Other/Mixed Why not vary exercises day to day?

[offwidth]

It is a general goal rather than specific.

CrossFit Athletes have a general idea of what the competition movements will be but not a specific idea.

With Sports like Olympic Lifting, Powerlifting, etc. you know "Specifically" what is required.

you do in CF comps and OCR as well. You specifically want a good, score, or time, or just to beat the guy next to you… to me anyway… that’s a pretty darn specific goal.
How you do that however is where it gets a bit muddy, because of the uncertainty of what the competition will bring. Hence the need for the competitors usually needing that Jack of all trades approach.

 

[Kenny Croxdale]

In my understanding, it is better to change exercises every 8-12 weeks of your training cycle.

Training Age

This is defined as the length of time and individual has been training; not one's chronological age.

Research indicates the length of a Training Cycle is to a large extent dependent on how long an individual has been training.

1) Novice Lifters
Lower Training Age

These individual are able to employ the same Training Program for a longer period before needing to change it.

Thus, Novice Lifter can continue to make progress with a program that 8 - 12 weeks.

2) Advanced Lifter
Higher Training Age

Advanced Lifter need to change their Training Program around every 3 - 4 weeks.

Advanced Lifter adapt to training much faster. Once adaptation occurs, progress stop.

Once progress stalls, stops or goes backward, the Training Program needs to be changed.

 

[Nate]

you do in CF comps and OCR as well. You specifically want a good, score, or time, or just to beat the guy next to you… to me anyway… that’s a pretty darn specific goal.
How you do that however is where it gets a bit muddy, because of the uncertainty of what the competition will bring. Hence the need for the competitors usually needing that Jack of all trades approach.

Jack of all trades but frequently pretty high performance. Local comps with snatching or jerking over 300 isnt bad.

 

[Luis T. Gonzalez]

Training Age

This is defined as the length of time and individual has been training; not one's chronological age.

Research indicates the length of a Training Cycle is to a large extent dependent on how long an individual has been training.

1) Novice Lifters
Lower Training Age

These individual are able to employ the same Training Program for a longer period before needing to change it.

Thus, Novice Lifter can continue to make progress with a program that 8 - 12 weeks.

2) Advanced Lifter
Higher Training Age

Advanced Lifter need to change their Training Program around every 3 - 4 weeks.

Advanced Lifter adapt to training much faster. Once adaptation occurs, progress stop.

Once progress stalls, stops or goes backward, the Training Program needs to be changed.

Absolutely, my high school did the bigger faster stronger program when I was there all through high school and everyone kept making wonderful gains just doing squat, box squat, dead lift, hex dl, bp, and power cleans. The only thing that changed was rep schemes.

 

[Steve Freides]

Folks, I don't think we need to debate the merits of CrossFit. As mentioned earlier this thread, CrossFit gyms are far from monolithic, and there are some run by StrongFirst Certified Instructors, people in whom I have a high level of trust and confidence that they are helping their students.

We don't say you're wrong, just that we know what we're doing works. I think the original question has been answered many times over here - CrossFit's approach is not StrongFirst's approach, and everyone is free to choose whatever works for them.

-S-

 

[ali]

A compromise here is to have lots of varied lower intensity movements and activities as part recovery, part fun, part staying mobile to gain overtime or at least not lose movement autonomy.
And then get good at and stronger in a couple of things for a cycle. And then switch to focus on other things or similar.
Which all together ends up looking like ROP as a weekly template. And ROP is and will always be the centre of the programming universe, a standard to set any ad libbed solo against.

 

[Luis T. Gonzalez]

Ride the Wave: How to Program for Progress | StrongFirst

Training should be consistent, but at some point you'll need to mix things up. Find out how and when to add variety to your training.

www.strongfirst.com

Here is a very well written article by Brett Jones in “waviness.” I like how he says Pavel tells people simply, “repeat until strong.” And if you aren’t sure that you are strong then you arent there yet.

 

[JR47]

It depends.

If your aim is simply to experience the workout, then: mix and match at will, you will have the experience.

But if your goal is to actually get better / promote adaptions then you need to practice a necessarily limited amount of things and invest time.

 

[Alan Mackey]

Beginner question... If it's beneficial to vary volume and intensity day to day/week to week, then why not completely vary exercises? (Like Crossfit WODs, for instance)

i.e.
M - Moving Target Kettlebell Complex (Clean - Press - Squat)
W - Naked Warrior (one arm pushup - pistol)
F - Quick and Dead (Swings - Pushups)
Or any day to day mix of very different exercises.

I've been geeking out on all these different programs lately and the kid in my wants to try them all. So I'm wondering what's the logic behind doing the same exercises weeks at a time as opposed to putting a huge variety into one week.

