mechanism for growth.

Metabolite summation, the last likely growth mechanism yet to be

mentioned, is probably not best done by either compounds or isolation. For example, you can get
a hell of a burn in your triceps doing cable extensions for high reps and short rests, but have you
ever done a drop set on the assisted dip machine? On metabolites, I’d say the two approaches are
tied.

b.) Compound moves

moves are likely more effective
effective on average.

Because compounds probably cause more damage, more tension, and more stretching under
load, they are probably on average more effective at muscle growth than isolations. Sure, there
are exceptions like the biceps, but if you
y ou had to pick ONLY compounds or ONLY isolations to
train with for six months, would you really just do flyes for chest and leg extensions for quads vs.
incline benches and high bar squats? And what the hell would you do for back training if you
could only do isolations?!?

c.) Compound moves are highly efficient.

Because they hit multiple muscles at the same time, compound moves are way more efficient.
Doing a row hits pretty much every muscle in the back, and even hits the rear delts and biceps
some. How many isolation exercises would it take you to replicate the stimulus of JUST bent
rows? It baffles the mind.

And the important note

note here is that efficiency impacts
impacts recovery. Even if you say “I want the
the best
stimulus and I don’t care how long I’m at the gym,” the very act of being at the gym for hours
longer than you need to is itself fatiguing and will interfere with gains.

In summary, we shouldn’t always be looking to change every exercise into more of an isolation
move. In fact, it could be said that, ideally, we SHOULD be prioritizing compounds UNLESS
there is a reason to choose isolations.
i solations. So, what are those reasons?

When to consider altering an exercise for more isolation (or switching

switching to another movement
movement that
isolates more):

1.) Systemic fatigue is high but you still have local work to do

Compound moves create a lot of systemic fatigue, mostly because they are just fucking hard!
Sometimes, you are getting close to going overboard on fatigue but you still need to hit some
muscles. In that case, you might choose more isolation moves that fatigue less.

For example, when powerlifters train for hypertrophy, they will base most of their chest work
around presses. But there are only so many presses you ca n do, especially in the context of
squats, deadlits, and the other compounds used to improve them over the training week. In fact,
sometimes the fatigue can even be pretty local to just the shoulder joints from all those presses.

But when you need more chest work even after hitting your limit on presses, some dumbbell or
cable flyes might come in very handy!

2.) Axial loading MRV restricting from doing more compounds