Includes but not limited to the following: support to select multiple muscle groups, support to create custom muscle & sub-muscles, primary vs secondary muscles w/ customisation on weight allocation for muscle related metrics (e.g. set count)
Benjamin Ng
last week
7
Co
Coco3 weeks ago
Agreed. Some exercises engage both primary and secondary (support) muscles, which may belong to different muscle groups. Currently, when creating a custom exercise, only one muscle group can be selected, with multiple individual muscles limited to that group. Selecting a different muscle group clears any previous muscle selections. Allowing users to select all targeted muscles across multiple muscle groups, without this restriction, could better reflect how exercises work in practice and improve the accuracy of exercise definitions.
Benjamin Ng3 weeks ago
Currently, it's only limited to 1 muscle group to prevent double counting in the muscle distribution tracking. But I think it would be feasible to have a secondary option which would allow you to select multiple muscles that is separate from the primary one and have an option to exclude secondary muscles in the muscle distribution.
Benjamin Ng3 weeks ago
Though I'm curious if your preference is to have it count towards both muscle groups or only the primary one in the muscle distribution breakdown? Personally I would only include the primary one.
Co
Coco3 weeks ago
The ratio of the secondary muscles counting in the distribution breakdown could be considered lowered / proportionate but not voided considering the importance of their involvement in most exercises such as compound lift like deadlift.
Benjamin Ng3 weeks ago
So like in the case of the deadlift, if the primary muscle is back and the secondary is legs, 1 completed set would be something like +1 set for back and +0.5 set for legs in the muscle distribution?
Co
Coco2 weeks ago
Further to my initial comment, lots of sources not only quote primary and secondary movers but stabilizers as well. So in the example of the deadlift, we could consider: primary movers (e.g. glutes, hamstrings) that receive the largest share of the set’s volume, secondary movers (e.g. quads) that receive a smaller share and stabilizers (e.g. spinal erectors, lats, core) that receive an even smaller, dampened share.
Conceptually, one deadlift set might translate to something like:
~0.4–0.5 set-equivalent to glutes
~0.3–0.4 to hamstrings
~0.1–0.2 to quads
~0.1 or less to back/core as stabilizers
The key idea is that no muscle gets a “full set” unless it is doing most of the mechanical work and stabilizers shouldn’t be counted the same way as prime movers. The unit being distributed is the work of the set, not the set itself, which means the approach will have to be tuned for each exercise that is not done in isolation.
Maybe an option is to give a table for each exercise where the user can specify how much the contribution is for the engaged muscles.
Benjamin Ng2 weeks ago
Got it, thanks for the detailed explanation. From a UX perspective, it might feel a bit overwhelming, especially since exact percentages can be hard to quantify and breakdowns might become less predictable. That said, I understand the intention, will take this into consideration.
