The 8 Worst Exercises Ever (PLEASE STOP!)
When it comes to working out, many people will do the 8 worst exercises ever. In this video, I am going to cover the 8 worst exercises ever and alternative exercises you can do instead. These exercise swaps will target the same muscles and provide better growth as well as keeping your joints safe in
This is the iron graveyard and this was Jesse. I’m going to show you how Jesse got in this position. It’s actually from doing the exercises I’m going to talk about today that I really [music] wish that you’d stop doing. And I’m not going to pick on him without reason. I’ll tell you why I don’t like the exercise and more importantly what you can do instead so you don’t wind up like Jesse.
I’m not dead yet. >> I’ve been doing upright rows for years. Never once had an issue. In fact, it’s a great builder for my shoulders and my traps. And again, never had one single adri.
A Now, I’m not saying that your shoulders about to detonate like a claymore in Call of Duty on a single repetition, but the accumulation of those repetitions every time you do your shoulders or every time you do that exercise leads to a compounding risk that just doesn’t need to be there, especially because you have a better option. And that’s the case with all these exercises. [music] This is a different exercise altogether in terms of how it feels and what it does to your shoulder joints. And this is a high pull. And the main difference between the high pull and the upright row is the position of the elbow and the wrist in relation to each other.
During that upright row, as you can see here, Jesse’s elbows are way higher than the wrist, which drives his shoulder into internal rotation under load. By the way, with that weight in his hands at the top of the movement when his arm is elevated above his shoulder, which can [music] lead to increased risk of impingement and feelings of discomfort if you have any impingement already. However, on the high pull, you can see that the elbow is now down lower than the wrist, creating [music] external shoulder rotation, not internal rotation, even though you can still handle the same load, and you can still get that same impact and growth on the delts and on the traps. Now, a lot of people tell you, you can do the upright row, stop listening to Jeff, because you can stop it at your chest or you can let your elbows kind of hang back a little bit and don’t go so high, right? So, you’re telling them to do the high pull.
The essence is an upright row done like a classic upright row is not an exercise that you should do and is one that you can easily swap out for just as good gains with something like this. The high pull the chest fly. Come on. If it’s good enough for Arnold, it’s good enough for me. How else am I going to build those tigle bitties JUST LIKE MY BOY?
OH GOD, GET ME TO THE MEDICAL CHOPPER. >> I guess you could say aasta vista to that shoulder, Jesse. Look, all kidding aside, guys, as a physical therapist, my issue here with the unsupported dumbbell bench fly is that itself is that it’s [music] unsupported. Your shoulder is placed in a much more vulnerable position, particularly the anterior shoulder capsule because of the unsupported nature of those dumbbells out in its most vulnerable, most stretched position. Again, you’re doing the exercise likely to get a greater stretch on the pecs, but in that position, you are most vulnerable, especially if you start to use heavier and heavier weights.
I know the recommendation is just go light, but what if I told you you could stand up, do a cable crossover, actually use much more weight, provide more overload in that stress position, but do it much more safely. Well, that’s exactly what the cable crossover does. Depending upon where you position your body in relation to the machine, you can set a safer safety net so that that bottom [music] range of motion, all you have to do is slightly turn to one side or the other to place the weights back on the stack. Again, without any vulnerability to the anterior shoulder capsule. And again, we get a lot more opportunity to load the exercise more heavily.
So you can combine that stretch tension with just the overall tension we get from using heavier weights to give you better stimulus for growth. Not to mention, of course, we can get that adduction fully across our body that we’re not getting on the fly cuz it pretty much stops at midline, making it a much better alternative. Again, it’s safer than what we’re showing here. So therefore, why not do it? Especially if the gains can be better.
As a world traveler, who am I to turn down an exercise with a foreign flare like the Bulgarian split squat or a Russian twist? But there’s no better exercise for my shoulders than a Cuban press, which I don’t know what I like better, the Cuban press or Cuban cigars. Which reminds me of a time when I was down in Cuba with my buddy Carlos smoking goibas underneath a palm tree. Damn, Carlos. This is a good cigar.
[screaming] I don’t know. Doesn’t seem as smooth as that Cuban cigar there, Jesse. Although it does light you up in very much the same way. I don’t know who thought it was a good idea to combine a basic compound lift like an overhead press with a corrective exercise because it’s just not necessary. As a matter of fact, you’re better off doing just a regular shoulder press and then of course something like this, which is just a basic external rotation with a band, right?
we can isolate one function from the other because when we’re doing that cub and press anyway, you’re getting just a little bit of resistance or stimulation of the rotator cuff into external rotation just in the very very beginning of the exercise. Whereas if we do something like my favorite exercise, a face pull, you can see that we get resisted external rotation not just in the beginning but all the way through the range of motion. And we could actually add an overhead press component, but not for [music] the sake of trying to build bigger shoulders because again, you can handle that with heavier weight on its own. This overhead portion of this actually stimulates the lower traps, which further contributes to stabilizing your shoulders and making it a more corrective or protective exercise long term. But you certainly don’t need the Cuban press, no matter how you feel when you smoke them.
Jesse, nothing gets you to rock hardcore like doing a properly performed military situp. As a matter of fact, my dad, an old Navy drill instructor, taught me a good trick. Keep your feet anchored underneath something to help you get those thousand reps real easy. 978. 97.
Oh, God. My back. Oh, what a idiot. And so, with all due respect to Jesse’s dad, thank you for your service, just not for the advice you gave Jesse. Because anchoring your feet under something does two things you don’t want it to do in a situp.
Number one, it takes away a lot of the work from the abs because you’re getting a good isometric engagement of the hip flexor that your body can almost post [music] up against and then make it easier like Jesse said for 1,000 reps. The second thing it’s doing is that when you do engage the hip flexors like this, they have a tendency to become overactive and start to pull on the lumbar spine, yanking your back into positions that [music] lead to low back pain. So to get the exercise to do more work for your abs, number one, and save your low back in the process, you want to anchor your feet beyond something. In other words, you want to be pulling against something in order to pull your body up. This you’ll start to feel in the hamstrings instead.
And by engaging the hamstrings, you reciprocally start to take away some of the contribution or overcontribution of those hip flexors, which is going to allow you to have that core do more of the work. Yes, probably limiting the number of repetitions that you do, but in the end making them a hell of a l