What is muscle confusion –
Muscle confusion is the regular practice of changing exercises in your training program. It includes using different types of activity and exercises. Muscle confusion also includes using resistance training programs by using different sets and rep programs, rest periods and various exercises. Muscle confusion will help you get lean, increase stability and built strength that you can use in every day life.
Muscle confusion will keep the body in a state of shock. A workout program incorporating muscle confusion will prevent specific muscle adaptations and efficiencies from developing. This means that your workouts will be more effective in building strength and overall health.
Why introduce muscle confusion into your workouts –
People who workout tend to stick to the same exercises either do that because it feels good, or because they are good at a specific exercise. What you are doing in your exercise program will work for a while and then you may need to change it. As you consistently do an exercise, you body/muscle will adapt and become more efficient at it. Therefore, you lose the effects of working out for general overall muscle health.
However, whether or not you need to engage in muscle confusion depends upon your goals. If you’re competing in a sport, you want to be as efficient as possible with the movements required. In this case, you don’t need to have pointless stress with random workouts since specific efficiencies and adaptations or economy of movement is the point. But if you’re after general strength and health muscle confusion is for you.
Have you hit a plateau in your workout program? Muscle confusion will help you bust through the plateau.
Types of exercises involving muscle confusion –
Incorporating muscle confusion into your workout program means incorporating variety into your exercise routine. Here are a few ideas to consider:
- Try a rest-pause routine – do a few reps of an exercise, rest for a few second, then crank out more reps of the same type of exercise
- Incorporate continuous tension – when doing an exercise, don’t lockout your joints. You want to keep constant tension on the muscles. For example, when doing squats, at the top of the squat, don’t take the tension off you muscles by fully extending your knees at the top of the squat. Squatting with continuous tension requires no pause at the top of the squat.
- Incorporate partial repetitions – pick an exercise and do partial repetitions. For example, with a squat go down, then go a third of the way up for 7 repetitions, then go all the way up, but then come down 2/3’s of the way for 7 repetitions, followed by 7 sets of a full range of motions. This exercise is the old standby of “21’s.” Partial repetitions will help increase strength especially on the weakest part of the exercise.
- Try supersets – perform a variety exercises focusing on a specific muscle, without a break between the exercises.
- Try using dumbbells or kettlebells for that exercise, if you always use a straight bar.
- Incorporate bands into your exercises.
If you have questions on this blog, please email Pat at pat@patsgym.com.
