Functional training is the science of training the body to meet the specific demands of life and sports, and differs significantly from traditional strength training.

The goal of functional training is to train or retrain muscles to work properly (“function”) through the use of specialized exercises. Functional training is based on the premise that you only improve what you've specifically trained, and that - since muscle form dictates the role and function of each muscle – a muscle must be trained the way it is designed to function. Functional training differs significantly from traditional strength training, which develops strength and builds muscle through the isolation of specific muscle groups. While adequate for building muscle, traditional strength training will not train the body to meet the specific demands of life and sports because it does not reproduce real life conditions.