Variation er nøglen i enhver rutine

Titazeus · March 26, 2006

Efter at have kørt den samme rutine i et par måneder nu er det så på tide at skifte rutine? Selvom jeg stiger i styrke og vokser er det så optimalt at ændre den? Fx bare udførelsen af øvelser? Det vil JEG mene, da der er ingen grund til at vente på, at ens krop rammer plateau.

Jeg ved, at det er et faktum, at ens krop vokser, fordi den prøver at tilpasse sig de forhold den er sat under.

Men hvis man løfter tunge vægte i forhold til ens krop, vil ens krop forsøge at tilpasse sig at løfte de vægte. Det gør den ved at reparere de ødelagte muskler med ekstra fibre. Altså mere og mere vækst. Så ved at køre en ny rutine må den tilpasse sig igen, og det vil frembringe mere vækst. Korrekt?

Det var det :smile:

CA8 · March 26, 2006

Nu skal det siges, at Morten B. taler om min og hans udvikling. Se henholdvis http://www.mortenbo.net/tlog og http://christian-birch.dk/tlog, for at få et overblik over vores udvikling. Selv mener jeg, at det er fuldstændigt åndssvagt at skifte et program, som giver så god styrkefremgang. "Never change a winning team" er nøglen. Programmerne skal skiftes, når man ikke længere gainer.

Bruno J · March 26, 2006

Efter at have kørt den samme rutine i et par måneder nu er det så på tide at skifte rutine? Selvom jeg stiger i styrke og vokser er det så optimalt at ændre den? Fx bare udførelsen af øvelser? Det vil JEG mene, da der er ingen grund til at vente på, at ens krop rammer plateau.
Jeg ved, at det er et faktum, at ens krop vokser, fordi den prøver at tilpasse sig de forhold den er sat under.
Men hvis man løfter tunge vægte i forhold til ens krop, vil ens krop forsøge at tilpasse sig at løfte de vægte. Det gør den ved at reparere de ødelagte muskler med ekstra fibre. Altså mere og mere vækst. Så ved at køre en ny rutine må den tilpasse sig igen, og det vil frembringe mere vækst. Korrekt?
Det var det

Hvis du har mod på lidt godnatlæsning, så er her en artikel om emnet fra en af mine guruer m.h.t. vægttræning, Casey Butt:

<H1 style="MARGIN: 0cm 0cm 0pt; TEXT-ALIGN: center; mso-pagination: none" align=center>The WeighTrainer</H1><H3 style="MARGIN: 0cm 0cm 0pt; TEXT-ALIGN: center; mso-pagination: none" align=center>Variety: How Often Should You Change Your Routine?</H3>There are basically two camps in strength training when it comes to exercise variety. One group says that you should change your routine every three to four weeks, the other says that if your program is working you should stick with it indefinitely. Let's look at both and see if we can make some sense out of it all.

The Case For Changing Your Routine Regularly</H4>This concept became popular in Bodybuilding and Weightlifting circles some years ago. The argument is that the body quickly gets complacent when subjected to the same stress repeatedly and eventually no supercompensation will be stimulated. The ex-Soviets called this the process of 'accomodation'. Physiologically, it is argued that actin and myosin filaments align favorably and on exaggerated angles to each other in specific response to work at specific angles. When this occurs to a substantial degree the rate of strength gains will decrease. In order to avoid this situation one should change their workout routine frequently. This change can be a change in rep range, exercise form, the number of sets performed, rep cadence, exercise order or the exercises themselves, depending on who you're talking to. But the general idea is to keep the body 'receptive' by constantly mixing things up.

Much of this thinking was substantiated by the Bulgarian and Soviet Weightlifting Teams' observations that strength and power seems to peak in three week minicycles - the coaches noticed that the lifters seemed to be stronger every third week or so. When this information was presented in the west (primarily by Bulgarian Team head coach Ivan Abadjiev) it was explained with the above argument. Combine this with the, then in vogue, concepts of Soviet periodization (changing the focus of the training routine every few weeks, months or even yearly) and you have an ideal environment for the embracing of the concept of frequent routine changes.

