Wellcultured - A men's fashion, fitness, sex, and lifestyle magazine.

Search for:

5 Stupid Exercises you should stop doing

_{Written by admin, Sunday, October 28th, 2012 in Culture, Featured, Fitness}

There are a lot of stupid exercises you can do in the gym — such exercises end up wasting your time more than building muscle or burning fat. Here are five examples.

Anything with a Smith Machine

◄ Back

Next ►

Picture 4 of 5

With the possible (and almost entirely useless!) exception of standing calf raises, smith machines are absolute trash and do not have any purpose other than taking up space in a gym. Smith machines prohibit the development of stabilizer muscles while simultaneously restricting movement to an awkward trajectory, rendering every exercise awkward, imprecise, and slightly unsafe. Unless you want to dick around with standing calf raises for some reason, there is no reason to ever touch a smith machine.

Tags: barbell, cable fly, exercises, smith machine, squat, stupid, tricep extension, waste of time, weight lifting

5 Responses to 5 Stupid Exercises you should stop doing

Bored says:

January 19, 2013 at 11:02 am

Well written. I would have to agree. I try to not do exercises that will put me in a crazy position. I hate to see people doing some of this shit. Another that comes to mind is the behind the head lat pull down. I still see it done and sure don’t know why. I am in the mode of protecting my joints. I have a slap tear that has been a huge problem because of a crazy ROM I chose one day. Thanks for the article.

Reply
Louis Jackson says:

February 23, 2013 at 11:59 pm

I agree with most of the exercises included in this list, especially the Smith machine. The more research I do, the more I realize that there’s really no good use for this machine. I don’t know how some of these exercises survive and make it into workouts this day in time.

Reply
Skip Wilson says:

May 21, 2014 at 8:21 pm

The smith machine is fine for inverted rows. Pullups or chinups are sometimes possible too, depending on the amount of head clearance.

Reply
JL Green says:

August 11, 2015 at 9:10 pm

Uh, rows are not for the biceps. They are for the back muscles. In that they involve pulling rather than pressing, they affect the biceps but that is certainly not their first intention.

Reply