Once again, I’m going to play the contrarian’s role here.

Switching movements everyday might hinder quite significantly your progress towards specific goals (just imagine practicing piano on Mondays, guitar on Tuesdays, basoon on Wednesdays…), but… it would be most adequate if you are trying to train for health and longevity.

Keeping it varied, playful and interesting might be the recipe for success when you have no goals in mind.

Imagine doing a whole session of loaded carries, varying the load, type of carry, rest periods and implement randomly. Followed the next day by another whole session of KB C&P without counting reps, doing uninterrupted sets between three seconds and three minutes, resting between zero seconds and ten minutes. And the following day another session of OS resets keeping it random. And then one session of practicing tightrope and pull ups.

You couldn’t possibly make much progress at anything, but… I’m sure you would be feeling like a kid in a playground again. And you wouldn’t skip a single play-workout. And you would be in excellent shape and more than ready for whatever life throws at you (unless you are a strength sports competitor, life won’t be throwing at you a 500 lbs. squat to be done).

I’m talking about this and it’s amazing.

 

[Training for Life]

Good discussion on this thread. I’d like to add that it’s easy to mix up two completely different things:

1. varying a mean or modality used to train something while sticking to the underlying principles

vs.

2. varying something entirely, including changing or not paying attention to the underlying principles

A good example of the first option would be to train a thing like pressing strength while varying the exercise (oapu / hspu / kb press / bench press / military press / sandbag press) and the parameters (eg. reps, sets, rest, sessions per week), while sticking to the underlying principles (eg. SF fundamentals like training fresh, frequently, never to failure).

Option 2 would be closer to doing things that are seemingly random from the point of view of improving a specific thing (like strength), eg. push-ups on day one, swimming on day two, triceps hypertrophy on day three, then a do-your-best-to-hold-in-your-lunch metcon on day four, HIIT sprints and burpees on day five, downing six beers on day six and so forth.

That said, we must also remember that it’s about perspective. If the goal is to improve something and we are looking at it from another perspective, like looking at a program that trains your energy systems with our strength-goggles on, it looks off. Not saying there isn’t a million and one actually silly and random ”programs” out there though…

 

[pet']

Hello,

On a general standpoint, it may be interesting to first assess our movement quality on the basic patterns (eg squat pattern...). Then, assess the technique of the basic lifts.

Then it may be good to recreate the move one is supposed to do for the event (movement specificity). This approach is well described in the book 'Building the elite'.

A good move baseline remains paramount to avoid building wrong patterns which can lead to discomfort, then pain, then injury.

On the top of it, CF or whatever, it is good to train all the energy systems even if proper aerobic capacity remains the base to build upon.

Kind regards,

Pet'

 

[John K]

Once again, I’m going to play the contrarian’s role here.

Switching movements everyday might hinder quite significantly your progress towards specific goals (just imagine practicing piano on Mondays, guitar on Tuesdays, basoon on Wednesdays…), but… it would be most adequate if you are trying to train for health and longevity.

Keeping it varied, playful and interesting might be the recipe for success when you have no goals in mind.

Imagine doing a whole session of loaded carries, varying the load, type of carry, rest periods and implement randomly. Followed the next day by another whole session of KB C&P without counting reps, doing uninterrupted sets between three seconds and three minutes, resting between zero seconds and ten minutes. And the following day another session of OS resets keeping it random. And then one session of practicing tightrope and pull ups.

You couldn’t possibly make much progress at anything, but… I’m sure you would be feeling like a kid in a playground again. And you wouldn’t skip a single play-workout. And you would be in excellent shape and more than ready for whatever life throws at you (unless you are a strength sports competitor, life won’t be throwing at you a 500 lbs. squat to be done).

I’m talking about this and it’s amazing.

I don't disagree with you at all. It almost sound to me like a "one lift a day" type program - each day being different, focusing on enjoying the movements. That sounds great.


@Rdodo - I think you are talking about two different things - you first want to know if you can do spontaneous acts of random exercise (you can!) and second you are excited about certain programs and want to cut and paste them together.

First: You can go in and do something different every day and have fun, and maybe you progress and maybe you don't, but you are moving and enjoying and that's awesome!

Second: I don't think it is a good idea to cut and paste programs - a day from this program, a day from that, a day from this one over here. Often programs are designed in a way that makes chopping them up inadvisable, especially if there's any kind of progression built in to them or the volume was chosen to wave in a certain way. I think it would work better if you did redesigned everything from the ground up. We'll call it the Rdodo Week:

• Monday - instead of trying to fit the moving target complex in here, do Dan John's armor building complex (2 cleans 1 press 3 front squats) and wave the time. Week 1 - 20 minutes, Week 2 - 25 minutes, Week 3 - 30 minutes.
• Wednesday - pushup and pistol practice.
• Friday - Do an "AGT" session. If you are only doing this once a week, I would cut out the volume dice rolls - with how little you're training, there's no reason to have a day where you only do one series. Rolls for 5s or 10s, and then autoregulate the volume and simply call it quits when the power starts to decrease.
• T-R-Sat-Sun : do what you like, have fun, don't go hard. Be outside. Move.
• M-W-F - train with a purpose, train harder. Aim to improve each week.

