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I've been playing sports all my life and I have a noticeable
"stronger" and a "weaker" side in my chest and arms. Are there any
exercises I can do to fix this?
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Christopher Warden:
Absolutely. The exercises most often used to strengthen left-right
imbalance are unilateral exercises, where you train one side of your
body at a time (i.e. a 1-arm overhead press, a 1-arm chest press or
1-arm rows.)
The best way to do it?
Train with more volume on the weaker side,
not with more weight. For example, if your left side is weaker,
you’d do 2 or 3 sets of a 1-arm chest press on the left, as compared to
1 set on the right. If adding more sets is not an option, simply trying
to add a few more reps when working the weaker side can help.
Do keep in mind, that even with your
efforts to balance out your left and right, you’ll probably still always
notice a difference.
After all, almost person on the planet has
one side of the body that they prefer to use, and that “preferred” side
will always go back to dominates the other as you use it for your
activities – whether or not they’re sport-related.
So, unless your strength difference from
one side to the other is the result of improper training or injury – in
which case it’s essential that you work to balance yourself out to
prevent mobility issues or further injury – I wouldn’t necessarily worry
about the “noticeable” difference too much.
 Christopher
“Doctor” Warden, CSCS traded in his lab coat, latex gloves and
microscope in the late 90's as part of a transformation from
pencil-necked geek to, well, freakishly strong not-so-pencil necked
geek.
His ability to understand and teach the technical aspects of
fitness, coupled with his passion and intuitive sense -- hey, are we
sure this guy's not Spiderman? -- have made him one of the most coveted
trainers in NYC.
When he’s not busy studying, writing or
transforming client physiques, Christopher loves traveling, snowboarding
and chillin’ with his family and friends. You can learn more about him
and his training insights by visiting his
fitness and
self-empowerment blog.
P.S. Are you running
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