Tag Archives: Overhead press

Fitness

Changing Up The Chest

Pain is temporary, Failure is forever.
Pain is temporary, Failure is forever. (Photo credit: lta362)

The chest workout log has become filled with seven weeks worth of exercising. Starting weights for the flat bench press rose to 25 pounds a side, but staid there since August 23rd. Declined flyes went down in weight, but the angle of the bench was increased, making the reps harder. Pec deck too saw a decline as the emphasis was set to the reps of 30, 20 and 15 for 3 seconds per rep. Only the machine seated press saw significant increases over the seven weeks. It was time for a change.

Finding a new chest workout is quite easy. A simple search in Google will bring back scores of hits, so it was time to read. As the goals of the previous regime were focused on declines with some flat bench finishing, the idea of flipping around is quite central. Bodybuilding.com had several great workouts. Scanned through the beginner ones and moved to more advanced. Ah, blending several into one focused workout.

The result is a workout with one goal: get the chest to respond and grow. On to the layout.

  • Warmup – 10 minutes. Arms, shoulders, chest. They all need to be warm and stretched.
  • Incline Bench Press – 3×8
  • Smith Machine Barbell Neck Press – 2×15, 1×25
  • Incline Dumbbell Flye – 3×8, 1×25
  • Seated Machine Chest Press – 3×30,20,15

No sets are pyramid style. Rest between sets is 45 seconds, except the neck press which is 2 minutes, including after the 1×25 set. The rep speed should be 1 on positive side and 1.5 on negative. The finishing sets on the machine press are 3 seconds on the negative. For added burn, press 6 second negatives after the last set of 15. Go until fail.

Enjoy.

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Fitness

Time To Move To Heavy

101122-N-7948R-111
101122-N-7948R-111 (Photo credit: U.S. Pacific Fleet)

The last few months have seen me using the exercises in Iron Man Magazine nearly exclusively. In particular, those found within the Training & Research Center’s articles, using the ideals of HIT and 4x. Steve Holman’s articles have lead to very good results and since the body needs to be confused from time to time, it is now that there will be some change.

For June and July, I am going to go with heavier workouts, though the reps will not be forced to drop much. Research is starting to show that decline chest exercises are more effective and stimulating the pectoral muscles. All the standing cable flyes will be replaced, as with the flat press. I’ve also knocked out some of the supersets and lowered the overall number of exercises. I want more bang for my time. The resulting chest, back and ab workout will now look like this:

  • Declined flyes   3×10
  • Declined dumbbell bench press   3×10
  • Super set:
    • Flat flyes   3×10
    • Wide-grip bench dips  3×10
  • Smith machine flat bench (negative)  1×9
  • Super set:
    • Pulldowns   3×10
    • Undergrip pulldowns   3×10
  • Upright barbell rows   3×12
  • Super set:
    • Dumbbell shrugs   3×12
    • Laterals   3×10
  • Knee Ups   4×12

The idea is to do this workout at least through June and then perhaps tweak it a bit for July. This is done once a week, usually on Monday, with a followup workout on Fridays that is more TORQ oriented. The latter workout will remain from the Iron Man articles and will be adjusted once the July issue of the magazine has arrived.

Changes for the leg work are still being finalized and will be posted as soon as they are ready.

Happy lifting.

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