I am looking for a routine for chest day (for physique), it's always seemed to lag and I haven't given it enough emphasis (plus my torso is very long 6'3), so I want to really try hitting it and see what happens.
I need something I can do from home due to gyms being closed. I have a bench(flat, decline, incline), squat rack, olympic barbell(45lb) + weights, and powerblocks, can someone help me come up with a good chest day to help it grow?
I attached a pic of where it's at right now for reference, not sure if I need to focus on upper, lower, everything?
Thanks
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06-04-2020, 03:05 PM #1
I need a Chest day routine, bad chest genetics?
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06-04-2020, 03:32 PM #2
Your chest development seems in line with your overall muscle development and doesn’t appear to be lagging the rest of your body.
Consider a balanced routine that doesn’t involve entire days for each muscle group and hits them more than once a week. See the stickies on the Workout forum page for some good programs. Your development will depend on progressive overload over time.
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06-04-2020, 04:20 PM #3
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06-04-2020, 04:47 PM #4
Gotcha, I guess it's just my own perception, thanks. It's tough right now because I have more goals towards boxing and cardio, so I've been boxing 3 days a week then running or biking 2 days, which leaves only 2 more days of the week and I normally try to take one a rest day. Maybe I should double up and do weights in the morning and cardio at night.
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06-04-2020, 04:51 PM #5
Edit. Missed home gym part, ignore me my bad
I would pick the press you execute the best, and maybe get some bands to do flyes that overload the shortened range and finish with power block flyes to finish the lengthened range. Don't go batchit with volume to compensate. Keep intensity and execution on point and progress lifts hitting it 2x a week or every 8-9 days (as often as you can recover)Last edited by jk202; 06-04-2020 at 04:56 PM.
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06-04-2020, 05:08 PM #6
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06-04-2020, 05:23 PM #7
You prob should decide what your priority is, since if you only lift weights 1 day/week you're only going to see limited muscle development, especially with all the cardio/boxing you're doing. If you're only going to work out 1 day/week I suggest a full body routine focusing only on compound lifts.
If you can also lift weights on your two cardio days, you'd have 3 days to do a program like Fierce 5. If your cardio is intense/long, the morning and night thing is a good idea. And make sure you're eating enough for all the stuff you're doing.Last edited by air2fakie; 06-04-2020 at 05:39 PM.
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06-04-2020, 05:57 PM #8
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06-04-2020, 06:08 PM #9
For chest, I find the best growth for me comes from hitting it twice per week, 10 hard sets per session. (20 sets total for the week). In my opinion, it’s all about exercise sequence. I start with dumbbells to get warmed up, then barbell presses, then one more isolation/stretch exercise. I typically do something like this for chest -
Incline Db press 4x8-12
Incline barbell press 3x6-10
Flyes of some sort 3x10-15
I find that a small incline hits chest the hardest. Think 15 degree incline or so.
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06-04-2020, 08:53 PM #10
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06-04-2020, 08:55 PM #11
Yeah I was thinking that (compound movements), but my goals for lifting at this point are primarily for physique, so I think I need more accessory movements to get a good pump going. I will try morning and night and see how that goes. I get a decent amount of rest at night so I think I will be okay if I keep the food up
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06-04-2020, 08:56 PM #12
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06-05-2020, 01:07 AM #13
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This is common but incorrect thinking.
Compounds should be the bread and butter of any routine - both strength and physique oriented. Accessories are only there to fill in the gaps and add extra volume. But these are low priority things for a relative novice. You don't need a lot of volume to progress. You have to balance off directed adaptation (repeating the same thing) and variety (adding extra accessories or changing reps/sets protocols). Novices generally need more of the former and add more of the latter as they become more advanced.
The pump is not a cause of muscle growth. It's just a side effect of certain types of training. You can grow muscle without a pump. You can get a pump and not achieve muscle growth.
You don't need to be concerned by your 1 rep maximum bench press - but you should be aiming to increase (say) your 8RM over time. Double this number and see what happens to the size of your pectoral muscles.
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06-05-2020, 03:04 AM #14
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06-05-2020, 03:06 AM #15
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06-05-2020, 04:58 AM #16
At the end of the day, genetics rule. There is only so much you can do to get around that.
