“Neuroendocrine adaptation” is a change in the body that affects you either neurologically or hormonally.
The most important adaptations to exercise are in part or completely a result of a hormonal or neurological shift.
Research has shown which exercise protocols maximize neuroendocrine responses. Earlier we faulted isolation movements as being ineffectual. Now we can tell you that one of the critical elements missing from these movements is that they invoke essentially no neuroendocrine response.
Among the hormonal responses vital to athletic development are substantial increases in testosterone, insulin-like growth factor, and human growth hormone. Exercising with protocols known to elevate these hormones eerily mimics the hormonal changes sought in exogenous hormonal therapy (steroid use) with none of the deleterious effects. Exercise regimens that induce a high neuroendocrine response produce champions! Increased muscle mass and bone density are just two of many adaptive responses to exercises capable of producing a significant neuroendocrine response.
It is impossible to overstate the importance of the neuroendocrine response to exercise protocols. Heavy load weight training, short rest between sets, high heart rates, high-intensity training, and short rest intervals, though not entirely distinct components, are all associated with a high neuroendocrine response.
The Olympic lifts are based on deadlift, clean, squat, and jerk. These movements are the starting point for any serious weight-training program. In fact, they should serve as the core of your resistance training throughout your life.
Why the deadlift, clean, squat, and jerk? Because these movements elicit a profound neuroendocrine response. That is, they alter you hormonally and neurologically. The changes that occur through these movements are essential to athletic development. Most of the development that occurs as a result of exercise is systemic and a direct result of hormonal and neurological changes.
Curls, lateral raises, leg extensions, leg curls, flyes, and other bodybuilding movements have no place in a serious strength and conditioning program primarily because they have a blunted neuroendocrine response. The deadlift’s primal functionality, whole-body nature, and mechanical advantage with large loads suggest its strong neuroendocrine impact, and for most athletes the deadlift delivers such a quick boost in general strength and sense of power that its benefits are easily understood.
FUNCTIONAL MOVEMENTS
There are movements that mimic motor recruitment patterns that are found in everyday life. Others are somewhat unique to the gym. Squatting is standing from a seated position; deadlifting is picking any object off the ground. They are both functional movements. Leg extension and leg curl both have no equivalent in nature and are in turn non-functional movements. The bulk of isolation movements are non-functional movements. By contrast, the compound or multi-joint movements are functional. Natural movement typically involves the movement of multiple joints for every activity.
Functional movements are mechanically sound and therefore safe, and they also elicit a high neuroendocrine response.
CrossFit has managed a stable of elite athletes and dramatically enhanced their performance exclusively with functional movements. The superiority of training with functional movements is clearly apparent with any athlete within weeks of their incorporation.
The soundness and efficacy of functional movements are so profound that exercising without them is by comparison a colossal waste of time.
Aside from the breadth or totality of fitness CrossFit kind of methodology seeks, our program is distinctive, if not unique, in its focus on maximizing neuroendocrine response, developing power, cross-training with multiple training modalities, constant training, and practice with functional movements and the development of successful diet strategies.
Reference:
CrossFit Level 1 Training Guide
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