Before you get up in arms and think that I’m all of a sudden “anti-Squat/Bench/Dead”…take a breath. The purpose of the article today is simply to get you to think about your training in a little more depth IF the primary goal of your training is more muscle mass and a better physique.
If the primary goal of your training is to get as strong as possible or to be a better Power Lifter then you should unequivocally practice and train the competitive lifts. Even if you are in a “hypertrophy phase” in your training – the end goal is still to be better at the Squat, Bench, and Deadlift and it’s probably a good idea to keep all those lifts in your program on a regular basis (or at least semi-regular basis). If your training program calls for more volume and frequency on various supplemental and assistance exercises, you may decide to reduce the volume and frequency of the competition lifts if you are a ways out from competition. But you should still include them, even as you as spread your focus and energy out to other exercises.
However, if you are a bodybuilder (recreational or competitive) and the focus is purely on muscle mass and physique, there are good reasons to perhaps consider alternatives to the Squat, Bench, and Deadlift.
One of the primary differences between training for physique/muscle mass and training for power lifting is exercise selection. In fact, it might be the biggest difference between the two disciplines. Otherwise the goals are similar in that we are trying to increase strength over time on the focus exercises of the program.
When you are training for physique / muscle mass, literally no exercise is mandatory. And no exercise is off the table, either. Contrary to what you might have read or heard, there is no rule that says you must Squat, Bench Press, or Deadlift in order to build muscle mass.
The primary driver for muscular hypertrophy is increased mechanical tension over time. As the muscle is exposed to greater and greater tension loads over time, it adapts and grows. We don’t really have a good way to measure tension on a muscle during an exercise and so we use weight on the bar (or dumbbell or machine or whatever) as a proxy. If you are squatting 315 vs 225, we assume greater tension on the constituent muscle groups occurs at 315 rather than 225, and this is likely a safe assumption to make.
So the logical conclusion that we might arrive at is: use the exercises that allow for the heaviest loads possible and we will maximize muscle growth.
It’s not entirely wrong or entirely right. And for a beginner strength athlete in any discipline, this approach probably makes the most sense.
However, things change when we’re talking about bodybuilding / physique. Bodybuilders don’t train for a big squat, they train for bigger quads and hamstrings. Bodybuilders don’t train for a bigger Bench Press, they train for a bigger Chest. They don’t train for a bigger Deadlift, but a bigger back.
So when we talk about increasing tension, we have to talk specifically about increasing tension across the muscle groups we want to grow. This is where things get potentially tricky if we’re using only load as a measure of tension.
In most cases a low-bar back squat is going to allow for the greatest loads to be lifted. But does this necessarily mean we’re going to maximize mechanical tension in the Quads using this exercise? I’d argue in most cases….no.
This is somewhat dependent on individual build/structure. Most people, when low bar squatting, shift the lions share of the workload to the hips which means lots of hamstring, adductors, glutes, and even erectors. Certainly the quads are hugely involved, BUT they are sharing all of that load with a whole helluva lot of other muscles, and they are generally not taken through a full range of motion. Both of those factors actively DECREASE tension in the quads.
So for a bodybuilder who has undersized quads – is the low bar back squat going to be his exercise of choice?
Or would he get more out of switching to a high bar back squat or even a Hack Squat taken rock bottom? Both of these example exercises take the quads through a fuller range of motion and reduce or eliminate the contribution of other major muscle groups into the movement. So instead of hitting 405 on the low bar squat, he is only hitting 315 on the high bar squat. Certainly there is a decrease in the total load on the bar, but there is going to be an increase (by a lot) of mechanical tension on the quads. He’ll get more growth in the quads by pushing up his high bar squat from 315×5 to 365×5 than he will from taking his low bar squat from 405×5 to 455×5.
The same is true with the Bench Press and chest hypertrophy. Again, this depends somewhat on your build and the style in which you bench. I’d argue that a modern power lifting style bench press with a massive arch in the back, a wide grip, and the bar brought down damn near to the upper abs is a very poor developer of the chest – even if it allows for the most weight.
You might be able to get a lot out of the bench press if you alter the mechanics a bit though – flatten the arch out some, bring the bar higher up into the chest, and maybe even move the grip in a little bit. We’re not trying to manipulate the lift to get the most weight – we’re trying to manipulate the lift to put maximal tension on the pecs. This means taking the pecs through their fullest range of motion possible. This means getting them into the stretched position at the bottom and allowing them to adduct the humerus which is their natural function. You may be able to accomplish this with the Bench Press or perhaps it is better achieved at angles of incline, decline, or with the use of dumbbells or machines.
Once you achieve the right mechanical position…now it’s time to progressively overload over time. And that’s when the growth will really start to take off.
So this brings us to the Deadlift. While the Deadlift allows us to generally handle greater raw poundages than any other exercise – what muscles are doing the work?? The answer – damn near all of them! Obviously an exaggeration, but the point is that all of that mechanical work is getting distributed across a lot of muscle groups – the quads, hamstrings, adductors, glutes, low back, lats, traps, forearms, etc. This makes the Deadlift a superb lift for the general strength trainee looking to maximize efficiency in the gym and get a great strength stimulus, but perhaps a poor choice for the bodybuilder.
So while it works a lot of muscles pretty good – it doesn’t do a great job for any one particular muscle group.
For development of the hamstrings, I’d argue that Stiff leg Deadlifts, Romanian Deadlifts, and even Goodmornings are a far better stimulus than the conventional Deadlift. All 3 exercises take the hamstrings through a much longer range of motion and have far more eccentric loading (including maximizing the loaded stretch position). Like the Deadlift……RDLs/SLDLs/GMs can all be progressively overloaded over time quite effectively while reducing the contribution of other muscle groups to the movement. This ensures that our proxy measure of tension (load on the bar) is actually measuring tension on the hamstrings as opposed to just tension across the entire body. Taking your RDLs from 315×8 to 405×8 over time is a more reliable way to grow the hamstrings than taking your Deadlift from 405 to 495.
