The 8 Laws of Physical Health & How Our Training Programs Use These Laws

There are eight laws to physical health according to Pete Egoscue, and the Eclipse Fitness training programs are designed to support these laws.  If you are a runner, you will run faster.  If you are a cycler, you will cycle better.  If you are a swimmer, you will swim easier.   If you are an athlete, your performance will improve.  If you lack mobility, you will rediscover it.  If you need more strength, you will gain it.  If you need to lose weight, you will lose it. If you simply want to enjoy your quality of life more, then you will. Here is how...


1. Vertical Loading: Gravity is necessary for health.  In order for gravity to exert a positive and dynamic influence on the body, the skeleton must be vertically aligned in its postures.

• The Turkish Get Up teaches the body through fluid movements to vertically align.

2. Dynamic Tension: A state of constant tension exists between the front of the body and the back.  The posterior portion is responsible for the erection of the body and the anterior is responsible for the flexion, or bending forward, of the body.  Neither activity can be performed correctly and healthily without this action.

• The Swing incorporates both flexion and extension of the body through its center driving force of the hips. This allows the body to not only learn how to bend forward and stand erect properly, but it also teaches it how to move between the two states (front to back) efficiently.

3. Form & Function: Bones do what muscles tell them to do.  All skeletal motion is initiated by muscle activity.

• Not all exercise movements are created equal.  Some even go against and inhibit the natural movement patterns that we are born with.  They can train dysfunctions and then lead to injury.  Each and every exercise in the training programs we offer adhere to only movement patterns that support natural form and function.

4. Breathing: The body will not function without oxygen. So essential is this law that the body has redundant systems to ensure compliance.

• These redundant systems may ensure compliance, but do not counteract the effects that poor posture has on breathing. You've seen poor posture - shoulders and heads are pitched forward and down, eyes looking toward the ground.  This stresses the diaphragm by not allowing it to properly function and reduces the size of the lung cavity making it more difficult to fully exchange air.  The exercises  within our programs will promote natural correction of the posture - straight and tall with head erect and eyes looking straight ahead.  This allows the diaphragm and lungs to function at full capacity.  

5. Motion: All of the body's systems - digestive, circulatory, immune, and so on - are interrelated.  The common thread that binds them together is movement.  The faster the molecules of the body move, the higher the metabolic rate.  The higher the metabolic rate, the healthier the human being.  We are designed to run, jump, climb, fall, roll and skip, not just for initial development but for continued health throughout our lives.  If these activities hurt or cause pain, it is because we are violating some or all of the laws of health.

• Just like our programs support form and function, they are also designed to encourage the body to move at full range without discomfort or pain.  We also do NOT encourage stressing the body through movement to the point of exhaustion or vomiting.  Body systems are interrelated.  When exhaustion or vomiting happens, this is the body's way of telling you that you have done too much.  So much that those systems have begin to shut down. 

6. Balance: In order for the law of motion to be effective and true, the body must achieve balance, defined as muscle memory, sufficient to constantly return the body to the first law of vertical load.  For balance to occur, muscles must work in pairs and equally on the right and left sides of the body.  Being left- or right-handed hinders this balance only when we violate the laws of motion.

• The Single-leg Deadlift teaches the body how to achieve proper balance, but that is not all.  It improves hamstring flexibility and vertical stabilization. It also builds strength in your hamstrings, lower back and upper back.

7. Stimulus: The body reacts to all stimuli 24 hours a day, regardless of the conscious state of health.  Therefore, the law of motion constantly reinforces this law of stimulus.  If motion is limited, the law of stimulus becomes stressful to the body.  The body absorbs pollutants and irritants rather than deflecting them.

• Because of our overall approach and the type of exercises we use, your body will move better and more efficiently.  This in turn allows the body to react more positively to stimuli within the environment that surrounds you..

8. Renewal: The body is organic; therefore, it is in a constant state of growth or rebirth.  Muscles, bones, nerves, connective tissues, cartilage and the like are all alive.  If the body is not renewing, it is because we are violating the laws of physical health.  The more laws we violate, the faster we age and die.  

•  The fact that our training programs are based on all aspects of  The Eight Laws of Physical Health, means that the body is better able to renew itself and increase its longevity. 

Superior training is based on superior principles.  And that is what we do here.  Go ahead, impress yourself!