Weight Training Tips and Articles

Chest Weight Training Workouts

December 21, 2007 on 5:30 am | In Weight Training Routines, Chest, Weight Training Exercises |

  The chest muscles, or pectorals, are among the most popular muscles to weight train. Most chest weight training exercises are easy to perform and building large pectorals will give that look of physical power. Becuase of this many weight trainers tend to overtrain their pecs, which can be detrimental to size and strength gains. You should keep your chest workouts simple, performing the basic exercises without doing so many sets that you won’t be fully recovered for your next chest workout.

  After you warm-up the first chest weight training exercise you should do is the barbell bench press. Lie on the bench and pull your shoulder blades inward to pop your pecs out so the resistance hits them harder. Don’t lift your butt off of the bench to get the weight up - if you have to you should use lighter weight.

  Do some incline barbell bench press sets after you do flat benches to hit the upper pectoral muscles. If you have overdeveloped lower pecs you may even want to start your chest workouts with inclines.

  After you do some bench and incline bench sets you can do a few sets of decline bench presses or weighted dips to build that bottom section of the pectoral muscles. Weighted dips are a great, and underused, exercise for this. If you are trying to hit your chest with dips you should try to get your hips behind the rest of your body instead of dipping with your body straight so you aren’t working your triceps more than your pecs.

  Try some sets of dumbbell flat and incline bench presses to get a nice stretch at the bottom of the movement and work the stabilizing muscles that balance the weights. For added variety you can do some dumbbell bench work on a strong workout ball. Bench pressing on a ball will really force you to stabilize and balance the weight.

  Finish of your chest workouts with dumbbell or machine flyes, or cable crossovers. Regularly switch which exercise you use as a finisher to a chest workout to keep your body guessing.

  Try doing 10-12 sets total for your pectoral muscles during your chest weight training workouts with varied rep ranges. This may not sound like much, but if you are training with the proper intensity it should be more than enough. you may want to do more or less total sets depending on how many days you have between chest workouts.