How NOT To Train Your Chest!

Today we’re talking about the CHEST, but more specifically, how NOT to train your chest if your goal is muscle gain. I’m still seeing a lot of the same mistakes in the gym and if you’re not seeing consistent chest growth, I’m sure after this video your workouts are going to be much more effective.

1. Stop Doing So Many Isolation Exercises

Just because you know 15 exercises that target your chest, doesn’t mean you need to do them all every workout. What ends up happening is that you make your workouts MUCH LESS effective because you don’t give exercises that create the most impact for muscle damage and growth the attention they deserve.

For example, some common isolation movements we like to train with are chest flys and the plate press. Now while these are excellent exercises to incorporate into your routine because they help build your Mind-Muscle Connection (MMC) and can be used for high volume training for an amazing pump, you shouldn’t be giving them the same amount of time and attention as you’re giving a big compound movement like the bench press.  

And the reason is simple. You will be able to train with 10 times more weight when benching compared to any other chest exercise. So this means if you plan on utilizing a chest fly, make sure you kill your chest first with 8 -10 sets of the bench press, then finish up with 3 – 5 sets of chest flys. You will INSTANTLY see a significant difference in how you feel after the workout and after a few weeks I guarantee you will see growth.

2. Take The Phrase “Less Is More” One Step Further

So this actually plays off the first tip but I wanted to make it a separate point because it’s important, especially if you run into one of those weeks where you’re super busy and your gym time is cut down significantly.  I feel like mentally we convince ourselves that there is “no point” in going to the gym if we can’t do our entire workout, so we skip it if life gets too crazy.

Well, I always say that something is better than nothing and if you only have 30 minutes to lift and it’s chest day, don’t divide that time up into 3 sets of flat bench, 3 sets of incline bench and 3 sets of chest flys. Instead, hit as many sets of the flat bench press as you can within your time limit. Keep your rest periods short (around 2 minutes max) and stick to 10 – 15 reps for the first 15 minutes. Then for the last 15 minutes, boost the weight and go for 6 – 8 reps.

You should be able to get 10 sets easy this way and to be honest, if you feel like your chest workout has gotten a bit stale lately I highly recommend trying this even if you are not short on time. Just do this workout for 30 minutes and then maybe give those abs you’ve been neglecting a proper smashing! Actually you should try my old school abs routine, I will link to it HERE.

3. Do NOT Neglect Your Back & Rear Delts

The final tip is make sure you DO NOT neglect your back and rear delts. Yes you might be “training” them, but if your goal right now is to have a big chest, you might not be as excited to train your back and rear delts and could be as a result not training them as hard.

But the rewards for proper back and rear delts training is HUGE. It will decrease your chance of suffering a shoulder or pec injury over time and it will allow you to push heavier weights with more explosive force and stability.

Also, a strong upper and mid back and shoulders will counteract all the pressing motions and restore balance to your upper body. This is the most effective way to reduce your chance of getting a pec tear or rotator cuff tear. Not to mention it will help you fix your posture which will naturally make your chest appear bigger and more muscular.

A strong back and shoulders to push off of while pressing, dipping or performing any chest movement will act as a strong foundation for your pressing and pushing movements.

Conclusion

One more quick tip! If you’re currently having shoulder pain while pressing or dipping, I want you to try repping out ONE set of face pulls (15 reps) in-between every single pressing or pushing set on your chest day. 

This might help you not only lift more weight, but it’s also known to frequently relieve the majority of the pain you might feel in your shoulder area if you have some tightness there.