Posted on July 21, 2015 by Jenny Cromack
The fitness industry is rife with camps of individuals singing from one book or another, google ‘compound vs isolation exercises’ and you’ll get somewhere in the region of 46,000 results and a whole manor of opinions.
In reality, asking the question are isolation or compound exercises superior is like asking, should I go left or right on the road? Well, where are you going, do you need to go anywhere on the way, how are you going to travel there? It’s the same with exercise…the type of exercise you choose should be dependant on your goal.
When we return to the question, are compound or isolation exercises superior we can begin to realise that neither is superior, each has its time and place. In fact combinations of the two can even lead to superior results in some circumstances. So instead of answering which is superior I have approached the subject in relation to which movements should be selected for a variety of circumstances.
As a big bang for your buck hormone stimulator, compound exercises are vastly superior, non more so than the squat and deadlift. Utilising compound exercises such as these helps to stimulate numerous hormones, two of the most commonly known and valuable are testosterone and human growth hormone. Therefore if the goal is size or fat loss, compound exercise must be in the tool box of exercises.
However, don’t be fooled that compound exercises are the only exercise that stimulate growth hormone. If we consider an individual with injuries to the knee, hip, and lower back selecting deadlifts and back squats is probably a poor choice. Although leg extensions on a machine will never be as effective as squats, in this situation it is likely that we will get better results from the isolation exercise.
When we consider an individual that has very limited time, the primary focus should be to use compound exercise, isolation exercises are often time demanding and require more frequent sessions. On the other hand when we utilise isolation exercises in combination with compound exercises we can achieve even greater hypertrophy results than just compound or isolation alone. Pre-exhausting a muscle for example the biceps, through a dumbbell bicep curl, which is an isolation exercise before performing a compound exercise which uses the bicep, such as a bent over row can elicit an even greater hypertrophy response.
For rehabiliation or pre-habiliatation of an individual, isolation exercises are vastly superior. Particularly when we look at motor recruitiment of muscle motor units. Research has shown that through isolation of specific muscle groups the body can learn to utilise the muscle much more effectively in day to day tasks or when we return to compound movements.
As you can see in reality neither type of exercise is superior, each have their place in the training room. If you need help with program design and exercise selection feel free to email one of the members of the motive8 north personal training team and we will be glad to help.