Weight Training Tips and Articles

Top Shoulder Exercises

Increasing the size and width of the shoulder, or deltoid, muscles is a must for anybody trying to build optimal muscularity through weight training. When you build more muscle in the shoulders it will cause your midsection to appear smaller by comparison. This is what leads to the v-shaped physique that most bodybuilders are after. If you perform the top shoulder exercises during your workouts, bigger deltoids can be yours.

Many of the top shoulder exercises involve pressing weight overhead. Other exercises for the deltoids, known as laterals, involve raising dumbbells or cables with the resistance focused on one of the three heads of the shoulder muscles. Overhead pressing exercises will help you build more thickness throughout the shoulders, while laterals will help develop every individual head of the muscles.

The military press is the most popular of the top shoulder weight training exercises to perform. They are done in a standing or seated position. You may put too much pressure on your lower back if you do heavy military presses while standing or while seated without back support. Performing military presses while seated on a bench with back support is without a doubt one of the top shoulder exercises - as long as you make sure to lower the barbell to your chin or in front of your neck. Lowering the barbell behind the neck can lead to injury, so you may want avoid doing overhead presses this way.

Dumbbell presses are another one of the best shoulder exercises. Doing overhead presses with dumbbells may be superior to doing them with a barbell since you can lower the weights to the sides of your shoulders without your head getting in the way. This will help focus more of the resistance on the side head of the shoulders. By contrast, military presses tend to work the front deltoids more. Seated dumbbell presses with back support is certainly one of the best shoulder exercises to work the entire shoulder area.

Laterals done with dumbbells or cables are the top shoulder exercises for targeting each individual head of the muscles. Considering the amount of work the front deltoids get from chest and overhead pressing exercises, you may want to focus mostly on training the side and rear delts with laterals. You’ll want your shoulders to be proportionate. If you want to increase the width of your shoulders, side laterals are the top shoulder exercise to perform. Rear laterals are the best exercise to help you build the rear heads of the shoulders to be in proper proportion to the front and side deltoids. Of course, you can do front lateral raises as well if you feel that you need to build up the front heads of the shoulder muscles. You don’t need to go very heavy when you do laterals. Just make sure that you feel the resistance in the head of the shoulder muscle that you’re training.

Many weight lifters train their trapezius muscles with their shoulders. The top shoulder exercises for building the traps are barbell and dumbbell shrugs. Upright rows are another excellent exercise for the traps.

When you perform the top shoulder exercises during your weight training routine, you’ll be well on your way to increasing the width of your upper body.

Building Bigger Shoulders

If you’re into weight training, building bigger shoulders, or deltoids, is likely one of your main goals. If you build thicker and wider shoulders your midsection will appear smaller by comparison and you’ll get that coveted v-shaped look to your physique. Performing intense shoulder weight training workouts will help you increase the size of your deltoids.

If you want to build bigger shoulders you need to do major compound exercises for them. The most popular weight training exercise for training the shoulder muscles is the military press. It’s done by basically lifting a barbell from in front of your neck straight overhead while standing or seated. Performing this exercise while standing will allow you to cheat a bit to get more weight up but may be hard on your lower back. If you do the seated version you’ll be forced to use better form. If you go to a gym you’ll likely see many lifters doing overhead presses for the shoulders where they lower the weight to behind their necks. You shouldn’t do the exercise this way because you’ll be more likely to injure your shoulder muscles.

Another great shoulder workout exercise is the dumbbell press. When you do these you can lower the dumbbells to the sides of your deltoids - which is something that you can’t do while performing overhead presses with a barbell. This will help you target the side deltoid heads to help you increase width while you’re trying to build bigger shoulders.

Performing laterals for each of the heads of the deltoids is essential for building bigger shoulders. This exercise will allow you to target each individual head of the shoulders. They can be done with dumbbells, cables, or machines. When you do laterals you should keep the elbows very slightly bent. To target the front deltoids do laterals by raising a weight straight out in front of you while alternating sides. To hit the side delts, raise weights to your sides. To hit the rear delts, bend over and raise weights until your arms are parallel to the floor. Since the front deltoids get a lot of work from chest exercises and the rear delts get a lot of work from upper back exercises, you should focus most of your attention on performing side laterals to build bigger shoulders.

Many weight trainers like to train their trapezius muscles with their shoulders. The best exercise for training the traps is the shrug. to do shrugs you simply hold a weight with your arms at you sides and shrug your shoulders up. Hold the weight at the top for a couple of seconds to really work the traps. You can do shrugs with either a barbell or dumbbells. You’ll want to use wrist straps while performing shrugs so your grip doesn’t give out because you’ll probably be able to use a lot weight on them.

Some good old fashioned weightlifting exercises such as power cleans and clean and presses are also great for building bigger shoulders. If you decide to do either of these compound movements you should start your shoulder workouts with them before moving on to overhead presses and laterals.

Building More Shoulder Width

  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 more shoulder width 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 heads of the deltoids 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 parallel 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. You should also keep a slight bend in the elbows. You can do side lateral raises with dumbbells, cables, or machines during your shoulder workouts.

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

  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 end building more shoulder width.