Yesterday I received a very simple email that asked me, “if you could perform only five exercises in the gym, what would they be?”

The first three came to mind without even blinking. But what exercises constitute the second tier for building muscle mass? I’m not sure, because beyond the “big 3”, there’s so many potential exercises. I needed to answer the question somehow, though, so I decided on 5 exercises. My final picks were as follows:

1) Deadlift
2) Squat
3) Bench Press
4) Pull-Up
5) Military Press

#4 and #5 were definitely a toss-up, as there are many other logical options: rows, lunges, dips, etc, etc.