Gear That’s Easy on the Joints

An article in The Wall Street Journal – by Gwendolyn Bounds – reviewed some “new” gear that is supposed to give you a great “workout” while being kind to your joints.

As with most exercise tools, it’s not the tool that’s the issue for joints. It’s more how you use it. It’s the lack of knowledge that gets your joints in trouble.

So, let’s break down the new gear and see what’s really going on.

The gear she included was (and I’ll also include which of the gear I have tried):

• TRX Suspension Trainer (I have it) – The TRX can be easier on certain joints because it uses a percentage of your body weight. For example, a squat while holding onto the TRX unit turns it into a sub-gravity squat. But, a push-up in the device is much more difficult even at less than full body weight loads because of the instability of the device. It’s like trying to do push-ups on gymnastic rings.
• Elliptigo – The idea here is to take the motion of an elliptical machine and put it on the street like a bike. I’ve not seen any proof that the loads on your joints are less but it makes sense that they would be. On a regular elliptical machine, the loads are between 60- 80% body weight so there’s a good chance that this device lowers the joint impact force.
• Valslide (I don’t have this but something oddly close – a furniture mover) – We use something similar, a furniture mover, for lower body movements, such as a reverse lunge where one foot is one the slider and the other is on the floor. The non-sliding leg will bear about 75% of your body weight (depending on how much weight you place on the slider). But, for upper body work, as in a plank position where you hold one arm still and move the other, the loads go up. Once again, it’s how you use the tool that makes or breaks it as a joint friendly device.
• Kangoos (I have a pair) – The are like ski boots with leaf springs attached to the bottom. They reduce the force of impact up to 50% depending on the kind of spring you choose. I really like these but they weight about 5 lbs. each so running in them is not easy even if it is joint friendly.
• P90X (I have the whole series) – How P90x found its way onto a joint friendly list is really a mystery to me. The whole concept behind P90X is “extreme fitness”. The drills are very hard to do, lots of impact, plyometrics. Yes, they have some yoga-like drills but overall, P90x is not for anyone who has any kind of joint pain.
• Kettlebell (I have one). A Kettlebell, while different in design from a dumb bell, creates above body weight training. And, like p90X, I’m not sure how it or the SelectTech Dumb Bell made it on the list of things that are easier on your joints. To get a training effect, you have to use loads the challenge your muscles and therefore your joints. There are drills, for example what we call a Flamingo Gunner – a bicep curl while standing on leg – that will create safer loads in the joints while still challenging your muscles but, of course, you would need to know that drill. Standard issue drills, things like a Kettlebell Swing, or a Turkish Get-Up are difficult to execute and require good core strength and endurance.

• Perfect Sit-Up – Why would you want to do sit-ups? Some people still think that by doing sit-ups, they can transform their abdominals into something that looks like a Michaelangelo sculpture. Sadly, not the case. Sit-ups create high compression loads on the spine and with so many other options that are safer and equally, if not more, effective, I think they should just be dropped from the exercise option list altogether for most people. True, if you can do the movement in the ideal way, you may be able to reduce the compression loads, but the average person who trains a few days a week and lives a relatively sedentary life should run away from sit-ups.

Bottom Line

Generally speaking, whether a drill is joint friendly or not, depends on the force, speed, and stability created by the drill and your own joint force production/absorption ability. It’s not the tool per se that is the primary deciding factor. It’s how you use the tool.