Good programming isn’t just about exercise selection. Managing fatigue created from different exercises in a way that you can still crush your remaining exercises is very important for ensuring you get the best overall stimulus from the session. For example, I wouldn’t do barbell squats after hammering my legs with other movements because that’s just a recipe for really weak and messy squats. This is the kind of thought that goes into my programming for my training groups: - Team Aesthetics: optimized for hypertrophy (4 days/week) - Team Power: Powerbuilding, optimized for hypertrophy and strength in the squat, bench, and deadlift (4 days + optimal 5th) - Rookie Squad: optimized for efficiency/hypertrophy for beginners or people who have busy schedules (3 days/week) Link is in my bio 🫡 ~$1/day to join my online training groups designed for beginner to advanced lifters where we implement research-backed training principles to ensure progress. Real-time programming done by me + access to me for questions and video review Sub the YouTube channel! Code: “EVAN” for @youngla @gorillamind @villagehiddeniniron

It’s not just about getting the sets in. The quality of the sets matters too and it is influenced by things like when the set takes place in the session. The two main components of maximizing a growth stimulus are the number and size of for muscle fibers being activated (motor unit recruitment) and the amount of tension those fibers experience (intramuscular mechanical tension). This concept is maximizing the first of those two, meaning that it’s going to increase our ability to activate the most muscle fibers, and therefore the largest ones that have the most growth potential. ~$1/day to join my online training groups designed for beginner to advanced lifters where we implement research-backed training principles to ensure progress. Real-time programming done by me + access to me for questions and video review Sub the YouTube channel! Code: “EVAN” for @youngla @gorillamind @villagehiddeniniron

Before anybody says anything, no, this is not better for hypertrophy (and this is about hypertrophy) because it “works the stabilizer muscles”. That literally makes things worse for hypertrophy because it adds other limiters to the movement other than the target muscle hitting failure. Increasing coordination demands by reducing stability, unnecessarily taxing other muscles that are not the target muscle, and using loading that produces a shitty resistance profile are all going to take away from the stimulus that the target muscle (in this case, the upper glutes) experience by reducing motor unit recruitment, mechanical tension, ease of execution, ease of progressive overload etc. Also, “Stabilizer muscles” aren’t these obscure muscles that only get worked when things are unstable. They’re the “normal muscles” that are just acting in a stability capacity rather than being the primary mover, which they would be in a different movement. And the very small muscles throughout the body, that will never be primary movers, aren’t big enough to make a difference in appearance when developed anyway, but get worked sufficiently with “stable” movements anyway. What people think is happening when they’re “training stabilizer muscles” is actually just improving coordination/technique, which happens by doing a specific movement over time and getting better at doing it. It’s also not necessarily more “fUnCtIoNaL” as function is task-specific. This would probably improve coordination and general proprioception, but there are other exercises that would do that as well but with a far better hypertrophy benefit.

The only time I would ever recommend these is if there were no other options at all; however, if you have access to free-weights to do these, then there are better options. ~$1/day to join my online training groups designed for beginner to advanced lifters where we implement research-backed training principles to ensure progress. Real-time programming done by me + access to me for questions and video review Sub the YouTube channel! Code: “EVAN” for @youngla @gorillamind @villagehiddeniniron

Another good cue, in my experience, is to keep your weight on your heels, specifically your inside heels. RDL’s are simple conceptually but sometimes require some creative teaching tools (not that this is very creative). This isn’t a perfect RDL obviously, but it allows you to learn what it feels like to push your hips backward (horizontal translation) with a barbell in your hands, and without falling over. See, when you do an RDL properly, it’s the weight in your hands that keeps you from falling over backward, but it’s difficult to learn with that weight in your hands and, alternatively, if there is no weight on the bar then there is nothing to counterbalance your centre of mass as you move your hips backward. This somewhat addresses that problem and lets you feel what it’s like to sit into your hips. ~$1/day to join my online training groups designed for beginner to advanced lifters where we implement research-backed training principles to ensure progress. Real-time programming done by me + access to me for questions and video review Sub the YouTube channel! Code: “EVAN” for @youngla @gorillamind @villagehiddeniniron

You would be surprised how many people understand that you need to keep dropping calories if you want long-term weight-loss, but don’t realize that that principle applies after the diet is over. Your maintenance calorie intake is influenced by things like sleep, stress, lifestyle, etc and ESPECIALLY body weight. Lower body weights require less calories to sustain, so when you’ve lost 20lbs after a hard fought calorie deficit phase, you have a new maintenance calorie intake that your surplus needs to be based on. Otherwise, you’ll end up wasting all that hard work and put that body fat right back on. ~$1/day to join my online training groups designed for beginner to advanced lifters where we implement research-backed training principles to ensure progress. Real-time programming done by me + access to me for questions and video review Sub the YouTube channel! Code: “EVAN” for @youngla @gorillamind @villagehiddeniniron