Great Chest Exercises

To build a bigger chest, concentrate on the fibers that produce strength more than the ones that produce stamina . Those “fast twitch” fibers will tend to grow larger and give your chest more size.

You do that by exercising for strength and explosive power. Use heavy weights and fewer reps and try to explode on the lifting phase of the exercise. Ever notice how big the power lifters and strong men get? They don’t get that way by working on light weight and high reps.

I get disagreements on this one, but it works for me. The Best Chest Exercise is the WEIGHTED DIP… no contest! Why? It’s very simple, doing dips (and pushups) is the only chest exercise in which you move your body through space, instead of moving the weight through space. .

This is a critical concept to understand, because, moving your body through space (instead of moving iron through space) is more taxing to your central nervous system, which amplifies your brain-to-muscle connections and this causes you to recruit more muscle in every exercise.

Dips work a lot of triceps and shoulders along with the chest. To hang a weight on you you’ll need a dipping belt or a strap or jump rope and you’ll need to be able to perform bodyweight dips. Start out light and do full range movements, keep them smooth and controlled. You can pick up your knees and lean your body forward to emphasize the chest even more.

Next up is the PUSH-UP, yes, that exercise that you’ve done or seen done all your life, but in reality it’s one of the few chest exercises that really demands a lot of strength and agility, because you must execute this with perfect form to get the most out of it. And it works out your abs and back (that’s where you first begin to sag and lose form).

Also, there are so many variants of the PUSHUP that are even more explosive. One of those is the MEDICINE-BALL ARCHBISHOP PUSH-UP; a long name, but this exercise works.

What you do is put 3 to 5 medicine balls in a semicircle, then get in the push-up position and put both hands on the ball to the far right; your chest should be over the ball and your feet must stay anchored throughout this exercise.

Now, move your left hand to the ball at the left and do a push-up, then bring your right hand to that ball. You want to continue moving left, doing push ups until you get to the last ball on the left. Then work your way back across the balls. That’s one rep.

The reason why you want to use the medicine ball is, when you put your hands on a ball, the inherent instability forces your core to work 20% harder than when you do a regular push-up, so this exercise trains your abs and hips to remain stable longer.

You’ll also want to do WEIGHTED PUSH-UPS, in which your workout partner puts a weight on your back, between your shoulder blades and then do a superset with LYING CABLE FLIES… and be sure to hold the contraction at the top of the exercise for three seconds, and then take 5-seconds to lower your arms back to the starting position.

Keep your form strict and clean to both prevent injury and to keep from cheating. However, It is acceptable to cheat and heave ho on the last couple of reps.

You can also use resistance bands to do weighted pushups or dips. They don’t require a partner, travel easily and won’t ding the floor. For pushups, just put the band behind your back. you can put it on your lower back to work your core more or up around your shoulder blades. Now put your hands into the band loop and pin it to the floor and go to town. If it’s to loose at the bottom of the stroke, just put a loose overhand knot in the center of the band and you’re set.

For dips, drape the band around the back of your neck so it comes down the front of your shoulders and then place your hands in the band and grab on to the dip bar and have a field day.

You can also use the bands to assist in these movements if you don’t have the strength to move your bodyweight yet.

We only put the bench press last on this list because it is the first you normally think of and we wanted to give you some other ideas. And it is not as functional as the others because you are not moving your body through space. Keep variety in your workouts to keep your body growing and to keep from getting board.

However, you can forge a chiseled chest by doing the INCLINE BENCH PRESS with dumbbells as well, instead of the traditional flat bench.

Related posts:

1. Best Chest Workout Tips
2. How to Do Proper Exercises for Abs
3. Top 4 Exercises for Building Washboard Abs
4. Build Muscle Fast With The Best Chest Workout Techniques
5. Top 4 Exercises for Washboard Abs
6. The 6 Best Exercises You Must Incorporate To Gain Muscle Fast
7. Strength Exercises through Dumbbells.

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