The When's and Why's of Exercise Selection
A common question for trainees is "how often should I be switching or varying exercises?" This is a simple question that can precipitate a painfully long discussion. I don't want to overcomplicate things, since I think this is something coaches and trainer do to make themselves seem like experts. So the short answer is that you don't need to change exercises as frequently as you might think.
For example, it's common for programs to switch significantly at 4 week intervals. This is seldomly necessary. Likewise, you probably don't want to be doing the same exercises with the same emphasis for months on end, although keeping a core group of exercises is often a good idea depending on the goal. So where's the middle ground, and how can you evaluate for yourself when to switch things up?
Change Exercises or Program?
There's some overlap here, but it's simple to distinguish for our purposes. A program change is when the overall goal of training changes. For example switching from a period focused on muscle hypertrophy to a period focused on speed or fat loss. A program change will often result in changes to the exercise in the program, but it doesn't have to.
For example, you could keep all the exercises the same, but significantly lower the repetition range and increase the relative intensity. This would be a significant change in the program, even though all the exercises remained the same. Similarly, you could change some exercises in a program without significantly changing the overall goal of the program. Something I recently did with an athlete and detail below.
The first example is unusual. The second example is common, and I frequently do this as part of the normal problem solving process of program management.
Now we can discuss exercises changes without confusion.
Why Change Exercises
Whether we're talking about just changing a single exercise in a program or an overhaul of all the exercises, we should understand some of the rational for why we bother changing exercises at all.
An Economist Goes into a Gym
Economists like to use the principle of opportunity cost, and so do I. Every time you do one thing, you forgo doing something else. That's opportunity cost. Training and exercise are no different. You can't do everything at the same time, because time and energy are limited. This means that every program is going to focus on some things at the expense of others. Periodically changing exercise selection, is one way to deal with this.
Technique
For more technical lifts such as variations of the olympic lifts, switching to simpler versions is a useful learning tool. To learn the snatch it's very common to break the lift down into simpler parts and gradually move towards more complete versions of the lift.
Backward Chaining is a specific example of this. Backward chaining involves learning the end of the lift first, and gradually working back to what will ultimately be the beginning or start position. The progression might look like the following:
- Learn an overhead squat with a snatch-width grip
- learn a tall-snatch or snatch from the hip
- progress to gradually lower start positions until you're doing snatches from the floor.
There are many examples of this approach in lifting and in sports. In the snatch example above, each of the steps in the progression might last anywhere from a single session to several weeks. Since this methods is focused on learning the skill more than changes in muscle size or structure it often has a more variable timeline than our other examples.
Focusing on a Weakness
This is probably the most obvious reason to change exercises in your program. Since there's always an opportunity cost associated with exercise selection, you're going to periodically identify weak muscles or lagging skills. Let's say you decide that the "extrinsic muscles" of the upper back (lats, traps, rhomboids, ...) are weak relative to where you'd like them to be. A reasonable course of action is to increase the amount of time and energy you put into these muscle.
Some readers might think that this is so obvious that it isn't worth mentioning. However, there's still many coaches and trainers who think that if you just focus on "the basics" it will take care of everything. In this case, the basics usually refers to the bench press, squat deadlift; although sometimes other exercises get included. Unfortunately, this just isn't true. If it were true, we wouldn't be discussing this topic at all.
Focussing on weaknesses requires a longer timeline, ranging from weeks to months. You're usually looking to change muscle structure through hypertrophy in this example. This is a relatively slow process compared to technical improvements. The more experienced you are, the slower this process will be.
Injuries
We all get injured at some point, despite all the nonsense content claiming to "bulletproof" your joints and muscles. Changing exercises is a valuable tool for dealing with injuries.
Recently, one of my weightlifters hurt her wrist playing volleyball, and had to wear a cast for a couple weeks. Obviously this made bearing load through her palm and hand impossible. Instead of just writing off weeks of training we changed exercises and were able to keep total training volume-load close to what it was pre-injury. By using Safety-Bar based exercises, jumps, and some creativity we were able to her through several weeks of training without losing any progress.
Changing exercise can also be used as a strategy to avoid overuse injuries. This requires a more of nuanced approach however. If you're changing exercises to avoid overuse, the exercise needs to be sufficiently different. This de-emphasis should be balanced with the need to sustain an appropriate training load for your goals.
The timeline for these kinds of changes is extremely variable. Minor stains might resolve in a few weeks, requiring trivial training modifications. Major injuries can follow you to the grave. The key is to be creative and work with someone who knows what they're doing.
Fun and Motivation
Doing new things can be fun, in lifting and in life. Sometimes changing things up because it's fun is reason enough. This becomes more true the longer you lift. I've been lifting for over 30 years, and sometimes I just get bored. Changing things up, especially if it means trying something new, keeps me going.
Having a good repertoire of exercises, and being willing to try new things is the key. Keep learning, keep trying things, and have fun. I should point out that this isn't just about the weight room. Doing something new, can mean non-lifting activities as well. This is particularly easy to implement if your goal are less task-specific, such as health and fitness.
Traps to Avoid
There are some things to be mindful of when considering a change in exercises. They're not huge, and won't "kill your gains" but they're still worth discussing.
Switching too Often
If every program leaves something unaddressed, why not just change your exercises all the time? Each new day could be a new set of exercises? Unfortunately, this isn't ideal.
When you start a new exercise it's typical for you to make rapid progress for the first few weeks. Most of this progress is the result of learning how to do the movement better. This progress is often referred to as neurological adaptation, as it's the result of improved neuromuscular coordination and processes with names like rate coding. But we can just call it "learning".
Not Switching Enough
This might seem too obvious for an article about when to change exercise, but it's a common enough issue to deserve a mention. It's common for trainees to have a short list of exercises they always incorporate into their training. This might be because it's a competitive lift they need to practice, as with weightlifters and powerlifters. Or maybe they just have favourite lifts.
It's fine, and sometimes necessary, to have core lifts that frequently recur in your programs. However, even with powerlifters and weightlifters, it's good practice to periodically rotate these exercise out. Or, at the very least, de-emphasis them in your training.
What to Ask Yourself
We've covered the most frequent justifications for changing exercises. So here's a few questions to ask yourself that can guide you in choosing when to change exercises and what to change them to. Likewise, these questions can help you decide when to keep things the same.
What's Your Goal?
Always start from your goal. Is your goal to just get as muscular as possible? Get stronger in a particular lift? Improve some sports performance outcome? Stay fit and have fun? These are all valid goals, but they don't all lead to the same exercise selection decisions.
What's Your Timeline
Do you have 8 weeks to put the final touches on competition performance? Or do you have 8 years to develop an athlete? Or is the goal a lifetime of fitness and health (this should always be one of your goals, to be clear).
What's Your Training History
Your training history is a significant factor when selecting exercises. It will define important factors, such as: what's been under-addressed, or what injuries you might have to work around.
Generally speaking, the longer your training history the more your training history matters. If you're relatively new to training of fitness, it will take a while for strength and weaknesses to emerge. Some to these will be the result of training decisions and some will be innate.
Wrap Up
Hopefully this article leaves you feeling more comfortable with deciding when and why to change the exercise in your program. Changing exercise selection is an important tool for meeting both short-term and long-term training goals.
Try to be systematic when selecting exercises and use the criteria discussed here to inform your choices. Don't fall into the dual traps of seldomly changing exercises or changing them to frequently. Finally, don't forget to have fun regardless of your goals.