How to Pick the Right Exercises
Exercise selection is one of the most important variables in a training program.
In this edition of Momentum you’ll learn how to pick the best exercises for a myriad of training goals so you can design an effective workout program.
You’ve likely heard the phrase “there’s more than one way to skin a cat?”
What kind of sick bastard skins 1 cat? Let alone several cats to find out all of the ways to skin it.
You have to figure a few of those skinned cats were trial and error cats…
We’re talking 100s of cats…
Sick bastard…
Anyway, as someone who has logged over 4,000 lifetime hours of training in the gym and trained who knows how many clients (500?) I can tell you there are certainly many, many exercises you can use to reach your goals.
Some choices may be better than others.
Some choices may be more effective than others.
And some choices made too often could lead to injury, something we’d like to avoid.
Before starting I should introduce you to the principle, SAID.
The SAID principle states that we get specific adaptations to imposed demands. We adapt to the type of training we do.
In order to get better at sprinting, you’ve gotta sprint.
But, there is also carry over between exercise choices.
The endurance we gain from running will help our endurance on a bike or while swimming.
The strength we get from squatting will help us do lunges or leg presses.
So while yes, there is specificity there is also generalizability.
The more specific the goal the more specific the training.
Want to run a marathon? You’d better have a marathon training program from an experienced coach like my wife.
So, how should you choose the exercises in your program?
Here’s what I would do.
Choosing the Best Exercises
What are your training goals?
Training goals should always be numero uno when selecting exercises for a program. You want to select movements or modalities that clearly align with your desired outcome.
Let’s say you want to get stronger.
Choosing an overhead squat to get stronger legs is like trying to open a can with a spoon. Can it be done? Maybe... but it’ll take a long time, be super inefficient, and likely cause some bodily harm in the process.
An overhead squat is limited mostly by shoulder mobility and stability, core stability, and balance; not your legs’ ability to produce force.
For leg size and strength a more stable exercise that is limited only by leg force production would be your best bet.
Exercises like back squats, hack squats, and leg presses would work much better here.
They would be the industrial-grade electric can opener that you need.
When choosing an exercise think “what is the limiting factor?” If the limiting factor is the desired outcome then you will likely be making a good choice.
So, talking about general leg strength you can use basically any stable lower body exercise to do it machines or free weights.
In fact, both machines and free weights increased leg strength similarly according to this new study.
If you want to be more specific and compete in a powerlifting meet then you must be specific with your exercise choices and go with barbell back squats, barbell bench presses, and barbell deadlifts.
This paper also showed the same amount of strength gain did not translate to the other modality. So, while machine exercisers gained leg strength it didn’t necessarily translate to free weight exercises, and vice versa.
Let’s say you want to improve your cardio.
I would ask, for what?
To not get out of breath going up and down the stairs? To run a 5k? For general cardiovascular health?
With a more general goal like improving heart health you can bike, walk, run, swim, cross country ski, jump rope, box, etc.
To run a 5k you gotta run.
Again, think of the SAID principle for specific goals and then have some flexibility for general goals.
But what about fitness classes or circuit training?
These can certainly be effective for cardio but often times I find that people are just trying to kill a lot of birds with a lot of stones and missing everything.
A lot of animal murder in this article…
As long as you are able to maintain a heart rate consistent with your cardio goal for a sustained amount of time the fitness class could be just fine.
For a general recommendation, try to get your heart rate between 65%-85% of max heart rate and keep it there for the duration of your cardio workout.
Let’s say you want to build muscle.
The rules here are very similar to strength with a few caveats.
Great muscle building exercises have a few things in common:
They put the muscle through a large range of motion
They emphasize and overload the stretch position of the range of motion
They are limited only by the strength of that muscle, like strength exercises
They don’t overly stress the joints
I talked a lot about muscle building exercises in my Muscle Science Series. Read Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3 at their respective links.
Final thoughts on exercise selection
If you have specific goals, your training program should be specific.
If you have general goals, you can use some flexibility in the types of movements you do.