#4: Exercise Variety

Q: Hey Guy,

I just finished reading your "The Five-Pound Rule" about making gains for natural bodybuilders. I enjoyed the no-nonsense advice you offered, and it confirmed for me that natural bodybuilding isn't rocket science; it's all about discipline and consistency. I utilize a lot of the strategies that you talk about in your article when I go into a mass-building phase: increasing heavy weights, key mass-building movements, training major bodyparts once a week, and focusing on rest and nutrition.

My question, however, is about exercise variation. From your article, I concluded that you recommend sticking with one particular variation of an exercise over a number of weeks (e.g., if you were working on the upper pecs you would do incline bench presses with barbells week after week). I would do incline bench presses with barbells one week, followed with dumbbells the next week, followed, maybe, by incline machine presses the next week. I use my diary to ensure that I'm increasing weights consistently, but do you think sticking with one variation for several weeks is the way to go?

Thanks in advance for your answer and wishing you success in your competition.

...R. Heffernan

A: Thanks for the good wishes. It turned out that luck wasn't what was required at the World Championships, but rather, what I really needed was a European birth certificate! However, that's another story.

With regard to variation, I do advocate sticking with the same exercises for the "Five-Pound Rule" to be the most effective. Because each exercise works the muscle and joints somewhat differently, you'll find that continually changing the exercises from workout to workout will actually impede your progress. One way of getting the variety you seek is to wait until you need to step back (e.g., maxing out at four reps) and then changing the exercises at that point.  Alternatively, you can keep your first two power movements the same for a bodypart and vary your third movement from week to week.

The power movements are the key to building the most mass. The more weight you handle, the more muscle you will develop. Dumbbells are great for range of motion, but barbell exercises are the way to go if you want to lift heavy.   Therefore, try as much as possible to keep the power barbell movements as the core of your training regimen.

Thanks for the question and good luck with your training!

...Guy Bourgon, Canadian Champion 2006

If you would like to ask Guy a question, please e-mail: askguy@seriousaboutmuscle.com.

SeriousAboutMuscle.com contributor Guy Bourgon is from Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, and is the winner of the Tall class in the Classic Bodybuilding division at the 2006 CBBF National World Qualifier. Guy also competed at the 2006 IFBB World Bodybuilding Championships held in Ostrava, Czech Republic, where he placed fifth in the Tall class of the Classic Bodybuilding division.