Ok so by now, if you started your training plan in January, you should be familiarised with your gym and some different exercises. (If not, then take a look at my previous blog post demonstrating 5 exercises you should be do as a beginner)
As well as recommending some excellent exercises, I also try to avoid giving new exercises to some of my clients who happen to be beginners.
1. High impact exercises
Running, jumping, twisting and turning are some of the things you do not want to be doing as a beginner. This is because your joints, muscles, tendons and ligaments are just not ready for it. These structures of your body need time to adapt to this type of load you are placing on them. If you're not willing to build up to it, you will get injured and experience joint pain. Give it a few weeks, follow our programs and you will build the foundations to excel physically.
Alternatives: Bike, rowing machine, cross trainer.
2. Anything using a smith machine
If this machine is in your program, remove it immediately. The smith machine is designed to assist you during your exercises but in my opinion this simply leads to reinforcmenet of bad movement patterns. Take a squat for example, using the smith machine you don't need to worry about keeping your spine protected by correctly bracing, you forget about contracting your stabilising muscles and all you need to do is squat down and stand up. You are doing yourself an injustice if you use the smith machine because by developing all of those muscles and finding correct form through the movment whilst performing a regular barbell squat, your body development will be accelerated as you will become stronger and more stable through other movements.
People argue that it is an easy way to teach good form...I say that is rubbish. If you want to teach good form, you should do it by practicing the REAL movment, without any load and gradually build up.
Alternatives: Body weight exercises.
3. Crunches
Now this exercise is not in my list of things to avoid because it's a bad exercise.In fact, your abdominals are important mucles which need to be developed as any other. However, the reason I say to avoid this exercise if you're a beginner, is because I feel beginners place their hopes on the crunch. Beginners feels that by doing this exercise, they will magically become thin around the waist and develop a fine set of visible abs. When in reality, this is far from correct. The real focus for a beginner should be developing deeper core muscles, creating the foundations to work from in the future.
Alternatives: Plank, side plank, pilates exercises.
4. Upright row
This exercise can be performed correctly, and can be effective. However, too much emphasis is placed on increasing the load and lifitng as much as possible, no matter what the form may look like. This is a recipe for shoulder problems, usually a niggling shoulder injury that doesn't seem to go away. Who wants that right? I feel this exercise places the performer into too much loaded internal rotation at the shoulder. If there are weak rotator cuff muscles present, this is not going to end well. The focus should be on creating a strong joint by working on the rotator cuff strength. See how to do that here
Alternatives: Seated dumbbell lateral raise, shoulder shrugs, Real delt raise.
So if you're a beginner, try to avoid these exercises and focus on creating solid foundations to avoid injury and allow you perform at your best during every workout.
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Have a good day,
Matt