If you are geeking out over a program (or programs), understand that you really miss the boat if you just start cutting them up. If you are excited about a program - do it. You can't have it all. You can design something that utilizes things you're learning about, but that is very different, and your results are not likely to be similar to what you're reading about. Ask yourself what you want, what excites you about those programs, and then you can go from there. Doing things randomly isn't wrong, going in and playing every day isn't wrong, but to me that's different than Frankensteining something together.

 

[Steve Freides]

@Alan Mackey, interesting fellow in that video. I lean a little in that direction. My daily walks through our town find me trying to balance on old, narrow sections of curb, sprinting up stairs, and I've been known to work the light switches in our house with my feet. Play is good. So is practice, and so is training.

-S-

 

[Philippe Geoffrion]

This is always a dilemma-variety vs specificity. Really, I’ve thrived on both and now use a combination of both. It all depends on your goals. People forget you can have both.

For example, I exclusively train bench and deadlifts right now, however what type depends on that day…

You can bench with pauses in a variety of spots, longer pauses, grip width changes, ROM, etc ie surface features. Still benches but different types. When you do this, with a variance unload, volume, you can improve the skill daily by magnifying sections of the lift.

 

[PaulGy]

A bit of variety is okay but if you constantly change the moves you use your body doesn't adapt to the training stimuli as much as it would if fewer exercises are performed. As a result, your strength in the moves you use is a lot less than it would be if you just focused on one or two of them with intelligent programming.

I think the ethos here is to do fewer things better for more strength overall.

As an example, say your upper body press depends on how you feel and you use benches, press-ups, military presses, lateral raises (a press *of sorts*), one arm press ups, you get a bit stronger at each. You focus on the military press, you get (eventually) a very strong military press which will serve as a base for developing your strength in other pressing movements should yuou deem it desirable. You give yourself a bigger tank of strength to work from.

Of course, many people also just stick with one upper-body press for years, happy with the strength, athletic and aesthetic results. I was in the best shape of my life when I trained for the Rite Of Passage from Enter The Kettlebell, with just 3 different moves - MPs, swings with snatches once a week.

 

[Ronzi]

Yes, I did the entire KBWOD program. I was a KB novice when I started. The only thing I would consider tweaking would be getting a little form checking from an SFG instructor.

My diet was not as good as it could have been. I didn’t always eat enough for the amount of training I was doing. My job makes it hard to dial in a diet. But, I’m not into physique training.

I think KBWOD should be the entry level point for anyone new to kettlebells. You get a chance to sample everything which allows you decide what you like best.

 

[DocMike]

I change out main lifts every 3 weeks, corresponds to 2 cycles for me. I change out assistance work when I can't do more for 2 times in a row. Principle of accommodation says that if you do the same thing too long you get adapted to it and it loses its strength stimulating effect.

 

[Nate]

Yes, I did the entire KBWOD program. I was a KB novice when I started. The only thing I would consider tweaking would be getting a little form checking from an SFG instructor.

My diet was not as good as it could have been. I didn’t always eat enough for the amount of training I was doing. My job makes it hard to dial in a diet. But, I’m not into physique training.

I think KBWOD should be the entry level point for anyone new to kettlebells. You get a chance to sample everything which allows you decide what you like best.

This looks really smart the way he starts simple, varied things, then progresses both in volume, exercises and even into complexes. There are a few weeks there that look like they could be killers. But it is Neupert, so I expect he'll push the envelope.....

 

[Antti]

I change out main lifts every 3 weeks, corresponds to 2 cycles for me. I change out assistance work when I can't do more for 2 times in a row. Principle of accommodation says that if you do the same thing too long you get adapted to it and it loses its strength stimulating effect.

I gravitate to a very similar schedule.

Do you feel training frequency play into it?

If you're going for a 1RM, do you count it in the three weeks? Or would you approach it differently?

 

[DocMike]

When I go for a 1rm I do plan it with a peaking cycle. I only do this 2-3 times a year and there is usually a meet involved at the end. A true 1rm is very taxing on the muscular, tendinitis, and neurological system and going for it too often actually hampers my training. Keep in mind my maxes are in the 5-600 range for sq and dl and 400 range for bench. I will go for rep maxes throughout my individual training blocks as they are a bit less demanding