Changing a workout
Some people vary exercises, even daily, believing this creates “muscle confusion” and, as a result, leads to more muscle microtrauma.
Do I need to change my workout?
First, it is worth making this clear, in simple terms: you can change a training program while keeping the same exercises (or at least most of them).
How so? By changing the stimuli (metabolic or tension-based) and incorporating advanced techniques such as drop sets, rest-pause, etc.
But back to the topic: In one study, participants performed 5 sets of 6 repetitions of incline dumbbell curls and, after 7 days, one group performed the same exercise while the other performed preacher curls, also for 5 sets of 6 repetitions. The muscle damage markers assessed over the 4 days after the session showed no differences between the groups!
Conclusion
Randomly varying exercises does not seem to “confuse” the muscle for the purpose of hypertrophy. Sticking to and consistently following a good training program whenever possible is important, even for tracking your progress (increasing weights, etc.). In future training programs, changing some exercises is important more for motivational reasons.
When should you change a workout?
Before changing your workout, don’t know the tempo of the exercises? You should, and have that information on hand if you want to fix skinny legs…
Remember that weight training is more than simply pulling or pushing weights at random!
According to several studies, contraction times close to 60 seconds, with repetitions lasting between 4 and 6 seconds—that is, the time in seconds—are ideal for designing hypertrophy workouts. However, we have plenty of ways to vary these stimuli.
Movement tempo in your training split as a variable is more important than simply increasing the “weight,” since indiscriminately increasing the load can affect your range of motion and compromise proper exercise form, and in extreme cases can cause unwanted injuries.
