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From your experience are there any benefits of changing your workout regimen often? As in experiences in muscle growth or weight loss?
I usually get in 3-4 times a week to weight lift.
I'm pretty boring. I like to stick to the same muscle groups on a particular day. I like to by habit stick to some semblance of a routine.
However, it does get boring and i lose focus. Thanks in advance.
There's no complete agreement with continual change vs. progressive loading, and I think they have different focuses. The competing views are:
Now, from one of the proponents of the first view point, a change in programming is eventually necessary but not for the same reasons as those who advocate continual change. I'm currently doing the Strong Lifts 5x5 program, and its creator Medhi is a proponent of the first viewpiont. In fact it's fairly common among most strength training programs (Pendlay 5x5, Star 5x5, Rippetoe, etc.). These programs tend to emphasize:
The opposing view seems to come from the body building community (although I am so new to this, that statement might be over simplified). The body building community tends to emphasize:
Unfortunately I just don't know as much about the body building side of things. My focus is strength. For me, I don't get board because my time at the gym is relatively short (I get my routine done in less than an hour), and I'm continually challenging myself. There's a lot to think about just getting the form right. Additionally, the progressive loading really exposes problems in your technique pretty quickly.
What is Progressive Loading?
Just in case you are not familiar with the term, it is the concept of going up in weight every workout session. This is different than doing pyramids where you increase weight and decrease reps each set. As an example, I'll use the Strong Lifts 5x5 program to illustrate.
Session 1: A workout
Session 2: B workout
Session 3: A workout
Continue until you stall (i.e. can't get all 5 sets of 5 reps in). Deadlifts in the SL5x5 program are a little different than the others because you are starting at 1 set of 5 reps and you go up by 10lb each session.
In short in every session you increase weight. There are other strength programs where you increase much slower, but those are designed for advanced lifters who have already maxed out the gains from the beginner programs (like SL 5x5).
If you are getting bored and losing focus, change it up somehow. You have over 600 muscles, surely if you are doing the same thing every time you are ignoring some in favor of others (though, to be fair, you're not exactly going to be exercising muscles like your cheek muscles or your tongue at the gym).
From my personal experience, cross-training improves your fitness level. I've heard a lot of explanations (most of which seemed only quasi-scientific) but I've noticed that if I run every day, my time and cardio fitness do not improve. If I run twice a week, lift weights twice, walk once and do yoga once, it improves rapidly and steadily, i.e., I can run faster, further and longer each time. I've found the same thing with lifting weights - instead of doing the same routine every time, or the typical A-B format each week (e.g., upper body on Monday, lower body on Thursday), if I do A-B for three weeks, then C-D for three weeks, then E-F(or whatever), I get stronger and more toned faster. (I don't mix it up every single time, like A-B then C-D then E-F, because it's a little overwhelming and it makes it harder to notice improvement, though there might be some.)
I think you answered your own question - change to stay engaged. I've seeing articles stating that people should change every 10-12 weeks because their bodies adopt to the exercises - but if you have a complete plan, covering your body to meet your goals, there's no - physical reason (and many power builders stay with the same exercises for years). I feel that each workout should be an improvement over the last, increased intensity through weights, duration, etc....but the actual exercises could remain the same as long as they keep you engaged.
There is a finite number of exercises. The key is to change the order both of the exercises and the days in which you do the exercises. The more you mix and match, the better the overall results. Additionally, if you write down each workout and build a plan, it is more likely that you will stay more engaged mentally. You will be able to track your exercises, weight and see improvements.
For Example 4 Day workout 5 week block #1:
Day 1 - Chest Back Shoulders:
Flat Bench 5x10; Incline 3x10
Lat Pull Downs 5x10; Bent Over Rows 3x10
Military 3x10; Standing Side Lat Raises 3x10
Day 2 - Legs & Arms:
Squat 5x10; Stiff legged dead lifts 3x10 Standing Barbell 5x10; Preacher Dumbbell 3x10
Day 3 - Chest Back Shoulders
Incline DB Press 5x10; Pec Deck 3x10
Pull-ups 5x10(to failure); Seated Rows 3x10
Seated Dumbbell Press 5x10; Shrugs 3x10
Day 4 - Legs & Arms:
Leg Press Sled 5x10; Hamstring Curl Machine 3x10
Seated Dumbbell Curl 5x10; Standing Cable Curls 3x10
Block #2
Day 1 - Back & Arms:
Dead lifts 5x10; Bent over barbell 2x10; Stiff-legged Dead Lift 2x10
Day 2 - Chest & Shoulders:
Decline Bench 5x10; Incline Dumbbell Press 3x10
Seated Military 4x10; Standing Front Lat Raises 3x10; Upright Rows 3x10
Day 3 - Legs & Arms:
Squat 5x10; Leg Ext 3x10; Hamstring Curl Machine 3x10
Standing Dumbbell Curls 5x10; Seated Curl Machine 3x10
Day 4 - Back, Chest & Shoulders:
Super-set - Pullups 5x10 (To Failure); Dips 5x10 (To Failure); Pushups 5x10 (To Failure); Shrugs 5x10(To Failure)
