Is muscle confusion a real thing?

Is muscle confusion a real thing?

When I first started working out, I signed up for a gym that offered small group personal training. We met three or four times a week, and the weight training sessions alternated between high-rep and low-weight days; Low rep, high weight days; and “normal” days (somewhere in the middle). The trainers told us that switching exercises like this prevented our muscles from getting used to each workout, which could lead to a plateau. By “confusing” our muscles in this way, we see steadier gains. (Related: Plateau-Busting Strategies to See Results in the Gym)

The workout routine worked for me and sparked a fitness habit that I have maintained to this day. But I always wondered what they told me. Can we really confuse our muscles? Should we?

“A lot of what we hear in the gym is true in terms of the practical outcome, but the explanatory mechanisms are wrong,” says Nick Tumminello, owner of Performance University. "So no, your muscles won't get confused. That being said, there are benefits to varying your workout routine. The more comprehensive a workout you can do, the more ways you'll train your muscles and the more likely you'll get positive benefits."

In other words, it's not necessarily the case that your muscles "get used to" certain exercises and they no longer become effective. It's just that when you perform the same movements at the same intensity and with the same number of repetitions day after day (or when you run the same distance day after day), you only work certain parts of your muscles. You will benefit from the moves, but only up to a point. You'll probably get bored too. (Psst...Check out these 6 muscle imbalances that cause pain—and how to fix them.)

However, if you keep switching it up, you'll be working more of your muscles. This applies whether you are performing the same exercises at different intensities or different exercises altogether. "Your body is an adaptable machine. It gets better at dealing with the stress you put into it the more you do it, so stressing it in different ways gives you more of a chance of adapting positively," says Tumminello.

In fact, he says, a recent study from Brazil compared people who did a routine over and over, people who did the same exercises but changed their rep range, people who did different exercises for the same number of reps, and those who did different exercises and different reps. "They found that the group that kept the reps but changed the exercises saw the biggest benefits; the runners-up were the people who changed the reps but not the exercises," he says.

So while my old gym was on to something - and you should mix up your workouts throughout the week - they may have oversimplified what they do. You don't confuse your muscles so they don't get too complacent; You challenge them in new ways with every workout to ensure they grow in a balanced, beneficial progression. As a result, you're less likely to hit a plateau or get injured - benefits that anyone can get behind.