Let's look at the most common ways of introducing variety into exercise routines and examine their effects.

Changing The Rep Range Or Cadence</H4>It was established in the series The Neuromuscular System on the 'Physiology Related Articles' page that different muscle fibers are optimized for performing different tasks. Of the two types of muscle fibers comprising human skeletal muscle (types I and II) the type II fibers generate the most force and have the highest potential for growth. They also require heavier weights in order to activate them. And because these fibers are designed for powerful contractions, they are optimized to use the phosphagen and anaerobic glycolysis systems of energy production. Type I fibers, on the other hand, have a lower potential for growth and predominantly use the oxidative phosphorylation system of energy production.

This tells us pretty clearly that if it's strength and size that we're after then we should target the type II fibers - this requires lifting at least moderately heavy weight. The type II fibers, as you already know, are further broken into subcategories, the most prominant of which are the type IIAs and the type IIBs. Generally speaking, the type IIBs require heavier weights to recruit them than the type IIAs - remember that in order for the next higher threshold fibers to be recruited all of the lower threshold fibers must already have been. In addition, the type IIA and type IIB fibers are also recruited when the need arises for 'fast' movements - the higher the speed required the more likely that not only the type IIAs will be recruited but also the type IIBs. So, overall, a general rep, weight and speed of lifting scheme can be identified indicating the best rep numbers, weights and rep cadences to train each of these fiber types. Such a rep scheme would roughly be:

Fiber Type Rep range % of 1RM required Rep cadenc (neg-pause-pos)

Type I 15 + - 70 % 2 – 0 – 1

Type IIA 6 – 12 75 – 85 % 4 – 0 – 3

Type IIB 1 – 3 90 % + 3 – 1 – 1

Of course, these numbers are only rough guidelines. It is not reasonable, after all, to assume that the negative, positive and concentric phases of the Squat would be of the same duration as the Bench Press - the squatting motion takes place over a much greater range of motion than the Bench Press. But the general concepts hold.

In relation to exercise variety, the above clearly shows that changing rep schemes may, in fact, recruit different muscle fibers in different patterns. For both Bodybuilders and strength and power athletes this has some significance. Clearly, strength and power athletes will benefit most from training with heavier weights in order to maximally train the IIB fibers. Let's take a closer look at what happens when training in different rep ranges...

It has been established that, for small muscles, all available muscle fibers will be recruited at loads above 50% of 1 rep max; for larger muscle groups it may take loads of 80% of 1 rep max, or more, before all available fibers are recruited. How does this sit with the above suggested rep/fiber schemes? Well, with submaximal loads (i.e. less than 1 rep max), the highest threshold fibers (the IIBs) may, in fact, be recruited but the nervous system will not twitch them at their maximum frequency and they, therefore, will not develop their maximum tensions.

So, working the IIBs with non-explosive reps in the 3-5 range will not force the IIBs to twitch at maximum frequency and synchronization, so it will not produce maximum strength gains due to nervous system optimization. It may cause the IIBs to hypertrophy, which would result in increased strength - especially if a phase of heavier training followed (thereby, optimizing the nervous system), allowing the newly hypertrophied fibers to exert their full force potential. It was once thought that prolonged training in the 3-5 rep range, however, may eventually cause the endurance aspects of the IIBs to become more prominent until the IIBs lose some of their abilities to generate their previous maximum tensions and, therefore, become more IIA-like. Recent research has indicated that this is not the case. The IIBs may gain endurance, but they do not lose their abilities to produce maximum force.

