My awesome ZGYM members and subscribers to my YouTube channel have already seen one of my recent Coffee Talks on fixing strength imbalances. This topic was actually inspired by a comment made by a ZGYM member who noticed having an imbalance of strength while doing kettlebell overhead presses (their right side was stronger than their left side).

First of all, strength imbalances are quite common. Almost everyone talks about being right or left handed, and having a preference for doing things on one side of their body versus another. There is no right or wrong place to have it though. A lot of it is individualized. You can be the only left-footed person in your right footed-family. Really, it’s all up to you. But no matter where this is, you can have up to 25% more strength on this preferred “dominant” side.

If you don’t know how to determine which side is the more dominant one, you can intuitively figure this out just by exercising and feeling your body. For instance, pay very close attention to how you perform certain things such as unilateral exercises, which work one part of your body while the opposite one rests. Like I mentioned before, the ZGYM member who discovered their imbalance noticed this after performing a one arm overhead press (instead of using both arms). The difference must have been apparent enough for them to notice it, thanks to the exercise being unilateral.

Once you’ve determined where your imbalance is (which can be either your lower body or upper body, or in some cases, both), you’re going to want to fix them. Ignoring them is not going to do you or your body any favors, leading to potential injury, physical stress, and impaired exercise performance. An effective way to restore balance in your strength is performing unilateral exercises. Yes, the very thing that alerted us of a problem is also going to be the key to fixing it.

Fixing the Imbalance

Let’s say you have a strength imbalance in your arms. Your right arm is stronger than your left arm, so it (the right arm) is the dominant side.

To fix the imbalance, we’re going to do a single arm overhead press- starting with the weaker side first– until the arm fatigues.

Whenever we’re looking to fix a strength imbalance, we need to start by training the weaker side first since it’s priority #1.

For this example, we’re going use our left arm first because it is the weaker side. (Remember that since this is a unilateral exercise our right side is not going to be doing anything yet while the left side is working.)

To determine the amount of reps that need be done, pay close attention to the number of times you can perform the exercise with perfect form. When you start to feel fatigue or that you can no longer do another rep with perfect form, stop immediately.

In this case, let’s say the amount of reps we determined was 6. 

Now we’re going to switch to the right arm and perform the same amount of reps (6).

You’re going to notice how easier this is compared to your left side due to the fact that your right arm is the stronger, dominant side. Resist the urge to perform more reps no matter how easy this is. If you give into the temptation to increase the weight or reps you’re going to make the imbalance even worse. I assure you that your dominant side will still benefit from this type of training while you give the weaker side a chance to catch up and grow stronger. Neither side is going to lose strength!

Putting it all together:

  1) Determine your dominant side and your weak side.

    Ex: Right Arm is Dominant. Left Arm is Weak.

  2) Pick a unilateral exercise to work them through.

    Ex: Single Arm Overhead Press

  3) Find the number of reps you can do with perfect form until fatigue on the WEAK SIDE.

    Ex: 6 Reps

  4) Work the weak side first at the number of reps you’ve determined.

    Ex: Left Arm (weak) goes first and performs 6 reps.

  5) Switch over to the dominant side and perform the same number of reps that you did on the other side.

    Ex: Right Arm (dominant) goes last and performs 6 reps.

  6) Repeat steps 4 & 5 as needed to restore balance.

 The weaker side will eventually catch up with the same level of strength as the dominant one, and you’ll be able to progress from there.

I hope this helps when it comes to correcting any imbalances you may have!