained.

In terms of body composition they found the following:

Men lost 4.2% of their body fat

Women lost 3.4% of their body fat

This is a great result, especially when put in terms of pounds of fat lost as this would be 7 lbs of fat lost for men and 5 lbs of fat lost for women. We should also keep in mind that this is only 10 weeks worth of time. Over a full year this could be closer to 20-30 lbs or more!

There is also some additional research that shows functional fitness style programming helps athletes lose weight as measured by their waist circumference. In this study, athletes lost nearly triple the circumference on their waist as compared to traditional fitness programs. This was also achieved with much lower training volumes and total time in the gym.

If you want more tips and guides on starting functional fitness, then click here to join the Tier Three Team. If you don’t, I bet you wear cutoff jean jackets everywhere.

Gaining Muscle with Functional Fitness

This is one area where new athletes definitely have some misconceptions, especially women. New athletes need to gain muscle for a variety of reasons:

Increased metabolism

Increased strength

Better Aesthetics

Muscle is much more bioactive than fat. It takes a lot of energy to maintain and build muscle, which helps to keep overall body fat lower. It also allows you to eat a little more without gaining weight.

In an 8 week study of new athletes, the researchers determined that while there weren’t huge changes in their athletes in terms of body fat they managed to add over 2 lbs of lean muscle. This is almost unheard of in such a short time frame.

There is also some recent research that shows people who participate in functional fitness style training actually don’t feel as hungry and and don’t eat as much as compared to traditional exercise programs.

Check this video out for some great pictures of real body transformations.

It’s science !

I can say that having been an athlete for over 11 years that this is fairly representative of the types of changes that you can experience with a solid diet and functional fitness plan.

Starting Your Journey

All of this is great, but I can tell you with 100% certainty that you will never experience these types of changes unless you get into the gym! I always tell people that the hardest part of being a athlete is walking in the door for the first time.

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Often times people feel out of shape, and they think that everyone in the gym is going to be some Icelandic functional fitness god who will laugh and point at them. That’s not true. We’re mostly Swedish.

Seriously you will probably never find a more welcoming group of people than at the gym, and I can promise they aren’t judging you because secretly each one of them has areas of functional fitness they struggle with.

Some folks will be very strong but struggle on longer wods. Some will be fast but not strong, and everyone has to work on technique at some point.

For more information on how to find a solid gym check out this article. Remember you only have to be brand new once. If you have the guts to walk into the gym then you have the guts to change your life!