Recently, through the work of popular fitness movements such as CrossFit and its many imitators, the previously unexplored concept of randomized training has received a significant amount of popularity throughout the fitness community.
This popularity is not without reason- randomized workouts have significant benefits, but like all approaches, random training also has its drawbacks.
In this article, I’ll compare and contrast random versus structured approaches to training, and then I’ll summarize by offering a few approaches that provide the benefits of both while simultaneously minimizing the drawbacks.
Benefits of Randomized Approaches “Crossfitters” enjoy random workouts, and I think you will too- here’s why: 1) That new car smell: To borrow a great phrase from my client Dr. Jeffrey Bernstein, there’s a palpable sense of renewal at the prospect of a new workout program that you plan to start on Monday In a sense, randomized training gives you that “New car smell” every single workout.
Needless to say, if you’re consistent, you’ll make more progress than your inconsistent peers, even if what they’re doing is “Better” or “Smarter” or “More scientific” than what you’re doing.
2) Specificity to random and/or varied professional or athletic needs: Some professions, avocations, and sport disciplines require or desire a generalized, highly varied, almost random set of physical attributes and motor qualities.
Drawbacks of Randomized Approaches Despite the significant benefits I’ve just described, random training also has its drawbacks.
The most significant of these shortcomings are as follows: 1) Constant soreness: If you squat anywhere between one and thrice a week, the soreness that you initially experience during your first handful of workouts soon becomes all but a distant memory as your body’s adaptive systems and resources solve this particular Rubik’s Cube.
On the other hand, the more random your training is, the more often you’ll be sore- the random nature of the physical challenges you experience makes it far more difficult for you to habituate.
If you’re an in-season athlete, or belong to a highly physical profession that presents randomized challenges, you don’t really want to be sore all the time.
2) Poor learning curve: In order to learn challenging and complex motor tasks, it’d be to your advantage to do them often.
Learning requires frequent repetition, and motor learning is no exception to this rule.
If your training is completely random, you’ll never have enough repetition to sustain the learning curve.
3) Limited specificity: This third point somewhat overlaps with the previous two points, but to put a sharper edge on it, powerlifters need to do their 3 competitive lifts, swimmers need to swim, and climbers need to climb.
If you want to be great at pull-ups, you need to work them hard- a lot.
Obviously, a completely randomized approach doesn’t accommodate this need.
Are a few suggestions for doing just that: Use A Structured Exercise List With Random Loading Parameters If you’ve determined that a particular exercise tends to move you closer toward your goals, you should probably do that exercise on a regular and relatively frequent basis.
One possible drawback of regular frequency is neural habituation and slowed progress as your nervous system “Figures out” how to deal with that particular form of stress.
The solution to this, which was discovered eons ago by athletes in a wide number of sports, is to randomize the character and/or specific attributes of that exercise stress.
If your needs require a variation on this theme, go ahead and apply your creative elbow grease to the situation.
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