Weight Training Tips and Articles

Building More Shoulder Width

May 2, 2008 on 5:42 am | In Proper Lifting Form, Weight Training Exercises, Shoulders, Build Muscle |

  Building wider shoulders is very important to anybody who’s into weight training or bodybuilding. Added shoulder width will help create a Herculean physique to give your body a look of strength and power. It will also give the illusion of a smaller waist, even if you don’t decrease the size of your midsection. Because of this you should focus on building more shoulder width during your deltoid workouts.

  The shoulders are made up of 3 separate muscle attachments, or heads. These are the front, side, and rear heads of the deltoids. To build wider shoulders you need to build the side deltoid head. Most overhead press exercises target the front deltoids more than the side delts. If you use dumbbells to do your overhead presses you’ll involve your side deltoids more because you can lower the weights to the sides of your head. To really isolate the side deltoid heads you need to do side lateral raises. To do them you simply stand, or sit, with a dumbbell in each hand with the palms facing you and raise the weights away from your body in an arcing motion until you arms are parellel to the floor. It sound easy enough, but there are a few things you can do to make them more effective. One is that you should keep the front of your hands tilted downward a bit like if you were pouring from a pitcher. ou should also keep a slight bend in the elbows. ou can do side lateral raises with dumbbells, cables, or machines.

  To really add some intensity to your shoulder workouts you should try some supersets of side lateral raises followed immediately by dumbbell presses. This pre exhaust technique will give you that pump that you need for more muscle growth.

  Since you may get enough work for your front delts from chest exercises you’ll probably want do more sets for your side delts during your workouts. Give it a little time and you’ll build that shoulder width.