For the erectors, lats, upper back, and traps, I’d argue that knee height rack pulls and correctly performed barbell rows (and some other row variations) are superior stimuli to the Deadlift as well. When we remove the contribution (or limitation) of the legs from the movement, then we can ensure the back is doing the work, and get more predictable growth from improvements in these exercises.
How Do We Know What Exercises Produce the Most Mechanical Tension????
Well, I’d say there are 2-3 areas we can really look at with varying degrees of reliability.
First is just basic knowledge of anatomy and muscle function. It’s a good idea to have at least some basic knowledge about the role of each muscle group in the body and what it’s primary functions are. Then with our exercise selection we can select movements that maximize these functions and maximize the range of motion around the joints in which they operate. You want to look at exercises that maximize range of motion, concentric and eccentric loading, and the deep stretch position under load.
A high bar squat taken rock bottom takes the knee (and therefore the Quad) through a more complete range of motion than a low bar back squat which typically stops when the femur is roughly parallel to the floor. At the bottom of the squat, the quad is placed under a pretty extreme loaded stretch (an underrated trigger of growth), and the quads are asked to do far more work in the concentric and eccentric phases of the lift.
In the RDL or Goodmorning (taken to maximal depth) the range of motion around the hip joint, and therefore the hamstrings, is greater than a conventional deadlift. The hamstring probably has a greater load in the concentric phase of the lift, although it might be close here. But no doubt it gets far more activation in the eccentric phase of the lift and a severe exposure to stretch under load, which is almost completely absent in the Deadlift.
Second, we can look at soreness patterns in the days following the training sessions. This is a very Bro-Sciency way of examining things but it doesn’t mean it’s wrong. In fact, I think it’s probably pretty damn reliable. In the days following an exercise, where are you sore???? Compare and contrast various exercises to each other and pay attention to your soreness patterns. This can give you a good indication of where various exercises are hitting you hardest.
Related to soreness would be the intra-workout “pump” you feel on a given exercise. Like soreness, I don’t know that “the pump” is necessarily causative in muscle growth. However, it’s definitely an indicator that the exercise you are performing is or isn’t targeting the muscles you want targeted. You can get a pump with a 10 lb dumbbell curl, but that doesn’t necessarily mean it’s going to cause growth.
I see this all the time when teaching clients to barbell row. At first, they feel very little in the upper back and lats. “The Pump” is usually felt in the forearms and biceps. As the trainee practices the movement and gets better we will shift over time to feeling massive pumps in the lats and upper back and next to nothing in the arms and forearms. This is a key indicator that we’re doing something correctly technique wise. Through better mind-muscle connection the trainee is now learning to row with the lats and upper back instead of yanking on the bar with their arms.
If you are bodybuilding, when you come off an exercise you should feel the effects of that exercise in the muscle group you want trained. This is the mind-muscle connection and it’s imperative to improving the effectiveness of your exercises and should, in some part, govern your exercise selection.
If you cannot establish any sort of mind muscle connection between the exercise you are performing and the target muscle group you are attempting to train, you are not maximizing your efforts. You either need some technical refinements on your lifting or you need to alter your exercise selection.
Volume vs Progressive Overload
Here is what I see a lot of with guys training for hypertrophy / physique.
They’ve progressed their Squat, Bench, and Deadlift massively over the past several years, but their physique doesn’t yet reflect their progress in the way that they think it should, relative to the strength they have gained.
But they’ve come to a point where continuing to get stronger on these lifts is harder and harder and small improvements of 10-20 lbs on each lift takes longer and longer. Maybe several months to elicit 10-20 lb gains on a given lift.
So what do they always go to? More volume.
No.
Doing more sets of the same exercises that didn’t improve your physique over the past 2-5 years isn’t your ticket to transforming your physique now.
You don’t need more sets or more frequency on inefficient movements for your physique.
You need different, but more specifically – you need better.
You need exercises that maximize mechanical tension across the various muscle groups that need to grow.
And here’s the match to the gasoline….you need progression on those exercises.
Increased mechanical tension over time means good old fashioned progressive overload on the RIGHT movements. Once you get in tune with the right exercises, you have to get stronger on those movements. It’s not enough just to do them. If you start with Dumbbell Presses for sets of 8 with the 60s, over the next few months/years you need to be doing sets of 8 with the 70s, 80s, 90s, 100s.
That’s where your growth will come from. Get crazy strong in the 5-15 rep range of exercises that work best for your body and can be progressed over time.
What you’ll find is that when you start to train with the right exercises, you’ll need far less volume to grow than what you might think. This of course implies that you are training these exercises hard, which is not always a given.
If you are doing inefficient movements for sets that are 3-4 reps shy of failure (or more) then yes, you will need a lot of sets to elicit an adaptation. If you simply bombard yourself with enough work you can get some growth.
But this is an inefficient mechanism. How are you gonna keep growing 5 years from now? Just keep adding volume? More sets every few months for the next 5-10 years is a lot of sets. After a point, more volume not only doesn’t work but it starts to deliver diminishing returns.
There are a lot of super successful 35-45 year old bodybuilders that compete both natural and enhanced. If they all clung to the “more volume” approach how many sets would they all be doing by the time they’re 35, 40, or 45 years old? The answer is a lot more than they actually do. A good deal of them tend to decrease volume as they age, because they get BETTER at delivering massive doses of stress to a muscle with less total sets.
The secret is improvement in the right exercises, not more volume on the wrong exercises.
