Changing It Up | "Muscle Confusion"

Bigger Stronger Leaner
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Hey guys, curious to know your thoughts on the old theory of changing your training frequently as to “confuse the muscles”. As bro-sciency this sounds, it is also parroted by more credentialed individuals, like Dan John “Everything works for about six weeks”, or Dante Trudel in DoggCrapp Training, or Scott Stevenson in Fortitude… To go even further, many training regimens rotate mesocycles or implement “blast and cruise” methods of training.

The argument for switching it up is that your body adapts to new stressors quickly, and that new stressors are a significant driver of growth; as such, changing up your training relatively frequently has a solid argument IMO. I think this argument could be further emboldened by most training programs’ 6-8 week cyclic nature as well.

The question is: How frequently? or perhaps In what ways?

Do you ‘switch it up’? If so, when do you make the change?

Dante Trudel has a strong point, IMO, that when you’ve failed to increase weight or reps (training to technical failure) 2 weeks in a row, it’s time to pick a new exercise.

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I just saw something on this yesterday and now I can’t find it. But the idea was that most of the adaptation to a new exercise in the first 4-8 weeks (it varies by individual) was neurological and muscle adaptation wasn’t responsible for most of the gains in weight lifted until after that period was over. I’ll keep looking to see if I can find what I’m thinking of as it was much more eloquent than what I’ve just written.

To answer your question, I like changing rep ranges first before switching to a completely different exercise. Am curious what others think.

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I like 6 weeks for keeping things conistent. Changes don’t have to be drastic: hand spacing and move, foot placement, etc, but a new stimulus can strengthen new angles.

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Maybe I can blame this on my lack of progress. Genetics isn’t a good one to blame now days so I’ll use this. I haven’t changed much about my training in a long while.

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I think one of the simplest changes that brings new strength to a stale movement is going from a barbell lift to it’s dumbbell equivalent. Weight goes down in the short run, but once the plateaus hit for DB movements and you go back to BB - the stability increase is noticeable and the movement feels good again.

Personally, I think I like switching up movements individually as they stop progressing so it’s not like I change up my entire program every 6 weeks… This being said, I recently went from HVT to HIT (Fortitude) and noticed quite a substantial change in feeling, effectiveness, quality, etc.

Perhaps significantly changing forms of training from say hypertrophy to strength or low volume to high volume on a 6-8 week basis yields the best results. We are talking about neurological adaptation (stress adaptation), after all.
Small changes may keep progress moving forward, but large changes may produce the better result.

Thoughts? Experiences?
@Christian_Thibaudeau @Ellington_Darden
I would be interested to hear your opinions, if you would like to entertain the discussion

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I think this is what I need to do. I’ve never focused on improving my lower rep/maximal strength for anything

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An extra 100 navy seal burpees confuses the fuck out of my muscles :joy:

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I think it’s a great question. I remember folks alternating between DC and high volume stuff back in the day. I forget to change things up, and I think that’s when I stop having fun. That’s not necessarily physiological, but maybe the lack of progress begets the lack of fun

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There’s a forward looking business saying that goes: “Nothing fails like success.”

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I have to agree with this.

Whenever we change a rep range or start a new exercise, we can progress every training because of neuro adaptation. Thats why it SEEMS that stuff works for that amount of time. In reality, i am sure as hell that just because you change stuff more often than me, for example, it wont give you not even 10-15% more gains.
I believe there could be some benefits to do this, but those wont be actual hypertrophy related - more like functional, maybe.

Most people know my opinion already but ill just re-spam it again here - unless you under-eat, under-train, over-train or train intentionally stupid, i dont think that some specific exercises, rep ranges, changing stuff, or changing drugs even, will produce noticably better actual gains.
I like how @Paul_Carter said about volume - if you are not growing of 15 sets a week, adding 5 more extra sets wont be a game changer.
And since bodybuilding and strenght stuff are both physiological topics, the same principles would apply all across. So if shit is not doing much, adding volume WONT make you explode to epic size gains. Just like adding an exercise wont. Or doing and exercise in a specific angle. And yes, also by changing rep ranges or programs or whatever.

I do believe that there might be some difference made with these parameters, but i believe its like 1% and it would be noticable to some pros. Like if you go for 502kg deadlift, that 1% means a new world record. For my shit deadlift, 1% is nothing so its not even worth to bother.
Same with size. Maybe to some pro, that 1% advantage of some specific angle or rep range changes enough that its noticable on stage compared to others, but not to any of us here.

