We all have them, whether we are aware of them or not. Some are elegant and beautiful, while others can be downright atrocious. Some are clearly defined, while others have fuzzy boundaries of right and wrong. Ideally they help us get where we intend to go, but more often than not they lead us in the wrong direction.

At this point you might guess that I am talking about relationships, but we will have to save that article for another online publication. In fact, I intend to discuss movement standards today, and specifically what they are, why we need them, and how we can enforce them.

What are movement standards?

Whenever human beings band together as tribes, certain natural laws tend to emerge. For instance, language is an example of a phenomenon that is largely conventional: the words we use derive their meaning from our habitual use of them to refer to specific things. Societies, too, are governed by certain sets of rules and regulations that came to be from the learned experience of humans living together and discovering the need for order.

Similarly, movement standards are a forced phenomenon that occur whenever humans get together to move. By forced I mean that movement standards exist whether or not you explicitly define them. Whether we are talking about sports, fitness, martial arts, dance, or anything in between, movement standards are a mandatory, albeit occasionally unspoken, part of the discussion.
So where do movement standards come from? Well, there are conflicting accounts depending on who you ask, but the common consensus is that movement standards were created either when Al Gore invented the Internet or when Greg Glassman invented Exercise. (Just let that joke sink in for a second.)

But in all seriousness, movement standards typically begin informally as a set of loose guidelines by which practitioners may converse about their activity in a meaningful way. Over time as a discipline increases in size and popularity, these guidelines then become codified into more formal rules. For instance, CrossFit is still a very young sport, and new movement standards (such as what differentiates a kipping muscle-up from a front uprise) are being defined all the time. Parkour is yet another discipline whose movement standards have become solidified over time, and you can now walk into any Parkour gym around the globe and understand the difference between various styles of vaults.

Why do we need movement standards?

With regards to progressing movements, Chip Conrad of Bodytribe Fitness has been known to ask, “Where do we go from here?” The reason we need movement standards is so that we can answer Chip’s question meaningfully! Consider the relatively simple example of a pull-up. When performed correctly, a pull-up should be a progression towards more complex movements, such as a muscle-up or rope climb. However, when an athlete cheats the range of motion at the top of a pull-up, then the more advanced skill of a muscle-up will only be further out of reach.

These types of movement progressions are embedded throughout fitness and sport. Push-ups, when performed correctly, should progress into dips, then handstand push-ups, and then more complex movements on the bars or rings. If, however, your movement standards for push-ups are lackluster, then do not expect you or your athletes to be succeeding on the rings anytime soon! “First things first,” as Coach Christopher Sommer of Gymnastic Bodies is prone to saying.

Movement standards certainly exist outside the realm of bodyweight exercises as well. In weightlifting, for instance, an athlete should be able to front and overhead squat with a nearly vertical torso in order to lift bigger numbers in the clean or snatch. In the world of kettlebells, one must demonstrate an appropriate hip hinge in the deadlift before attempting to swing the bell. In both of these examples, your level of success at each stage in the process is directly related to your movement standards in the earlier progressions.

Furthermore, let us move beyond the physical and discuss a few broader concepts related to why we need movement standards. First and foremost, it should be your goal to create a culture and atmosphere where people do things correctly simply because they are correct, not because they are forced to do so. When you devote your attention to one individual, everyone else in the gym should be holding themselves accountable to a high standard of movement, not trying to cheat reps just because no one is looking.

This attitude carries over into other areas of your life and your clients’ lives as well. Which is more powerful: helping someone get their first muscle-up, or having that same person return to your gym a year after they moved away and tell you that your approach to fitness has significantly impacted their entire life? I know which I would choose! Regardless of whether you work with professional athletes or average fitness clients, your insistence on enforcing movement standards can and will have positive effects on their lives. As the saying goes, “How you do anything is how you do everything." If you help people achieve their goals by following proper movement standards and progressions, then it is likely they will take note and apply these principles outside the gym.

How can we enforce movement standards?

Enough philosophical babble; let us get down to some practical tips for how to apply these ideas in the gym right away. The key thing to remember here is that culture rules supreme, and you will not be able to implement these changes in your gym unless it is a widespread phenomenon. First, consider some self-enforcing movement standards. For instance, try the following:

• To ensure full depth on squats, place a medicine ball on the ground behind the hips and squat to the ball each rep.
• To prevent excessive knee bending on a kettlebell swing, place a medicine ball between the feet and do not allow the kettlebell to touch the ball.
• To ensure a vertical torso during squats, stand close to a wall, face it, and be sure not to touch it as you descend.
• To ensure a proper hip hinge during deadlifts, stand close to a wall, turn away from it, and be sure to touch the wall as you hinge.
• To keep the legs together as one unit during pull-ups, pinch a towel or t-shirt in between the feet and keep it there during all reps.
• To ensure full depth and form on push-ups, touch the ground with the chin, chest, and hips simultaneously at the bottom of each rep.

Another method to help enforce movement standards in your gym is to adopt certain types of policies. Be certain, for example, that the athlete or client is performing movements on which they are able to meet the movement standards. If a client has poor ankle dorsiflexion and thus cannot squat to parallel, then give them plates under their heels to allow them to reach full depth. Asking them to squat to parallel without assistance in this case is setting them up to fail to meet the movement standards.
Yet another policy to adopt is to minimize the use of assistance bands for pull-up work. The strength curve of the band does not match that of the pull-up (at the bottom the band helps the most when it is needed the least, but at the top the band barely helps at all when it is needed the most). Better options to help develop pull-up strength include horizontal rows, chin-over-bar holds, and pull-up negatives. You can, however, use the assistance bands for movements that have similar strength curves, such as push-ups, dips, handstand push-ups, and pistols (where the sticking point is near the bottom of the movement when the band is stretched the most).

Last, but certainly not least (especially if you coach CrossFit), you should discuss the ideological differences between training and testing with the people with whom you work. Competitive CrossFit athletes need to occasionally practice movements, such as butterfly pull-ups or kipping handstand push-ups, that might fall outside the scope of ideal movement standards. However, these exceptions are for infrequent testing scenarios and not everyday training. On the other hand, general population fitness clients probably never need to practice competition! They can “compete” using good movement standards in your gym every day if they feel the need. (As an aside, competitive Olympic weightlifters should hold themselves to high movement standards all the time due to the slightly subjective nature of judging at meets.)

Conclusion

In his seminal work Movement, Gray Cook writes, “First move well. Then move often.” By setting high performance standards, you will help define what proper movements are and effectively train your athletes to follow them. Please use this as a jumping off point by which to reflect on your own training and coaching, and hold yourself and others to high movement standards.