Higher-rep training for the IIAs would result in them hypertrophying and becoming stronger, but the strength gain would be more prominent in the higher rep ranges because the nervous system would not be optimized for low-rep training. During these sets, as the IIAs fatigue, the IIBs would gradually be recruited, but they would not twitch at maximum frequency and, therefore, develop endurance adaptations more rapidly. This tells us that this type of training is ideal for a Bodybuilder because, in addition to making the IIAs grow (see the Muscle Growth Part II: Why, And How, Does A Muscle Grow And Get Stronger? article), it also allows the IIBs to quickly take on charateristics that will allow for their maximum hypertrophy.

Changing Exercise Volume</H4>If you've read the article Volume: Set Volume And Frequency you'll realize that increasing or decreasing exercise volume solely for the sake of change is a bit of a foolish idea. Taking a segment from that article:

Clearly, the ideal program for building muscular size and strength would include prescribing the training volume, frequency, and intensity level that stimulates the maximum muscular supercompensation, while also permitting the nervous system to recover, and intramuscular glycogen and enzyme levels to be replenished, as soon after (or before) muscular hypertrophy has ceased as possible. This would allow for the maximum amount of strength/growth producing workouts to be performed within a given time span.

If you change your rep range or cadence and find that this modification dictates that you increase or decrease your training volume and/or frequency then this would be a sound path to follow. Changing the exercise volume of a program that has been optimized for maximum results would not produce any additional gains unless the program was not optimal in the first place.

The only time changing exercise volume would be advised is when overtraining or undertraining occurs or if it is part of a periodized program designed with proper loading and recovery in mind. It is not a random hit-or-miss process.

Changing Exercises Or Exercise Form</H4>This is a relatively simple one. Changing exercises will obviously stress the muscular and nervous systems differently. If you change your form you will be stressing the muscles, tendons, ligaments and nervous system in different ways also. By changing your form you are essentially no longer performing the same exercise; why would you not expect the recruitment patterns to change? Any alteration in your form, however, must be 'eased' into, allowing the body to adapt gradually to the new stresses. If you don't do it this way you're asking for injury. Even then care must be taken that the new form isn't detrimental to your body.

The important point here, though, is that the new exercise, or exercise form, must be as efficient as the one it's replacing at producing the effect you desire. It wouldn't be a very wise move to replace Squats with Leg Extensions if developing strength, size and power is your goal.

Changing Exercise Order</H4>This involves switching around the order in which you perform the exercises. The effect obtained would be that the muscular and nervous systems would be in different states of fatigue when you perform the rearranged sequence of exercises as compared to when you performed them before. An adaptation of this is the basis for pre-exhaustion. If you do Leg Extensions before Squats you won't be able to Squat as much because your quads will already be tired.

From a variety perspective this may indeed provide new stress to the muscles worked because a different neuromuscular recruitment pattern may be elicited by exercising the muscle in a fatigued state. But again the question has to arise that is the new sequence of exercises as beneficial as the old one. Sometimes this may not be true; sometimes it may be. Performing Dips before Incline Presses may be just as beneficial as the other way around, but performing Deadlifts before Squats would not be a good idea. For more on proper exercise sequence see the article entitled Making A Strength/Size Routine Part II: Exercise Sequence.

Clearly the above methods can produce differing stresses to muscles, tendons, ligaments and the nervous system. So, if the original proposal that the body quickly gets complacent when subjected to the same stress repeatedly and that eventually no supercompensation will be stimulated is true, then the above methods of producing exercise variety may indeed have merit. Let's look at the case against frequently changing your routine.

The Case Against Changing Your Routine Regularly</H4>From a bodybuilding perspective, the case against frequent routine changes can be summed up succinctly by the typical argument that once you find the exercises, volume, rep ranges and cadences that work for you, you should not change them. People on this side of the fence will argue that you will never get good gains out of a routine if you don't stick to it long enough to realize them. Sounds reasonable.

