The Power of Variation: How Changing Up Exercises Keeps Clients Engaged and Gets Results
Let’s talk about push-ups. A movement so foundational, it's practically synonymous with fitness itself. But if you think push-ups are just about banging out reps in the same way every session, you're missing the real magic.
At NSFTA, we challenge the status quo—and here's one place where I think the industry gets it wrong. Too many coaches get locked into dogma. They treat specificity like it’s a rigid box rather than a guiding principle with flexibility. But specificity doesn’t mean doing the same lift, the same way, forever. It means training a pattern, a stimulus, a demand.
And here's where variation becomes a superpower.
Think about this: You’re working with a client whose goal is to increase their bench press. Rather than chasing 185lbs every week, we cycle through a series of horizontal pushing patterns—push-ups, close-grip presses, DB chest presses, cable presses, even the overlooked Svend press. We program intelligently, apply progressive overload, and most importantly—we get them strong across the pattern, not just the single lift.
Six weeks later, we retest that 185 bench. Guess what? It’s moving better. Not because we hammered the same barbell over and over again, but because we trained the pattern in novel ways that challenged the musculature, stabilized supporting structures, and improved neuromuscular efficiency.
It’s not just anecdotal either.
Research from Fonseca et al. (2014) showed that incorporating exercise variation, even within the same muscle group, resulted in greater hypertrophy and strength gains than fixed-repetition routines. This isn’t fluff—this is science backing what seasoned coaches know instinctively: variation breeds adaptation.
“Muscle confusion” isn’t a fad phrase—it’s a biological reality. The human body adapts to repeated stimulus. Variation keeps that stimulus effective.
Now add in the psychological element. Clients get bored. Monotony kills motivation. But when you introduce a new challenge—pause push-ups, Spiderman push-ups, T-turns, clapping push-ups—you're not just progressing the movement. You’re re-engaging the mind. You're giving them something fresh, while still working toward the same goal.
Progress doesn’t have to be linear. It has to be consistent.
At NSFTA, we believe in training smarter. You can have specificity and variety. You can chase adaptation without boredom. And you can get results without relying on the same movement over and over and over again.
Let’s stop training exercises. Let’s train people.
Citations
Fonseca, R. M., Roschel, H., Tricoli, V., de Souza, E. O., Wilson, J. M., Laurentino, G. C., ... & Aoki, M. S. (2014). Changes in exercises are more effective than in loading schemes to improve muscle strength. Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research, 28(11), 3085–3092. https://doi.org/10.1519/JSC.0000000000000497