There are tons of methods, theories, programs, and anecdotal evidence, but one thing is common :
1)There are genetic freaks that will explain their success with one of these parameters.
2)There are MORE people that are shit in these sports, doing the exact same things.

So it all comes down to this… if your basics are set well, you progress the way you progress, and nothing you change beyond that wont produce noticable gains.
But thats just my opinion. If someone thinks that changing stuff often really helps, i would like to see a picture of “now” and then a comparison of “later” in like 3 months and lets see if we can spot the H000GE gainz.

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I like the DC psychology of rotating exercises that are plateauing. I also find it beneficial to cycle between high volume and high intensity throughout the year. I think Jim Wendler programs these changes intelligently with Leaders and Anchors.

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It’s a rich tradition. Stuart McRobert suggested the same thing in “Brawn”, “The Complete Keys to Progress” was basically giving you a new approach every issue, Super Squats goes 6 on/6 off, etc. All just bro-approaches to periodization.

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I agree, but what if you were to reduce 10 sets a week and increase intensity? That’s kind of what I’m getting at regarding “changing it up”. Not a small change, but a big one.

I think the two have a significant overlap in principles, but by no means would I say they have the same principles across the board.

When is the last time you significantly changed your training regimen? I believe you’re on 5/3/1 currently… Do you think changing to something like Fortitude or Deep Water would produce no changes? (sorry, i seem to be recommending Fortitude at every turn lately… evidence that it is working for me)

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Im on 531 yes, but i have tried almost all variations of those for main lifts. But after the main lifts i have been looking for the perfect bodybuilding formula and i have done high volume, high intensity, i did the 350 stuff, i did the EDT… nothing really changes… i believe that if you train hard, 1 set to failure will work just as good as German Volume Training.
I have been looking for the right training formula, and right cycles my whole life. Its been already like 17 years and i believe i have tried it all. If i progress i progress. If i dont - i dont. For me its food related much more than training or drug related.

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Clarence Bass also covers periodization for Bodybuilding purposes in his book “Ripped 3” from 1986, which he adapted from the work of Soviet Sport Scientist Dmitri Matveyev for Olympic Weightlifting. Personally, and in the eyes of many experienced lifters, it seems that periodization is one of the best Training philosophies for preventing plateaus and ensuring continued strength and size gains.

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Yup! Just makes sense too. Any athlete in the world has an on season and and off season. If your “sport” is lifting weights, you’d do the same.

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I don’t know how I would interpret this if I were in your shoes tbh - you have been on either permablast or BnC for a significant period of time… That being said, I think you might simply be near (or at) your genetic limit. Of course, I only know you :pinching_hand: this well, and through a computer screen at that; so you would know better than I

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Well… 1)i wasnt like this always but i never noticed a rapid growth. Whatever i have is gained slowly in all these years. So if some method would have been noticably better i would…notice.
2)I also tought i am on my limit but then i gained 40lbs and now im bigger than ever and not all of it is fat. What i did see when i gained weight and got bigger was that i gain muscle if i eat to get fat. I did try lots of drugs and lots of training methods but nothing seemed to speed up the process in any way. Its just - either i gain or i dont, its food related. I can do what i want with training - unless i overtrain, the amount of weight/muscle gained stays the same.

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Hmmmm, for me at least, progressive overload has been what I believe to be the main contributor to gains in muscle and strength.

Sometimes I have found switching things up with set, reps, tempo, stance / grip to help, but sometimes not. Usually if it is a clear no, then I don’t really revisit that exercise performed in the way I did it, but sometimes I think it maybe needs a longer timeline to work. Triceps extensions didn’t help my bench nearly as much as doing close grip bench high volume did, but maybe if I stuck with the triceps extensions for a year, they would work. So the close grip high volume bench yields results for me in 6 weeks perhaps, but triceps extensions take 6 months to a year to reap the reward. Maybe always doing the extensions, but doing the close grip bench in waves would work? All part of the gains mystery.

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I think you have body dysmorphia. I always see you putting yourself down, despite the fact that your physique is probably in the upper 95% of this very website. If that’s what keeps you going, by all means, but you are totally jacked, man! You understand Muscle Building better than you think you do.

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