Strength and power athletes (and their coaches) competing in sports where specific lifts are contested will contend that they must continuously perform the competition lifts or they will lose the ability to perform them optimally. This comes from the fact that the body 'fine tunes' itself for those lifts by optimizing intra- and intermuscular coordination, as well as specific muscle hypertrophy, when constant practice is performed. This is pretty much the 'use it or lose it' principle of weight training. It is analogous to the 'practice makes perfect' wisdom of skill training - if an activity is not continued detraining will occur. This argument, in fact, is one of the main rebuttals against the concept of exercise-based periodization: If an athlete wishes to perform a certain task then he should practice that task; while he is devoting his attention to other activities he will lose his ability to perform the required events optimally.

But what about the contention that the body quickly gets complacent when subjected to the same stress repeatedly and that eventually no supercompensation will be stimulated? Let's look a little closer at the physiological basis for this argument.

The Physiological Responses To Changes In Exercise Routines</H4>When the body is first presented with a new muscular stress a few key things happen. Immediately following the exercise the nervous system will begin 'optimizing' itself for the new task required of it. It will alter it's intra- and intermuscular recruitment patterns so that it can produce more force, more efficiently. A prime example of this would be how shakey your balance was the first time you did Squats. Your first set was probably very bad, your next set a bit better and if you did any more sets your balance likely improved (up to a certain point) on each one. When you returned to the gym for your next workout you probably found your balance had vastly improved over your first session. You were also likely much stronger in the lift than you were in the first workout. This is essentially the same thing that occurs when you learn any new sports activity. After a few sessions the neuromuscular system will have improved its efficiency pretty much as far as it's going to, without extended practice, and your strength gains will slow down dramatically (this neuromuscular optimization will take much longer with more complex exercises such as the Olympic Lifts).

I know I've said that I don't want to get into the fashion of quoting studies to back everything I say but, since this subject is one of such hot debate, consider the following:

NEURAL TRAINING IN STRENGTH Bosco, C., Rusko, H., & Hirvonen, J. (1984). The effect of extra-load conditioning on muscle performance in athletes. Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise, 18, 415-419.

Two groups of seven subjects, one a control and the other an experimental group whose members wore a weighted vest (7-8% body weight) all day including training except when skill acquisition activities occurred. All subjects were sprinters who no longer were improving.

After three weeks, control subjects showed not changes in either physical or mechanical properties. The experimental group's force-velocity curve shifted to the right, meaning that they were able to exert more force at original speeds. Performance changes occurred in 15 sec jumping and the drop jump test.

This investigation showed biological adaptation to strength training occurs in both neurogenic and myogenic muscle components. Neural changes appear first and improve technique, increase the firing rate of motor units, recruit additional motor units, and improve the synchronization of motor units. Morphological [muscle growth] adaptations occur later and only after neural adaptations are exhausted.

Implication: Initial strength training is purely a motor skill development activity where the central nervous system harnesses existing resources to perform the strength activities more efficiently and to exploit the structures of muscle more effectively. Discrete skill learning of this nature will not transfer/generalize to other activities in highly skilled performers.

Of course, because of the more intense muscular stresses involved, we might expect to see more of an initial growth response with weight training, but when you change around your routine essentially the same thing happens - with nervous system adaptation being the main producer of initial strength increases. After a few weeks the strength gains slow down considerably. What is happening in response to exercise from that point on? Since neuromuscular adaptation is no longer the main producer of strength gains, from this point on the vast majority of strength gained has to be in the form of muscular supercompensation. This is clear support for the you'll - never - get - good - gains - out - of - a - routine - if - you - don't - stick - to - it - long - enough - to - realize - them crowd.

