If you do something long enough you will most likely end up with some things that you change your mind about. New information and experiences can lead to a new perspective, which forces a change in how I think about things.

One of the things that I have been forced to change my mind about is the value of exercise variety – in essence, how often should you change exercises in your strength training program?

I came up thinking that exercise variety was necessary to create “muscle confusion”. By not letting the muscles get used to any given exercise you kept them in a perpetual state of adaptation. Using the same exercises for too long would give the body a chance to adapt, which would bring your results grinding to a halt.

The question was how often you needed to change exercises, and answers varied from every workout to the more standard every 4 weeks. I fell into the “every 4 weeks” crowd and trained myself and a lot of clients using that timeframe.

Yes, it worked and yes, there are some very smart ways to make use of a 4 week training cycle. However, I had an experience that forced me to rethink if there was more to the story.

What happened was that I tried what was then a new workout program that was taking the online strength training community by storm – Jim Wendler’s 5-3-1 Program. It is still a popular training program and for good reason…it works really well at getting you stronger.

But here is the kicker…it used the same basic routine for months on end. Squat, Bench, Deadlift and Military Press every week.

Despite the same exercises being used each week, I was getting stronger and seeing results. It really forced me to rethink what I thought I knew about using the same exercises for “too long”.

As I started to look for answers to this question I started to find examples of the same thing in strength training sports. And this made sense, seeing as how the 5-3-1 Program is basically a stripped down Powerlifting training cycle. 

In sports like Powerlifting and Olympic Weight Lifting they stick with the same core exercises for a long time. Part of that is because it is literally their sport but they also achieve extremely high levels of strength doing something that we’re told is “wrong”.

But you also see this phenomenon in a lot of other sports as well. At the highest levels of sports like track & field and wrestling you see the same thing where athletes will use the same basic strength training exercises for long periods of time, relying on changing the weight, reps and/ or rest periods to continue to see results.

In fact, after studying the problem more I realized that there are several advantages to focusing on the same exercises for an extended period of time. 

The first is that you get really good at that exercise, which decreases the risk of injury while training.

It also lets you develop significant strength gains with less risk of injury because of the longer runway you are giving yourself to achieve similar gains in a shorter period of time.

What’s more, all of this falls into the Comfort Zone Expansion concept I’ve been talking about lately as a great option for the 40+ year old rider. 

By using the same exercise and developing a level of mastery with the movements you allow your body to develop a level of comfort with those movements, allowing you to expand that comfort zone that isn’t there unless you spend several weeks with the same exercise.

By giving yourself a longer runway to results you allow yourself to start out and stay in the literal Comfort Zone for longer, seeing significant results by accumulating a lot of “easy” workouts. 

So while there is a place for faster changes, I currently recommend that the 40+ year old rider spend at least 6-8 weeks with the same routine and to look at ways that you can extend that out to 12-16 weeks.

The truth is that there is nothing wrong with sticking with the same exercises for as long as you are seeing improvements in your performance. This could be months using the same exercises and progression plan. 

At the end of the day, muscle confusion is not a scientific training principle and falls into the realm of “bro science”. You can and should squeeze everything you can out of a training routine before moving on, especially if you are an older rider.

BTW, the Kettlebell AXE workouts I’ve posted about are great ways to use this concept. If you haven’t tried them out then it would be a good way to do so since you can use them in conjunction with a more traditional workout plan to see how you feel.

I’ll also be releasing a new workout program soon that I think will be a good option for the 40+ year old rider who wants a way that makes use of these concepts. 

Let me know if you have any questions about this training strategy and, as always, feel free to share this newsletter with a fellow rider who could benefit from the info.

Until next time…

Ride Strong,

James Wilson