lagging chest...

[michael1]

Hi buds!

Working out for several years now and pumped almost a 100 lbs of mass naturally on here...

But .. i am still having very much problem getting a serious pec development.. i think i have tried everything but the chest respons minimally ...

Any thoughts?

[drew]

Try this workout:

Incline Bench:

Dumbbell Press (6-8 reps x 4 sets)
Dumbbell Fly (6-8 reps x 4 sets)

Flat Bench:

Dumbbell Press (6-8 reps x 4 sets)

Decline Bench:

Dumbbell Press (6-8 reps x 4 sets)
Dumbbell Fly (6-8 reps x 4 sets)

On the decline fly, the form is to start in a basically crucifix position with your arms as far out and back as possible. In one solid movement without bending your arms bring the weights together over your crotch then return to start.

The weight for each set of each exercise should be the max that you can do while maintaining correct form. You should be able to barely get to 8 reps. 1-6 should be ok, then 7 takes some effort, and 8 should just about max you out. If you can keep going to 10 and above you're doing too little weight. If you can't make it to 6 or more with proper form (and without pulling your back off the bench) then you're doing too much.

In the low position don't ever let your elbows bend past 90 degrees (except for on the decline press where you can stretch a little further down). In the up position you want your arms to be vertical. Do NOT bring the weights together or let them touch.

Breathe in deep breaths on the way down and blow out good hard breaths on the way up.

-------------
DO NOT WORK TRIS ON CHEST DAY

This just screws you out of a good chest workout and a good tricep workout. Work bis and tris together on a single day and make sure that day is at least 2 days on either side of your chest day.

-------------------------------
On a different day, do four to five sets of cable crossovers at the 10-16 rep per set range.


---------------

Do this every week, eat enough protein and calories, and work your legs really hard, and your chest should start to thicken up.

[drew]

Oh yeah and on the incline fly, the form is to hold the weights in front of your chest but not in front of or over your head, with them almost touching and your wrists and elbows bent so that it's the equivalent of bear-hugging a big tree. The tree is too big for you to get your hands (with weights) to meet all the way, but you can get close.

Start with them in the together position, then extend them down and out, but DO NOT unbend your wrists or elbows. Your arms do not change position at all. This means you NEVER straighten out your arms at all, even at the lowest position.

Open your bear hug until you can't widen it out anymore, then bring the weights back together. Again don't let yourself bottom out and don't let the weights touch during the duration of the set.

Remember to keep the arc of motion somewhere around the bottom of your pecs/very top of your abs. Don't let them (and there's a natural tendency for this) come up so you're doing your fly above your head.

[WhoDunIt]

Good advice Drew, I tend to have the same problems, I'll make sure to follows this next time I have a chest day!

[michael1]

Thanx drew .. i surely give this workout a try !!

I have good overall mass.. but my chest...

[inm]

How is your tricep/front delt development? It may be the case you're using them for lifting on chest movements. There is a world of a difference between training the movement and training the muscles, even though to the outside looker, you're still lifting some weight. its about concentrating on activating the target muscle.

[FuzzyKB]

Originally Posted by michael1

Hi buds!

Working out for several years now and pumped almost a 100 lbs of mass naturally on here...

But .. i am still having very much problem getting a serious pec development.. i think i have tried everything but the chest respons minimally ...

Any thoughts?

[FONT="Courier New"]

Drew's Workout tips are great. . . .
Everybody has a part that is difficult. You share with our kid. What we finally did was to go to a training routine that was given me by a pro I dated a million years ago and it has worked.

Think of what a pro would look like illustrating any given chest exercise. Think of the movements of each exercise taking place in slow motion. If you do this right you will be forced to cut the weight a great deal.

Take each movement of each exercise and slow it down to a crawl:

This means that the descent of the weight from the top or full extension to your pecs will take about 5-7 seconds and the return to extension of your arms on the way back to the top of the travel should take the same. During this time you must concentrate on control 100%.

This is so extremely brutal that failure will happen very quickly and you will be forced to reduce the weight. If on flat bench for example you normally start at 220, drop the weight by 50% and then try it. Again, think absolutely of form and do not falter. Slow, Slow, Slow. . . . .

This basic technique can apply to anything, but around here we use it on pecs, bi's and tri's.

If you do this one right, you will be surprised at the effort required to do it.

The down side is that it takes longer to work a given body part, but based on our experiences around here, the results are worth the time and effort.

No single technique works for everyone, and also remember that you need to change things so that muscle fibers are unable to acclimate to any one technique or type of movement at a given velocity. This will accelerate the "tear down" and hence get results.

[WhoDunIt]

Thanks again Fuzzy!

