Exercise Selection Criteria: Building Strength & Muscle
Standards are important. While this is true in many ways, this is especially true within fitness because your choices are virtually limitless. In this now century-old industry, we need ways to navigate the good from the bad, or at least the better from the worse, as things are rarely ever that black and white. Therefore, strong criteria for great decision-making within all of the chaos is highly useful if not completely necessary. Luckily, a large proportion of the available scientific literature in exercise science pertains specifically to the comparison of nearly every programming variable. This allows us to confidently establish these high-quality criteria:
Exercise Selection Criteria:
1. Targeted.
2. Scalable.
3. Large Range of Motion.
4. Strong Force-Profiles.
5. Low Complexity.
Targeted—this first criterion is quite simple. An exercise should be accurately targeted towards a specific muscle or small muscle group. Furthermore, that muscle or muscle group should be the limiting factor when a given set approaches muscular failure. Without the precision of selecting a well-targeted exercise, we tend to lose both specificity and overload. Common errors specific to failing to meet this criterion are selecting exercises that are either combinational/multiphasic or poly-articular—involving too many joints and joint actions. Overcomplicated movements tend to lose their targeted adaptation.
Scalable—our next criterion requires the exercise’s level of intensity to be virtually limitless. An exercise must be able to be both progressed as well as regressed when necessary. While it is possible to scale exercises well qualitatively, it should be considered an added benefit if an exercise lends itself well to quantitative loading (especially micro-loading). The value of this criterion stems from progressive mechanical tension (see: overload) being the primary mechanism for developing the muscular system. Being able to quantify tension (even if indirectly) and progression of tension over time is required to assure long-term goals are achieved.
Large Range of Motion—this one has two important components. First, high-quality exercises should have movement consisting of both concentric and eccentric muscular contractions (think: lifting and lowering phases). Isolated isometrics (muscular contraction without any movement) are significantly inefficient. Any unique benefit they may possess can be gained from programming them into conventional repetitions (e.g., w/ tempo’s & pauses). Secondly, these movements should be relatively large. The size of a movement may be viewed as either total displacement of load (i.e., work = force x distance) or performed angular work (torque x angular displacement). The total displacement perspective typically works better for compound/multi-joint movements while the angular work perspective is more appropriate for isolation/single-joint movements. Regardless, exercises with relatively high ranges of motion are generally superior to low-range or no-range options.
Strong Force-Profiles—another complex, multi-component criterion. First, selected exercises should fall on the appropriate side of the force-velocity curve (the high-force, low-velocity side). High-velocity exercises like running, jumping, throwing, striking, and anything with minimized force-contact times are poor choices for the purposes of muscular strength and development. Secondly, the resistance curve of an exercise (either ascending, descending, bell-shaped, or even flat) should either maximize force through as much range of motion (again) as possible or aim to maximize force at a targeted (again) muscle length and joint angle. This is considerably nuanced with much more to be expounded (e.g., stretch-biased force curves). Lastly, the force-profile and range of motion criteria conjoin to dictate that a high-quality muscular strength/growth exercise’s primary lever crosses a sticking point threshold (the point by which the resistance is maximized).
Low Complexity—this dictates that a selected exercise be relatively lowly technical for the nervous system. Generally, the greater the amount of skill required from the nervous system, the lesser the ability of the exercise to generate muscular adaptation. As coordination demands increase, the ability for muscles to produce high levels of force decreases. While skill and complexity can come from already discussed areas from the targeted criterion (e.g., combinational, multiphasic, poly-articular/planar movements), other areas like learning curves, kinetic chain, and stability come into play here. Steep learning curves and long kinetic chains are unnecessarily complex and will slow or even halt the acquisition of muscular development goals (i.e., using the snatch exercise for quadriceps development is extremely inefficient). The biggest mistake is with regards to balance & stability. Simply stated, exercises should be performed on stable ground, with stable loads, and without any external perturbation. Any added instabilities will slow and quickly stop all strength and development progress due to the inverse relationship between coordination and muscular force production.
To briefly conclude, an exercise selected for the purposes of strength and hypertrophy (muscle growth) should meet the criteria of being well-targeted, easily scalable, large in range of motion, strong in its respective force profiles, and lowly complex for the nervous system. Additionally, any exercise selections should also fit well into a greater structured exercise program. Exercises should limit biomechanical redundancy and aim to complement other selections by augmenting their adaptive effects. Furthermore, a comprehensively designed program should aim to minimize any glaring gaps or weaknesses. All in all, it is necessary to have stringent criteria for program related decision-making to assure training goals are achieved.