Should you do isolation or compound exercises first in a workout? If you are focused on strength alone in a workout then you should do your compound exercises first in your workout and this involves the warmup. If however you are focusing on more bodybuilding style then you can warm up or pre exhaust your muscles with isolation exercises first.
When you first start working out in the gym you are going to come across a range of exercises, this will be to the point of information overload. There are hundreds of exercises and thousands of ways to apply them to your workout based on goals, training level and specific characteristics.
The two main categories of exercises that you will come across are grouped as compound exercises and isolation exercises (not to be confused with accessory exercises).
Before you read further and look to decide how you should order these exercises and whether you should do isolation or compound exercises first in a workout there is something that you need to be aware of.
Every single person will have different aims/goals from their training sessions and also have very different genetics, therefore what works for one person is of no guarantee to work for someone else following the exact same process.
This is important to note as choosing the order of exercises and exercise selection will depend on what your individual training goal is and also what your personal characteristics are. This article will therefore act as a guide for exercise selection rather than a prescribed routine.
Table of Contents
What Are Compound Exercises
Compound exercises are multi joint exercises that recruit more than one muscle group. It’s important to think of compound exercises in terms of movements because it’s the movements that engage multiple joints and ultimately muscle groups.
The key compound movements are the following:
- Upper body horizontal push
- Upper body vertical push
- Upper body horizontal pull
- Upper body horizontal pull
- Squat
- Hip hinge
- Lunge
- Weighted Carry
When looking at compound exercises the majority will fall into this category.
Compound Exercise Examples
Now that you have the list of movements it’s easy to start programming a routing with these in mind, the following are key compound exercises along with the muscle group that they work.
- Bench press, Incline bench press, decline bench press, parallel bar dips.
Primary muscle group – chest. Secondary muscle groups – shoulders and triceps - Overhead press
Primary muscle group – shoulders. Secondary muscle group – triceps - Barbell row, dumbbell row, t-bar row
Primary muscle group – back (lats, rhomboids, lower traps). Secondary muscle group – biceps and rear delts - Pullups, lat pulldowns, cable/machine pullover
Primary muscle group – back (lats). Secondary muscle group – biceps - Back squat, front squat
Primary muscle group – legs (quads and hamstrings). Secondary muscle group – glutes. - Deadlift, stiff leg deadlift
Primary muscle group – Back (lower back known as erector spinae). Secondary muscle group – glutes, hamstrings and back (traps, thoracic spinae, rhomboids) - Lunge, reverse lunge
The primary and secondary muscles are interchangeable in this and are the following – legs (hamstring, quads and glutes) - Farmers Walks
Primary muscle group – posterior chain and core (erectors, traps, abs and lower back). Secondary muscle group – forearms, calves and stabilizing muscles.
These are the majority of your key compound movements and as you can see each has a specific muscle group that acts as the primary active muscle during the exercise and then secondary muscles that support the movement.
Compound movements should make up the core of your training, your should focus every session on not only getting stronger in these lifts but also in perfecting your form and technique to extend your training longevity.
I mention form and technique because with more muscle groups and joints involved in a movement your risk of injury from incorrect form increases. I’m not trying to scare people away from doing these but just a general reminder that form is essential when working out.
What Are Isolation Exercises
Isolation exercises are single joint movements that target a single muscle group, some isolation exercises even go as far as targeting a single head of a particular muscle group.
Unlike compound movements which train a range of muscle groups an isolation exercise as the name suggests focuses on one single muscle group for the purpose of more muscle fibre recruitment, cell swelling and to get a better pump.
Now when i say more muscle fibre recruitment that is not to say that is completely accurate, a heavy dumbbell chest press will recruit more fibres for the chest than a dumbbell fly will. What it will do however is target muscle groups that are often under stimulated if you just focus on compound lifts.
Unlike with the compound exercises earlier I’m not going to add a list for isolation exercises because the list is pretty much endless so what i will say is think of an exercises that is single joint and can only be done by using a single muscle group.
A seated preacher curl for example will only let you move the elbow joint by contracting the bicep and moving your forearm up and down. This single joint movement means that the bicep is the only active muscle group for the duration, you can’t cheat and use momentum or help bring other muscle groups in to assist the movement.
Should You Do Isolation or Compound Exercises First in a Workout
I would hope that this goes without saying however in general one is not better than the other when it comes to training isolation or compound exercises. There are specific aims and goals when you use each in your routine and therefore should not be branded as better or worse, essential or not necessary.
You need to take personal opinion out of the equation when it comes to exercise selection and use logical training methodology. Therefore I’m going to give two examples for you to base your plan on and these are instances when you should use compound exercises first in a workout or when you should use isolation exercises first in a workout.
When Should You Use Compound Exercises First in a Workout
When arranging your workout it’s important to note that you should do an overall warm up to get blood flowing and also a mobility circuit to warm up the joints for the target muscle groups you should be training.
That applies to any weight training based workout. For strength based training sessions when your focus is on increasing strength through the key compound movements then you order these first in your workout.
The reason for this is because you want to warm up for the lift using the movement pattern that you will be performing. In any powerlifting based competition and training session you perform the movement with the bar alone for a few sets regardless of how strong you are.
The reason for this is to activate the muscle groups that you will be targeting as well as getting into the correct movement pattern before working up to heavier weights. Using an isolation exercise first to warm up the target muscle will not give you the mechanical crossover as using the actual movement will.
When Should You Use Isolation Exercises First in a Workout
There are two reasons why you would use isolation exercises first in a workout and both are for muscle building and hypertrophy purposes.
The first is to warm up a specific muscle group to increase the mind muscle connection when it comes to a compound movement. A pec fly for example will pump blood into your chest so that when you then do a version of a bench press you will feel the working muscle more which means you can better activate the muscle fibres.
Sometimes it’s hard to get a mind muscle connection and minimize secondary muscle groups taking over during a movement so this is a great technique to get blood into the desired working muscle and create a mind muscle connection.
The second reason for placing an isolation exercise first in a workout is to pre exhaust a muscle group before doing your compound movements.
What you’ll notice is that compound movements are still the main focus of a workout even when prioritizing something else as the first exercise and this is because of the muscle building and strength potential that comes from compound movements
Pre-exhausting a muscle group means that you will be able to fully fatigue the muscle fibres of your target muscle group and similar to getting the mind muscle connection that is needed.
When doing a compound movement fresh it’s easy for other muscle groups to assist the movement however when a muscle group is already pre exhausted then it will fatigue within your set rep target without the other muscle groups taking over.
Are Isolation Exercises Worth It
I’ve mentioned how essential compound movements are when building muscle, strength and ultimately a physique however it’s worth noting that isolation exercises are still worth it.
Compound movements will build the foundation of your physique however isolation exercises are what will help you work under stimulated muscle groups and build an overall physique with no weak points.
I read in Arnold Schwarzenegger’s book that he famously built the foundation of his physique with heavy compound exercises in basic gymnasiums in Austria however once he got to Germany and had access to machines that would target specific muscle groups that he really started to take his physique to the next level.
Whilst compound exercises will build a solid foundation and should be the focus for 80% of your training plans, adding in isolation exercises will really bring your physique to another level and accelerate your progress in the gym as long as you don’t reverse the process and prioritize isolation exercises for 80% of your training plans.
You should also check out:
How to use progressive overload for isolation exercises
Tips for exercise ordering
What Next
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