5 Biggest Time Wasting Exercises still Popular in the Gym











5 Biggest Time Wasting Exercises still Popular in the Gym

The most common reason people mention for not working out is the lack of time. Considering the fact that how valuable your time is, you should spend it wisely. This is especially important while you are working out as you want to make use of the limited time your have for working out as efficiently as possible.

Download our free health and fitness app with hundreds of workouts. Just click here

Most of us are just working out to stay in our best shape and be physically fit to perform our daily task. To attain this goal we have to choose our exercises very carefully so that we do not waste our time. Now if we were professional athlete where our job involves working out we will choose our exercises very differently. However most of us are not professional athletes and considering the modern past paced lifestyle we only have a limited time to spend in the gym, therefore we should select the exercises which give us the best bang for the time we spend in the gym.

We humans have the tendency of looking at others for reference. We decide to perform the exercises we see others perform in the gym and the most obvious people to look after are professional athletes. We see what they are performing then we just copy them. Unfortunately the training of Arnold Schwarzenegger will be very different from the training for an average Joe in the gym who just wants to be fit. This phenomenon has resulted in a lot of not so useful exercises now being quite popular in the gym. In this article we discuss the 5 popular exercises people perform in the gym, which are not very useful considering the amount of time you have to spend performing them.

Bicep Curls: Probably the most popular exercise in the gym, this exercise is so popular that it has become the poster boy for strength training. Everybody includes this in their workout program; in fact there are a lot of people whose full workout program revolves around bicep curls. The only exercise they care about is the bicep curl, after all who does not want to show off those big bulging biceps.

Unfortunately, bicep curl is a big time waster as this exercise only targets your biceps, which is a very small muscle group, whose only function is to bent your arm at the elbow and rotate it. Not a great exercise for muscle gain or functional performance. Now if you are a seasoned body builder who is finding it hard to grow your already big biceps, sure you can include bicep curls. For the beginners and the others who are more interested in being fit rather than look big, there are other much better options, such as the chin ups or T-Bar rows, which not only target your biceps but also your back. Moreover these movements are far more functional than bicep curls and therefore provide us benefit in our daily life.

Wrist Curls: One of the sign of manliness quoted by women is the strong forearms, with veins popping out. As a result a lot of guys include wrist curls in their program to grow their forearms. Using wrist curls to grow your forearms is a big waste of time.

Now if you had an injury to your forearm or wrist and need to improve your grip then sure include wrist curls as they will be easy enough for you to start rebuilding your strength, however if you are not injured then performing wrist curls is just not worth your time. There are much better options for you. Deadlifts are a great way to build your forearms and the good thing is that deadlifts engage nearly your full body and makes you strong overall thus providing a lot of benefit in a short amount of time. The other option you have is to perform farmer’s walk, this exercise will not only make your forearms strong but also your full arm, shoulders and core.

Shrugs: Shrugs are generally performed by bodybuilders to build thick trapezoid muscles over your shoulders. Thick trapezoid muscles are definitely a sign of athleticism and therefore a lot of us include shrugs in our program. As such shrugs are a really good exercise for building those traps but the problem is that this exercise only engages your traps.

Trapezoids generally are quite easy to develop with other exercises. Any pulling exercise will hit your traps as most of the pulling exercises include the movement of shrugs anyways. If you realize that your trapezoids are not growing as much as you wish then you can definitely include shrugs in your program but for the rest of us deadlifts, rows and pull ups will do the job od building those thick traps.

Tricep Kickbacks: Tricep kickbacks as an exercise are used for build, as the name suggests, triceps. Just as in the case of bicep curls, this exercise only targets the triceps and hence for someone who is mostly interested in developing overall fitness, it is a big waste of time. There are far better options to target your triceps such as dips, bench press and shoulder press. These exercises mostly are categorized as chest exercises, however they also make your triceps really hard and if you are pressed for time then you can skip tricep kick backs and instead perform these exercises.

Even if you are having difficulty building your triceps and want to include a few sets of triceps isolation exercises, tricep kickback is not the best exercise. In order to build muscles you need to lift heavy. The problem with tricep kickback is that it places you in such a position that you will not be able to lift heavy weights over the full range of motion. Lifting lightweights is not going you the benefits .anyways

Cable Abductors and Adductors: These exercise are mainly use to strengthen your abductor and adductor muscles, which are the muscles on the inner and outer thigh. I never understood why these exercises got popular as these exercises do not seem to be of any use. These is no functional benefits in opening and closing your groin and there seems to be no benefit in terms of aesthetics as well as the abductor and adductor muscles are not that visible.

Most probably these exercises got popular amongst women to tone their thighs. Unfortunately there is now consensuses in the fitness community that we cannot spot reduce fat. So don’t waste your precious time performing these exercises, Stick to squats and lunges and you will make a much better use of your time.

Download our free health and fitness app with hundreds of workouts. Just click here

Just because others are performing a certain exercise does not make that exercise suitable for you. Get out of the monkey see monkey do mentality and use your time wisely by choosing functional compound movements in your workout which will give you the best bang for the time you spend in the gym. You time is your biggest asset spend it wisely.