STOP DOING ISOLATION EXERCISES LIKE THIS (3 MISTAKES)

Stop Doing Isolation Exercises Like This

For those unfamiliar, isolation exercises typically imbricate those that hit only one muscle group, This could be biceps curls, triceps extensions, lateral raises, or chest flys. 

If you are new to lifting, or plane an intermediate, you might be making any of these 3 mistakes, which make those movements less constructive for stimulating muscle growth. So, if you want to make sure you’re getting the very most out of every lift you perform in the gym for maximum results, then you’re going to want to read this through to the end.

Isolation Exercises Mistake #1:

First on the list is a really worldwide piece of translating that I see people giving all the time. There is  this idea out there that progressive overload should only be unromantic to recipe exercises, and that isolation exercises are only for focusing on getting a pump.

Now, there’s nothing wrong with mixing up your training a bit in terms of rep ranges and intensity levels.if you plane have some movements in your plan where you focus a bit increasingly on feel versus just moving the weight.

But at the end of the day, there’s no real physiological understructure for why recipe exercises and isolation exercises need to be put into these variegated categories.

Whether you’re doing a multi-joint movement or a single joint movement, you have a set of muscle fibers that are stuff stressed. The vital underlying mechanisms that trigger hypertrophy don’t magically transpiration in either case.

For example, your pecs don’t know that you’re performing a dumbbell printing versus a subscription fly. Your quadriceps don’t know that you’re doing a leg printing versus a leg extension. All that those muscle fibers wits is the stratum of mechanical tension they’re under, and how much of their existing resources are stuff used up.

So, whether you’re doing a recipe movement or an isolation, you still need to be training tropical to muscular failure. Especially if you want to optimize muscle stimulation and growth. This ways performing exercises somewhere in that 0-3 reps in reserve zone (check out my vendible on the RPE scale if you want to learn increasingly well-nigh this concept).

You still need to be applying some form of progressive overload over time.

This could involve subtracting increasingly load to the exercise; performing increasingly reps with the same load; making the exercise increasingly mechanically difficult using rest-pause training, slower negatives, or upper intensity techniques; or some combination of all of those things. 

This worldwide tideway of treating isolations as pure upper rep pump work really follow logic. Many people treat it as an remembrance where you just zombie out your sets, finger the burn, and don’t track anything.

Now, there are unrepealable isolation lifts where you’re going to want to use higher reps in general. Things like lateral raises would fit this description where you need to alimony the shoulder joints protected. Others would include triceps extensions, or movements that have a really short range of motion like calf raises or shrugs.

But, just remember that the same unstipulated mechanism that triggers your lats to grow during a weighted chin up is the same mechanism that triggers your biceps to grow during a dumbbell curl.

Whatever muscle group you are working on, training hard, getting tropical to failure, and progressing over time are what truly matter to optimize growth.

Isolation Exercises Mistake #2:

This is flipside really worldwide idea, that on recipe movements, you want to train nonflexible and heavy and then take longer rest periods to really recharge surpassing the next set.

Whereas on isolation exercises, you are supposed to rest, say, 30 or 60 seconds. People will say that’s totally fine since it’s just an isolation, and you are not really worried well-nigh progressive overload and just want to finger the shrivel and get a pump.

Now yes, when you’re doing a single joint movement, you’re usually going to be lifting less total weight. Since you’re only emphasizing a single muscle group, this is going to midpoint less systemic fatigue, so you won’t need as much rest in between sets compared to a worthier recipe lift.

Regardless, whether it’s recipe or isolation exercises, you should rest as long as you need to. It will help you fully recover from the previous set. This way, you can perform the next set at your maximum strength potential.

I’ve talked well-nigh this subject quite a bit in the past, and there’s plenty of research on this topic now (Study 1, Study 2, and Study 3 in specimen you are interested).

It really doesn’t matter whether it’s a smaller exercise like calf raise or a bicep curl. If you’re truly pushing that set with the level of effort you should be (assuming you want the most growth possible), you probably should not be fired up and completely ready to go then in less than 1 minute.

In that case, you’re doing increasingly of a cardio or workout workout than a muscle towers one. In most cases, a minute and a half would probably be a reasonable minimum rest time. Something increasingly like 2-3 minutes would be platonic if you’re really pushing yourself to failure.

On worthier recipe lifts, you may plane need to take 4-5 minutes for rest if you’re training particularly hard. 

But specific time frames aside, the marrow line is to rest long unbearable between sets so that you finger fully re-generated, both physically and mentally. This applies regardless of whether you’re doing a multi-joint or single-joint exercise. Again, the vital hypertrophy mechanisms are the same in either case.

