Incorporating 'Functional Fitness' Into Your 2023 Daily Routine

If exercise made your list of New Year's resolutions or if you're getting back in the swing of things, there's a way to train your body for life's daily activities.

Functional fitness means incorporating things you do in everyday life into your exercise routine, like classes at Conquer Fitness at 6th Street and Utica.

"Functional fitness really dates back to our very beginnings. As cave men and cave women, we had to go out and hunt and gather for our food,” said Dr. Frank Gaffney, cardiologist at the Oklahoma Heart Institute.

He said even though functional fitness is a current trend, the form of exercise has existed for decades.

"We decided that we should isolate muscle groups and hypertrophy muscles that never gave us any real strength to the things that we need to do in life. So, this is just getting back to the normal motions that keep you fit in your life doing the things that you want to do,” Gaffney said.

Some examples are practicing squatting for when you pick up a flowerpot in your backyard or torsional work, like unloading suitcases from your car.

"Cardiovascular training, increasing your heart rate, is the single most important thing heart patients and all humans can do for your survival benefit,” Gaffney said.

He said it's not as much the how you work out that matters; it's the fact that you're moving your body.

"All the things that we do that we take for granted in our day-to-day life, if you don't have the muscle strength, that's how you get injured,” Gaffney said.

Whether you're exercising to accomplish a goal or to maintain health, it's good for your heart.