So what about the contention that the rate of strength gains will decrease as actin and myosin filaments optimally align themselves in response to exercise stress? It is undeniably true that this phenomenom occurs - the optimization takes place so that more force may be developed during the movement (duh!). So, it is also logical to assume that this 'new' alignment would more successfully resist damage during high tension contactions - thus affecting the growth stimulus. My contention would be that the ability of the muscle to now generate more tension would, at least partially, offset that effect - partially, but perhaps not totally. It is conceivable that, if the muscle's ability to produce intracellular ATP has not increased proportionately, the muscle may now be sufficiently 'damage resistant' so that ATP depletion may bring a cease to contraction before a sufficient training stimulus has been incurred. If the mitochondrial density is allowed to fall too low a condition of irrational hypertrophy may develop. The solution to this situation would be a period of higher volume/rep training aimed specifically at sarcoplasmic hypertophy. In any case, ex-Soviet research has indicated that adaptations of these sorts take 6-8 weeks in the most elite of athletes - the period would be longer for athletes of lesser ability.

The true thorn in the side of the case against regularly changing one's exercise routine has been the fact that after the initial dramatic optimization of the neuromuscular system gains in strength are not dramatic enough to enable the trainee to lift 5 lbs. more each session (the minimum amount of weight you can add in most gyms) or to get an additional rep on each set. Because the lifter can't seem to increase his weight or reps over several workouts a plateau is assumed and the lifter concludes that he has gotten 'stale' on his routine. The logical solution, given these conclusions, is to change the routine.

The Problem</H4>The problem with the whole process is not usually 'staleness' or a plateau. The problem is the inadequate measuring devices of progress - a minimum of 5 lb. weight jumps and rep increases. Using very small weight increments (no more than than 2.5 lbs. on 'heavy' exercises and 1 lb. or less on 'lighter' ones) strength progress from session to session can be maintained for much longer periods of time than three weeks. The conclusion that because your strength isn't progressing as quickly as it was is not sound reason to conclude that the routine is not as effective as it used to be. Look to your expectations of sustainable strength gains first and consider the fact that early dramatic gains are due largely to nervous system optimization. If you haven't read the article entitled Progress: How To Measure It And What to Expect (for the advanced lifter) then I strongly suggest that you have a look at it.

So how do the Bulgarians themselves deal with these three-week 'bio-rhythms'? They don't change their routines to any great extent, they simply perform less volume and train with slightly less intensity every four weeks. They, therefore, perform three intense weeks (usually progressing in volume slightly) and then perform one volume-reduced 'unloading' week.

How Frequent Change Can Be Utilized</H4>It was stated above that during the first few sessions of performing an exercise the neuromuscular system optimizes itself greatly for the task. What this means is that after a few workouts the body has become very efficient at generating maximum force in the movement, but it also means that during the first few workouts the body isn't really that 'good' at doing them. This fact has been used by some trainers (most notably Louie Simmons of the Westside Barbell Club) to avoid 'unloading' weeks altogether by changing exercises every 2-3 weeks. If the nervous system isn't capable of 'firing' the muscles maximally during the first few workouts then constant change would keep the body from entering an overtrained state because the nervous system would never get a chance to operate the musculature on all 8 cylinders, so to speak. This would also have the benefit of allowing the trainee to work extremely heavy all the time, thus subjecting the tendons and ligaments to heavy loading regularly. In addition, all the potential strength-building benefits of performing many different exercises can be realized (though these exercises must be carefully chosen for optimum effectiveness).

This style of training lends itself most effectively to the development of absolute strength because the frequent cycling of exercises allows lifters to choose exercises that specifically target weak ranges in their lifts and to work the supporting structure (tendons, ligaments, etc.) with constantly heavy weights. In order to maintain neuromuscular efficiency in the contested events the lifter must perform regular training sessions on those lifts, but Westside Barbell-style trainees contend that these sessions can be performed with very submaximal weights and still allow the trainee to maintain the desired intra- and intermuscular coordination. In the case of Powerlifting programs, the Bench Press and Squat (off a box) would be performed weekly, but very lightly. Incidently, they would also be performed very explosively to 'teach' the nervous system to voluntarily recruit the high threshold fibers more efficiently and to alter the response threshold of the Golgi Tendon Organs.

