In your opinion, what’s more important, changing up rep schemes or changing up the exercises you do for each body part. I know both should be done, I’m just curious to know what you think is more important, or do you think they are equally important.
i would say, in my opinion… both are equally important.
the human body is an incredible machine and will adjust overtime to your routine, and thus, progress halts.
jaystyles
IMHO I think changing up the movements is more important, as well as the periodicity inbetween body parts.
As an example… My workout partner and I were doing chest on Wednesdays for the last few weeks and then we decided to do the ol switcheroo and work chest on Monday as well as do all of our movements with dumbbells.
surprise bitch!
It was one of the best pumps I’ve had in a long, long time.
Shock the monkey.
B.
why should you change exercises? are you saying that i should drop squats, deadlifts, and bench presses from my routine just for the sake of changing exercises? you need to periodize sets, reps, and intensity. not exercises.
P-DOG,
IMO, it wouldn’t hurt to drop squats for 3 or 4 weeks and do lunges and step-ups or leg press, or some other type of leg work combo. Keeps your body guessing.
Both have there place and can be very effective at keeping the body guessing.
I you only switch movements and always do say 5 x 5 you are going to be shorting yourself. The same could be said for not changing excersizes that hit the same muscles but in a different way.
Phill
Supsaiyan, you may find an answer to your question reading CW’s ABBH1, ABBH2 and Singles. As suggested by CW,these 3 programs can be performed one after the other for optimal hypertrophy. Both ABBH1 and ABBH2 contain compound lifts with a certain variety between the 2 programs. Personally what I like is the combination of loads, sets and reps.
I would put equal importance to each variable. For instance, I have had great results with a 5 x 5 routine in which I would keep the main lifts the same for as much as 9 weeks at a time(cycling only load), but the assistance exercise selection would be cycled every 3 weeks and the volume and intensity every week. To put this in perspective, I think cycling the load and intensity for a single exercise over a period of 9 weeks is just as beneficial as cycling exercise selection for, perhaps, a 1 to 5 rep max. But then again, unless over a 9 week period you would utilize 9 different exercises, you would still attempt to break a new record each time you came back around to that exercise, so in retrospect, I would put equal weight to each variable.
BradTGIF,
‘Shock the monkey’… thats a good one.
jaystyles