When programming for strength, exercise selection is important. To improve overall strength, you want to select primarily exercises that are multi-joint compound movements that can be heavily loaded; your most bang for your buck, movements. These exercises are referred to as your primary lifts. Improving strength in a single movement is not enough, you want to train in multiple planes of movement. These movements include a horizontal push, horizontal pull, vertical push, vertical pull, a squat, a lift from the ground and a carry. When selecting your primary lifts, you want to choose a compound movement from each plane that has a high potential loading. For those of you who prefer, no fuss, basic sessions or have particular time constraints, a program built entirely upon primary lifts is an acceptable choice. However, some of you may feel when sticking to solely primary lifts, some body parts may lag behind and cause issues in progressing to higher loads or may simply wish to include more volume, to either improve your strength further or to produce hypertrophy. If this is the case, there is another category of lifts available. Assistance lifts, as the name suggests are a number of isolation exercises or compound movements with lesser load potentials, that are selected to assist in improving your primary lifts and to add targeted volume to your programming. These lifts are categorised by body part, select body parts that are appropriate to the primary lifts you are wishing to improve.
Below is a list of possible primary and assistance lifts, what plane of movement they operate in and what body parts they incorporate. For instructionals on how to complete these movements, bodybuilding.com, t-nation and elitefts, offer comprehensive and in-depth articles and instructionals on how to complete many of these movements with proper form.
PRIMARY LIFTS
HORIZONTAL PUSH
-Barbell/dumbbell Incline bench press, barbell/dumbbell flat bench press, barbell/dumbbell decline bench press, barbell/dumbbell floor press, dips.
HORIZONTAL PULL
-Bent-over row, Pendlay row, bench row, t-bar row.
VERTICAL PUSH
-Military press, overhead press, push press, Standing dumbbell shoulder press.
VERTICAL PULL
-Wide grip pronated pull-up, medium grip supinated pull-up, neutral grip pull-up.
SQUAT
-Front squat, Zercher squat, back squat, box squat.
LIFT FROM GROUND
-Straight leg deadlift, single leg straight leg deadlift, Romanian deadlift, rack pulls, Dumbbll deadlifts, deficit deadlifts, sumo deadlift, snatch grip deadlift, atlas stone.
CARRY
-Farmers carry, Zercher carry, overhead carry, single arm carry.
ASSISTANCE LIFTS
BICEPS
-Zotttman curl, incline curl, preacher curl, isolation curl, hammer curl, Eazy bar/DB/BB curl, medium grip supinated pull-ups, close grip pronated pull-ups, medium grip neutral pull-ups.
TRICEPS
-Tricep kickbacks, overhead tricep extension, tricep extension, skull crushers, dips, close grip bench press, board press, med-ball push-ups, diamond push-ups.
FOREARMS
-Plate pinches, fat gripz, hangs, pronated/supinated wrist curls.
SHOULDERS
-Arnold press, Cuban press, single arm shoulder press, neutral grip shoulder press, seated shoulder press, lateral raise, seated lateral raise, 1 ½ lateral raise, front raise, rear delt raise, face pulls, upright row, landmine press.
LOWER BACK
-Back extensions, good mornings, seated good mornings, deficit deadlifts.
UPPER BACK
-Pull-up variations, lat pulldown variations, seated row variations, bent over row, single arm bent over row, Kroc row, inverted row, t-bar row, prone incline rows, prone incline flys, band pull-a-parts, Blackburn, YWTIs (see Joe DeFranco’s youtube channel for instructionals), face pulls, cable crossovers.
TRAPS
-Shrugs, single arm shrugs, overhead shrug, snatch grip barbell high pull.
QUADS
-Split squat, Bulgarian split squats, lunges, reverse lunges, step ups, knee extensions, leg press, piston squat, goblet squat, prowler push.
HAMSTRINGS
-Nordic hamstring curl, prone hamstring curl, seated hamstring curl, Romanian deadlift, straight leg deadlift, single leg straight leg deadlift, pull through, kettlebell swing, swiss ball hamstring curls, good mornings, seated good mornings, glute ham raise.
CALVES
-Donkey calf raises, seated calf raises, single leg calf raises, calf raises, weighted heel raised walks.
GLUTES/ABDUCTORS
-Frog pumps, hip thrusts, banded side steps, side lunge, prone heel raises, glute bridge, prowler push.
CORE
-V-sits, toe touches, crunches, side crunches, sit-ups, weighted sit-ups, sprinters sit-ups, Turkish get up, Russain twist, candlesticks, hanging knee raises, hanging leg raises, hanging toes to bar, bicycles, chest touches from push up position, mountain climbers, Brazilian crunches, rollouts, bridge, single leg bridge, single arm bridge, side bridge, Torsonator twist, side bends, saucer holds.