The Beginner’s Guide to Strength Training (Part 2 of 30): What It Is and Isn’t

Strength training is a misunderstood art.

Sure, we laughed when we saw “Euro Training” — but strength training is more than just throwing around weights (or people, I guess). It’s an art of coaxing the body into strength gains and adaptations.

Yet, strength training is often the umbrella-term for a lot of stereotypes, misnomers, and subcategories — from “fat powerlifters” all the way to “meatheads,” it can mean different things to different people.

It’s Not Bodybuilding

What many people think is strength training is actually “bodybuilding” – machines, isolation exercises, and bicep curls. They are, however, two completely different endeavors and should be treated as such.

Bodybuilding is an aesthetic sport. There isn’t much emphasis on functionality — it’s just the process of pumping (not necessarily strengthening) individual muscles to look bigger, fuller, and more defined. By targeting specific muscles, they can also pump lagging areas so they look better for their competition.

I have the utmost respect for bodybuilders for their athleticism and sacrifices. Yet, bodybuilding is a sport — it’s not a means to an end; it’s the end, itself.

Strength Training: Movements Over Muscles

Strength training focuses on movements over muscles.

Instead of targeting the triceps, for example, strength training thinks of it as a “push” motion — driving something away from you. By doing this, you’ll strengthen the triceps, but also use your shoulders, chest, traps, stabilizing muscles, tendons, and ligaments.

Rather than – as Nick Winkelman from Athletes’ Performance puts it – target each individual muscle and hope that your body connects all the dots while you sleep, we should focus on movements and indirectly strengthen those individual muscles. If done correctly, no muscles will “lag behind,” and we’ll develop a body that’s made to move.

Why is this better?

More Functional

Stand up for a second. (I’ll wait.) Now, bend down and touch your toes without bending your knees. What muscles moved? Did they work in unison? By training muscles in isolation, we overlook that muscles, bones, tendons, and ligaments all work together to move.

Training movements instead of muscles develops important movement patterns that we use everyday — a squat, a lunge, a hip-hinge, etc. It improves our flexibility and mobility because we are exercising the way our bodies are designed to move and using full range-of-motion.

It also improves our athleticism because sports are just a series of movements executed at high intensities. Take the vertical jump, for example — it’s an explosive move with simultaneous triple extension at your hips, knees, and ankles. What do you think does a better job of training that: a squat or training each muscle in isolation?

Or which exercise helps you push an opponent: a tricep pulldown or a pushup? As long as you train movements, the individual muscles will take care of themselves (and look better, too).

Burns More Calories

Using several muscles at the same time creates a bigger metabolic effect and helps us burn more calories. (You’ll love the effect that has on fat loss.) This is a different routine and mindset than chasing a “pump” — rather than trying to fill each muscle with fluid, we’ll stimulate the muscle fibers to grow.

Safer

A lot of muscles weren’t meant to work in isolation either.

Take the hamstrings, for example. Those are meant to work with the glutes, not by itself, to extend the hips. Isolating that muscle could make it overactive and more prone to strains and pulls.

Training movements also strengthen your stabilizers — the tiny muscles that work to keep your big muscles moving correctly and safely. If you neglect those stabilizers for too long, they’ll stop working properly. That will lead to poor movement patterns and increased risk of injuries.

What Type of Exercises You Should Do In Strength Training

Multi-joint, complex exercises.

That’s a complicated way to say “exercises that work several muscles and joints at the same time.” Instead of doing a bicep curl, do a chinup — it’s the same exact movement at the bicep and elbow (flexion), but it develops great strength in your back, shoulders, and grip at the same time. Now, you’ll build more muscle, get even stronger, stimulate a better hormonal response, and still hit your biceps.

Or instead of a tricep pulldown, do a close-grip push up. Again, you get the same movement at the tricep and elbow (extension), but you’ll also strengthen your chest, shoulders, and core.

Start thinking about the isolation exercises you already do and how you can switch them to target even more muscles.

Strength Training: Comprehensiveness

We’re not focused on just the pump; we’re not focused on just absolute strength; and we’re not focused on just endurance.

We want to improve everything.

Within our training cycles and training blocks, strength training aims to build absolute strength, size, endurance, and explosiveness together. That requires us to apply different volumes and intensities to the body to target all the adaptations we want while constantly making progress.

We also want to improve mobility and stability in our joints to not only look better, but feel better too.

Additional Note: Strength Training Isn’t Just Powerlifting or Olympic Weightlifting

Powerlifting is a sport involving three exercises: the back squat, deadlift, and bench press. Strength training, however, is much more than just driving up these three numbers.

Don’t get me wrong — a squat, deadlift, and bench press are often the staples of an awesome strength training program. But it also depends on the individual: can they still strength train if they don’t have mobility (or health) for a squat, deadlift, or bench press?

Absolutely.

There are many strength coaches who don’t use traditional squats or deadlifts because they feel the risks outweigh the benefits. While I believe it depends on each individual, those coaches can still get their athletes extremely strong, fast, and healthy.

Some strength coaches also differ on their use of Olympic lifts — the Clean (with or without the Jerk) and the Snatch. Just like the powerlifts, these two exercises are common in many solid strength training programs. But they’re not the only way, however, to train power and explosiveness.

And with such a steep learning curve, they’re not always the safest.

(I’ll talk more about this as the series continues.)

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Next, I’ll break down the crucial mistakes most people make in their strength training program and how to fix it. With that, you’ll get great insights into the expansiveness and depth of strength training — it ain’t just picking up a dumbbell!

Throughout this seres, I’m sure you’ll have a lot of questions, so be sure to ask using the comment section of this post. Feel free to reach out to me via Facebook and Twitter to get your question answered. See you soon!