Variety is the key to any successful fitness program. Repeating a limited routine over and over is ineffective, as the body quickly adapts and stops improving.
Variety is a key element of any fitness program. Why? To prevent plateaus.
You see, our bodies are amazingly efficient machines. This is both a blessing and a curse. The blessing is the body’s efficiency enhances our ability to survive. The curse is the difficulty this efficiency can cause in an exercise program. Our muscles, when stressed by exercise, recover, and become stronger. This principle is the basis of all weight and cardiovascular training. However, as the muscles become stronger, they also become more efficient. The next time a muscle is put through the same routine, it is able to move the same load with a lower expenditure of energy – the definition of efficiency. Over time, the same exercises become less effective at changing your body, because your body can get through the routine with less effort. At that point, your fitness progress will stop.
In order to prevent stalling out in a fitness program, variety of exercises and is the key. Changing routines frequently will keep your body “confused” and will allow you to make the biggest possible fitness gains in the shortest time. Now that’s the kind of efficiency that I like.
