Can exercise correct poor posture?

Poor posture usually results from muscles shortening or tightening up while other opposing muscles become weak and lengthened, usually occurring as a result of our day to day lifestyle at work or at home, or through overuse of some muscles and underuse of others when exercising. This can often lead to pain, injury, or other health-related problems either immediately or over time due to unwanted stress on the body.

However, without identifying the basics of correct posture, it’s very difficult to explain what poor posture can look like.

The spine should have three gentle, natural curves; the lower back, mid-back and the neck. Correct posture will maintain these natural curves in the spine but not exaggerate them, with the head positioned directly above the shoulders and the top of the shoulders positioned over the hips.

What is most commonly observed with those of us suffering with poor posture is an over-exaggeration of the mid-back and the neck resulting in a forward lean and rounded shoulders, which also results in the head, shoulders and hips not maintaining correct alignment.

So…how can we prevent and fix poor posture?

Preventing poor posture, as you may already know, is far more straightforward than correcting cases of bad posture, particularly if they are long term. This is the main reason to be conscious of your body and whether you are doing the correct things to ensure your posture remains healthy. However, this doesn't mean that if you suffer with poor posture that you have to accept this for the rest of your life, with the right exercises and consistency even the most severe cases of incorrect posture can be reversed. 

Fixing poor posture:

Each case can be entirely different when it comes to the causes, severity and the approach used to correct postural issues. This is why it is important to first of all be assessed by an experienced exercise professional in order to be prescribed the most effective exercises to reverse poor posture. This is where MegaBox Fitness can help. 

We first and foremost conduct a detailed postural and movement assessment and after analysis of the results, design an individually tailored programme incorporating specific corrective exercises while avoiding movements that can exacerbate poor posture.

Preventing poor posture:

If you go through long periods of sitting down at a computer, have noticed yourself slouching more, or even if you have no postural issues whatsoever, you can take proactive measures to reduce the likelihood of developing poor posture in the future and building strong foundations for correct, healthy posture. 

To conclude… first and foremost the simplest way to prevent bad posture is to be mindful of your body position when working or sitting and take small breaks to stand up and stretch if possible.
If you're exercising, in particular resistance training, it is important to focus on all areas of the body to avoid overtraining one area and creating imbalances. It can be quite common to see this happen when the chest and anterior shoulder muscles are worked more than the muscles in the back which can encourage and exacerbate poor posture. 

Once again, this is an area where MegaBox fitness can help eliminate this issue.
As the MegaBox circuit requires you to follow a structured workout, all the exercises performed are chosen by our experienced coaches with muscular balance and good posture in mind. This means that within the resistance exercises of the circuit, there is a slight bias of posterior work to offset the anterior work done while boxing and to promote strength and movement in the areas needed to reverse poor posture and maintain good posture.

Small Group Training and 1-to-1 Personal Training will take these elements into consideration in even more depth and should be considered when deciding on which training option is best for you!

Thanks for reading!