If you go back to the section on 'Changing The Rep Range Or Cadence' you'll see another way that frequent change can be used by strength and power athletes in order to target different goals. A very productive approach is to perform a period of IIB fiber hypertophy training (3-5 reps), followed by a period of lower-rep training (1-3) aimed at increasing limit strength through nervous system optimization. This allows the trainee to increase the cross-sectional area of the IIB fibers (thus making them stronger) while avoiding the rapid plateauing that occurs with continued very low-rep training (1-3). It also allows the trainee to maintain neuromuscular efficiency for the contested events because low-rep training is never abandoned for very long. Extended further, this approach involves a period of training aimed at sarcoplasmic hypertrophy of the IIBs (8-12 rep sets), a period aimed at sarcomere hypertropy of the IIBs (3-5 rep sets), and then a period of training aimed at increasing neuromuscular efficiency (1-3 reps).

From a Bodybuilding perspective, the frequent changing of exercises approach may have much less practical application. The curious Bodybuilder could, however, experiment with rotating major exercises every 2-4 weeks, or so, and see what happens. I believe that, in the vast majority of cases, the drug-free Bodybuilder will find that he's better off sticking with the most effective compound exercises and incrementally increasing the weight each workout until a plateau is reached. At that point, the exercises may be switched for other, equally effective, compound exercises.

Periodically focusing on different rep ranges may be of more benefit to the Bodybuilder. Intense, low volume, lower-rep training (3 rep sets and less) may produce rapid sarcomere hypertrophy but may, over time, potentially lead to a state of irrational adaptation. At the onset of this condition, a change to higher rep sets (and possibly a higher set volume and/or training frequency) may produce the necessary sarcoplasmic hypertrophy to allow for continued size gains.

Clear As Mud</H4>I've probably provided you with no clear-cut answer as to whether it's better for you to constantly change your routine or whether you're better off sticking to essentially the same one (with constant volume and intensity modifications based on strength gains, of course). But I hope I have helped clear up some of the confusion that exists pertaining to supposed strength plateaus. If you're a strength athlete, I suggest that you try both approaches and decide which method you feel works best for you. It should only take a few weeks for you to decide whether the approach is working or not - if in doubt, test your maximum after, say, a month. If you have any questions, feel free to post them on the Strength And Size Forum.

Titazeus · March 26, 2006

Kunne du ikke bare komme med konklusionen? :bigsmile:

MaxPower · March 26, 2006

bruno -> det er vist ikke gået så godt med formateringen. Har du et link i stedet, eller vedhæft evt dokumentet, hvis du har det liggende på disk.

CA8 · March 26, 2006

bruno -> det er vist ikke gået så godt med formateringen. Har du et link i stedet, eller vedhæft evt dokumentet, hvis du har det liggende på disk.

Men hvad mener du om den konkrete situation? Prøv at se på vores udvikling. Der er ingen grund til, at skifte program, vel? :wink:

Titazeus · March 27, 2006

Jeg har læst artiklen, men kunne godt tænke mig at høre jer andre, så kom frisk.

Bruno J · March 27, 2006

bruno -> det er vist ikke gået så godt med formateringen. Har du et link i stedet, eller vedhæft evt dokumentet, hvis du har det liggende på disk.

Ja, der gik da vist helt ged i det med HTML-koder over det hele. Jeg prøver lige at vedhæftet dokumentet. Weightrainer findes desværre ikke mere, så linket i dokumentet virker ikke.

The_WeighTrainer__Variety.doc

Bruno J · March 27, 2006

Og når nu jeg alligevel er i gang med at uploade artikler fra mit favoritsite gennem tiderne, Weightrainer, så er her et par stykker mere:

The_WeighTrainer__Coefficients_and_Formulas.doc

The_WeighTrainer__Progress.doc

The_WeighTrainer__Training_to_failure.doc

The_WeighTrainer__USSR_three_week_routine.doc

The_WeighTrainer__Volume_and_Frequency.doc

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