I would focus on the exercises that you genuinely feel in your pecs, without cheating. Go as heavy as can on those exercises, again without cheating, and strive to increase your strength in said exercises.
Beyond that there are many things you can try to see if it "suits you": pyramids, drop sets, pre-exhaust, etc...
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06-05-2020, 08:45 AM #17
Gotcha I thought you had to stretch the fascia by getting a pump in order to increase muscle size faster. I think one of my issues is that when doing lifts like bench press and incline press, I feel it more in my shoulders than my chest. I've tried changing grip, tucking elbows, etc.. which definitely helps, but I have to REALLY concentrate and lower the weight in order to feel it in my chest.
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06-05-2020, 09:34 AM #18
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Fascia stretching is one of those things that MIGHT make a lat 0.1% difference... but you have to get the other 99.9% right first.
"Feel" is a contentious issue. You can't really avoid using your pectorals when you do the action, it's not like another muscle can take over - at least not entirely. I would stay focused on the total workload you apply to the movement. The feel and the pump and all those things are secondary.
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06-05-2020, 12:14 PM #19
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You're problem is thinking you need certain feelings when you just need to execute the exercise well with appropriate load.
It's all about moving the right weight, the right number of times, as effectively as you can.
Everything else is **** people tack on that's either not important or maybe makes up half a percent and gets treated like it's half the picture5 day full body crew
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06-05-2020, 01:05 PM #20
I definitely disagree with the others who state what you feel is irrelevant, that you should just lift. Especially the benchpress is an exercise that you can gain very little from (chest wise) if not executed correctly. Some people also are naturally better "wired" biomechanically to respond to the bench press; it's no coincidence that 6-time Mr. Olympia D.Yates never did flat benchpresses. He stated himself that he never responded well to the exercise, so he stopped doing them early in his career. If, on top of that, you lift sloppy, you can expect very little chest gains.
If you feel it more in your delts than your pecs, it's a important sign that you need to adjust things, as opposed to "just lift".
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06-05-2020, 02:18 PM #21
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06-05-2020, 02:27 PM #22
In my opinion, maybe a few light sets of banded flyes before you press just to get the recruitment feeling of your pecs (if that's a problem for you), then try your best to maintain that same feeling while you're pressing. I like flyes because they're fun and my chest gets all swollen after, but when I got serious about benching my chest blew up. Your mileage may vary.
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06-05-2020, 11:32 PM #23
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06-06-2020, 12:47 AM #24
Your chest doesnt appear to be lacking.. but if you insist and want greater chest development
1. Ditch flat bench do decline and incline instead
2. Use more dumbbell press instead of barbell
3. Do chest activation work (google it if you don't know)
4. Don't do crazy volumes, chest are small muscles, if you are doing the same volume as the whole back the you're either undertraining your back or overtraining your chest. 2-3 exercises with 3-4 sets each are enough as Dorian Yates said, but go heavy on each exercises with good form.Global Citizen Crew - I educate stupid basement-living miscers about the world's culture and critical thinking
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06-06-2020, 03:05 AM #25
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True, but when you are the one trying to argue against the laws of physics and all the evidence of sport science I think the owness is slightly more on you to back up outlandish claims. Without deferral to athletes quotes, since athletes tend to be very unreliable sources of authentic information in all sports, especially the genetically gifted ones.
There are 2 mechanisms of hypertrophy yes?
Progressive tension overload being the primary driver by far.
And metabolic fatigue, that plays somewhat of a supporting role but is probably worth capitalising on in so far as it doesn't negatively impact our primary goal above.
So based on these, we need to balancing getting more overloading tension consistently, and when we can do some metabolically fatiguing work.
And 99.9% we are going to conclude with some primary key compound movements to progress over a certain amount of time by balancing stimulus and fatigue as best we can, and then for lighter assistance and accessories we can do some density or myo set work to take advantage of the latter mechanism.
Now there's also a few laws, specificity (more important for strength athletes so will skip over this discussion), but the law of accomadating resistance will matter, its possible that enough progressive overload will get around this and we see that in novices too dramatic effect quite often, but for later trainees where progression is too slow to achieve this alone, the law starts to neccessatate changing some variables to adjust the tension we are applying.
Hence varied rep ranges and exercise selection inevitably come into play.
Now.
Where does "feeling" the muscle fit into this?5 day full body crew
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