Reading the title, Muscle Confusion Workouts might leave you confused, at least if you are in the beginning phases of your fitness journey. I know that I would have been confused if I had seen it several years ago. I think I might have said something along the lines of, “Muscle Confusion Workouts", huh? Is that what they call it when you’re head hurts after hours of searching for the right workout? Not exactly.
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What is a muscle confusion workout?
The concept behind Muscle Confusion Workouts is that every so often, it's good to change your workouts. The trick is to know when you need to change your workout and how much change you actually need. Typically you want to switch it up every 4-8 weeks so that your muscles don’t get too far accustom to the stress that you’re placing on them. This is where the term “muscle confusion” comes into play. There are too many ways to change up your workouts to go over in one article. So, instead I’m going to share a few guiding principles that I think apply to many people’s questions about how to attain strength, endurance, and muscular size.
One method of muscle confusion is to use three different workouts rotated month by month. You could choose one endurance, one strength, and one size workout. I recommend starting with the endurance workout. By starting with the endurance workout, we ensure that we are building a safe foundation for being able to handle heavier weights in the later phases of training.
Another way of utilizing the principles of muscle confusion is to switch the order of the exercises that you do. There have been many successful examples of athletes doing this. One of those examples, is strength coach and professional youtuber, Elliott Hulse. Elliott wanted to increase his bench press so he changed the order of his workout so that he did the bench press first. It worked. His bench press numbers began to increase.
Switching a workout every 4-8 weeks works well sometimes but isn't always necessary. If you're getting great results with your current work then there is no need to switch. It's like the old saying goes, 'If it ain't broke, don't fix it.'