Isolation Exercises Mistake #3:

Lastly is a mistake that relates to the first one, but increasingly specifically to the mind-muscle connection. In other words, that “feeling the muscle” is increasingly important on isolation lifts versus compounds.

This is something I hear all the time. But again, what is the rational understructure for this idea?

Right off the bat, I don’t think the mind-muscle connection is as important as most people think. I’d say it tends to be over emphasized as it is only one gauge out of several variegated gauges that you can use to assess if the exercise you’re performing is unquestionably hitting the targeted muscle effectively.

But when it comes to recipe versus isolation exercises, there shouldn’t be any reason why the mind-muscle connection is increasingly important in the specimen you’re performing a mechanically simpler movement that mainly involves one muscle group. If anything, most of the time the mind-muscle connection should be less important. 

For example, take a leg extension versus a leg press.

Unless you’re totally out to lunch and you have no track whatsoever what you’re doing, then hitting your quads on a leg extension is pretty sufferer simple. It’s a single joint movement where you sit there locked into the machine. You proffer at the knee, and the quads work. 

If you’re doing a leg printing on the other hand, and the goal is to emphasize quads, there are unrepealable mistakes you could be making that would reduce quad stimulation. For example, positioning your feet too upper which would put increasingly accent onto the glutes.

So in that case, modifying your technique and working on “feeling the quads” more, would have increasingly application, not less.

Another example would be training the when versus biceps.

If you want to optimally train your lats, then you’ve got to consider a few form cues. These include your arm position relative to your torso, your torso angle, and the wile that you’re pulling the resistance at.

Whereas with a biceps curl, you simply flex and proffer your elbow. You can definitely optimize your biceps curls using variegated form cues, but it’s a lot harder to get that wrong.

If you do some curls, and you don’t do them like a well-constructed idiot, you’ll probably be training your biceps pretty effectively. This is without really needing to get too hung up on the mind muscle connection. Yet if you’re doing lat pulldowns and you really want to strop in on the lats, it’s mechanically increasingly complex.

Therefore, “feeling the muscle” would have increasingly utility in that case.

Now this is partly just theoretical, but how does this unquestionably wield to your isolation exercise training? The mind muscle connection definitely has some application, but you moreover don’t want to get too obsessive well-nigh it either.

You don’t need to be lifting like a perfect robot. There is no need to be feeling some deep super intense wrinkle in the muscle on every single rep. Lifting with that mindset will probably reduce your gains in the long term rather than increase them.

Now of course, proper form and technique are extremely important. But you should strive to find a wastefulness between proper form while permitting yourself some leeway to move naturally. 

If you’re trying to micromanage every tiny little detail on your curling exercises, thinking that if your elbow travels forward plane a little bit, or there’s a very slight sway in your when on the last couple reps, this will rationalization you to lose the mind-muscle connection and will destroy your gains, you’ll momentum yourself crazy. 

I think that unquestionably limits muscular overload in the worthier picture.

Remember, muscular failure is only failure relative to the specific form you’re using.

So if you’re doing a 100% ultra strict perfect flourish and your biceps fail, it’s not like your biceps are unquestionably completely depleted and have no strength left. They’ve only failed within the confines of that ultra strict form you’re using.

Whereas if you indulge yourself a little bit of leeway–maybe the elbow comes forward just a little bit, or you have a very slight lean as you squeeze out that last really nonflexible reps–I would say that’s unquestionably superior for loading your biceps. Plane if your front delts or when come into play slightly, that doesn’t automatically midpoint that there’s less stress on the biceps.

The goal with curls is to maximize biceps stress, not necessarily to completely remove flipside muscle. So if your biceps are nearing failure, and then you incorporate a small bit of natural movement or loosen up the form just slightly, it moreover probably ways increasingly stress on the biceps overall.

It scrutinizingly functions like a forced rep. The other muscle group helping your bicep is unquestionably profitable the targeted muscle to work plane harder than it would be worldly-wise to in comparison to trying to alimony your form veritably 100%

So, factor the mind-muscle connection in somewhat. However, it is by no ways the be all, end all for maximum muscle growth.  probably plane less important on most isolation exercises in comparison to recipe lifts.

In Conclusion

A recap of the three worldwide mistakes people make with performing isolation exercises:

1. Only wield progressive overload to recipe movements, not isolation exercises.
2. Take shorter rest periods on isolation exercises than you would on compounds.

If you are currently making any of the whilom mistakes, try out some of the translating laid out in this article. It may help you make sustainable gains in the long term