[david marks]

It may be the case you're using them for lifting on chest movements. There is a world of a difference between training the movement and training the muscles, even though to the outside looker, you're still lifting some weight. its about concentrating on activating the target muscle.

[Lucas88]

Originally Posted by drew

Try this workout:

Incline Bench:

Dumbbell Press (6-8 reps x 4 sets)
Dumbbell Fly (6-8 reps x 4 sets)

Flat Bench:

Dumbbell Press (6-8 reps x 4 sets)

Decline Bench:

Dumbbell Press (6-8 reps x 4 sets)
Dumbbell Fly (6-8 reps x 4 sets)

On the decline fly, the form is to start in a basically crucifix position with your arms as far out and back as possible. In one solid movement without bending your arms bring the weights together over your crotch then return to start.

The weight for each set of each exercise should be the max that you can do while maintaining correct form. You should be able to barely get to 8 reps. 1-6 should be ok, then 7 takes some effort, and 8 should just about max you out. If you can keep going to 10 and above you're doing too little weight. If you can't make it to 6 or more with proper form (and without pulling your back off the bench) then you're doing too much.

In the low position don't ever let your elbows bend past 90 degrees (except for on the decline press where you can stretch a little further down). In the up position you want your arms to be vertical. Do NOT bring the weights together or let them touch.

Breathe in deep breaths on the way down and blow out good hard breaths on the way up.

-------------
DO NOT WORK TRIS ON CHEST DAY

This just screws you out of a good chest workout and a good tricep workout. Work bis and tris together on a single day and make sure that day is at least 2 days on either side of your chest day.

-------------------------------
On a different day, do four to five sets of cable crossovers at the 10-16 rep per set range.


---------------

Do this every week, eat enough protein and calories, and work your legs really hard, and your chest should start to thicken up.

Great advise of good chest development on all points. Drew's dumbbell routine is particularly good for beginners or if you're at a sticking point because it requires more stabilizer muscles to get involved and get strengthened than a bar or machine rountine does...you're putting more effort into balancing the weight as well as lifting. Without strengthening these stabilizers, you limit your bar routines. I change up routines every 4 to 6 weeks to shake things up and I see improvements in my bar routines every time I come back from a dumbbell routine.

The cable crossovers also allow you to change angles even more with just a slight shift of your body and/or upper torso, hitting the upper, middle and lower pecs with some variety of movement. I especially like the cable crossover doing the "decline movement" (only standing obviously) to REALLY hit the inner pec at the bottom of the separation...it makes that triangle between the lower pecs and the top of the abs POP.

When you're doing squats, breathe in DEEP as you lower your body...the chest is NOT just the pecs...it's the rib cage, beneath and the structure that supports the pecs. You want to expand that rib cage while breathing as much as you can on this move to get that structure to expand and grow, too (unfortunately, the younger you are the more effect this has). The squat is one of the easiest ways to force whatever growth you can get here.

Originally Posted by FuzzyKB

[FONT="Courier New"]

Drew's Workout tips are great. . . .
Everybody has a part that is difficult. You share with our kid. What we finally did was to go to a training routine that was given me by a pro I dated a million years ago and it has worked.

Think of what a pro would look like illustrating any given chest exercise. Think of the movements of each exercise taking place in slow motion. If you do this right you will be forced to cut the weight a great deal.

Take each movement of each exercise and slow it down to a crawl:

This means that the descent of the weight from the top or full extension to your pecs will take about 5-7 seconds and the return to extension of your arms on the way back to the top of the travel should take the same. During this time you must concentrate on control 100%.

This is so extremely brutal that failure will happen very quickly and you will be forced to reduce the weight. If on flat bench for example you normally start at 220, drop the weight by 50% and then try it. Again, think absolutely of form and do not falter. Slow, Slow, Slow. . . . .

This basic technique can apply to anything, but around here we use it on pecs, bi's and tri's.

If you do this one right, you will be surprised at the effort required to do it.

The down side is that it takes longer to work a given body part, but based on our experiences around here, the results are worth the time and effort.

No single technique works for everyone, and also remember that you need to change things so that muscle fibers are unable to acclimate to any one technique or type of movement at a given velocity. This will accelerate the "tear down" and hence get results.

I use FuzzyKB's "slo-mo" routine as another way to shake things up for all the major muscle groups. If you want to test this out before building a routine around it, just try it with push-ups or squats. Get an idea of how easy/hard it is to do a push-up or a squat (no weights needed if you just starting out) at a normal to fast speed (about 3 seconds to go up and 3 seconds to go down). Then, slow things down to the 5-7 second speed, FOCUS on form and the feel of the muscle and see if you can do as many push-ups as you can at normal speed.

[TheBlondMyth]

try FST-7, stretches the facia meaning more growth can occur. if the facia cannot be stretched anymore means muscle growth is limited. give it a look up on google