Strength coach and Athlean-X founder Jeff Cavaliere C.S.C.S. makes plenty of YouTube content in which he lists and ranks the exercises he thinks are most effective and beneficial for sustainable muscle growth—but he also does the opposite. In a new video, Cavaliere reveals the seven exercises that he has permanently retired from his own workout routine for a variety of reasons, and which you might want to think about removing from your own training regimen.
Decline bench press
“I don’t like the way I feel when I do this exercise,” says Cavaliere. “As soon as I assume that position, the blood rushes to my head and I worry more about how I’m feeling or how good I’m not feeling instead of the exercise I’m doing.” He recommends dips and high-low crossovers as alternatives which will help you hit the same lower chest area.
Lying hamstring curls
Cavaliere stopped doing this one after it started to cause him back pain, but he also finds it to be a biomechanically inefficient way of training hammies. “You’re just reinforcing overactivation on the hip flexors,” he says. “With that overactivation comes oftentimes spasm of the lower back because those hip flexors are attached to the lumbar spine.”
Muscleups
This popular albeit difficult-to-master calisthenics staple isn’t bad per se, but Cavaliere has an issue with the transition between different stages of the exercise. “You’ve got to go through a hell of a lot of internal shoulder rotation,” he says. “For me, with two torn labrums, this exercise has never felt comfortable.”
Bicep pushups
“There is no pushup that actually works the biceps to any significant degree, or at least more than it works the triceps,” sats Cavaliere, who recommends doing a classic bicep curl instead.
Snatches
Cavaliere has no problem with the snatch. Rather, he respects it for the Olympic-level movement that it is, and acknowledges that his own shoulder mobility problems would make it unsafe personally. But he believes it definitely has value if you do it properly. “In order to do this mechanically correct, you’d better put in a lot of time and reps,” he says.
Forward lunges
Again, this isn’t necessarily a bad exercise for everyone: but if you have knee pain, then you might want to avoid this. Cavaliere does the backward lunge instead, eliminating that problem.
Single-armed dumbbell row
Cavaliere says he has sustained two hernias and knows several other people who have had the same injury as a result of the positioning in the one-arm DB row. He recommends placing both feet firmly on the ground instead of half kneeling on the bench in order to stop worrying about the asymmetrical stresses of the exercises.
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