"What Do You Mean I Should Do Accessories?"

It’s another day at the gym. You’ve just squatted, benched and deadlifted. Your nervous system is spent, but you’re feeling great about powerlifting overall. 2 hours into your session, the thought of having to stay even another 15 minutes to do accessories is even less enticing than watching something heat in a microwave for 3 consecutive minutes--well, maybe not that, but you get me, right? You may be asking yourself, “Why would I need to do accessories if I’m hitting my numbers?”.

You see. Here’s the thing: we want our bodies to be most prepared for any activity demands that come our way. In this case, let’s discuss strictly powerlifting. Last week, you breezed through your program and absolutely crushed it! This week, it was hard to get enough sleep because of work and you didn’t have as much time to eat. Your top set targets are only slightly greater than the previous week, but holy shit does that bar feel heavy!

The only thing certain about training is that it is uncertain how we will perform on any given day! Our capacity to lift is determined by factors other than training volume, such as sleep quality, diet and stress. When those other factors are compromised, it’s even more important to ensure that our movement patterns are in tip top shape! What do I mean by this? “Neurons that fire together, wire together”, as said by numerous lecturers, but its origin lies with neuroscientist, Donald Hebb. The source isn’t so important, but what we must understand is that our body parts are connected to one another to perform various movements. It may be difficult to understand how an activity like a squat where both sides are being used “equally”, but even with a bilateral exercise, it is important to have unilateral movement capabilities resilient enough to combat tissue failure. Referring back to my point from before regarding decreased training capacity, it would be a shame if the intensity was greater and your left gluteus medius was unable to help you out because it’s weaker than the right and was being compensated for this whole time. This is when injury can result and way worse than spending a few extra minutes to work on single limb accessories. 

Some of you might be diligent about accessories already! If that is you, great! If not, performing exercises like single leg glute bridges, Bulgarian split squats, etc., may be more helpful in the long run than you think and, to be honest, shouldn’t take up too much of your time. Performing them 2-3 times/week should do the trick to keep the muscles you’ll need to get the bar off your chest (triceps/deltoids), the bar to fully lockout (glute bridges) or come out strongly from the hole (split squats).

Note: I’m a transparent person. I can’t say that accessories will eradicate all likelihood of getting injured, but they will make it considerably less likely to happen. Let’s get those accessories in there!

Reference: Suchomel TJ, Nimphius S, Bellon CR, Stone MH. The Importance of Muscular Strength: Training Considerations. Sports Med. 2018 Apr;48(4):765-785. doi: 10.1007/s40279-018-0862-z. PMID: 29372481.