To get wide shoulders, you need a perfect training, possible through science and experience. I took over 20 years to create it, and I will show you that. When it comes to shoulders, you need to understand the structure of your training during the week.
If you do an ABC protocol, the classic one with chest and triceps, back and biceps, legs and shoulders, stop now. You have the legs, which are a huge muscular group, and the shoulders, which you'll see is also big. Either you have energy for one or the other.
The solution is breaking down that shoulder workout. You can hit chest and triceps, but you'll add the shoulders. In that training, you'll include the front delts.
You'll do the regular chest workout, and also one or two front delt exercises. I recommend doing shoulder presses with dumbbells or the barbell on the front, or front raises, which isolate that muscle. Then, you move to the triceps.
In your back workout, the rear delts work a lot, especially with the rows. It's interesting to finish the back workout and include at least one rear delt exercise, like the reverse fly, or rear delt pulley exercises. If you want to give it emphasis, you can even add one more.
Now, you'll get to the specific shoulder workout. Isn't it a waste of time? No.
You have the rear, side and front delts. They are three different muscles. Each one of them needs a specific volume for them.
When you train back and chest, you give them something, but the side delts, which give you that aesthetic bonus, barely worked at all. I want you to start your training with lateral dumbbell raises. It's the basic side delt exercise, and it's interesting to kick off the workout.
- Why will you start with the side delts? - I dunno. Science shows us that the muscle you train first gets developed more.
This exercise has a particularity. You have a lot of torque up top, a huge physical demand, because the lever is big, and as you lower, the lever decreases to a point the muscle relaxes. My tip is to reach shoulder height, but stop going down when it's close to the thighs, keeping the tension on your muscles, and you'll do 3 to 4 sets here.
Now, for another lateral raise. However, we are doing it on the pulley. In this case, it is the force vector, and it's diagonal now.
We are adding intensity to the muscle down here, so we are using this exercise which looks the same, but it complements the first, so again we do 3 to 4 sets. The first exercise had bigger torque in this point, where the muscle was shortened, and now we have an exercise with more torque here, and it would be great, if possible, doing machine lateral raises. It doesn't have vertical or diagonal vectors, but a circular vector.
It has the same overload, vector and torque for all angles. If you don't have the machine, no problem. If you did it with dumbbells and with the pulley, with torque on those two points, to create a more complete training, we need torque down here.
You'll place the pulley at the belt line, with a 90° angle between your arm and the cable. The torque is down here, it compliments the other exercises. Again, 3 to 4 sets.
Why use all those different torques? If you work just the first, you'll get the fiber's activation when it's shortened, but with the variations you give that same fiber a huge work in different elongation ranges. See how we are working different ranges?
That's how complex a perfect shoulder workout is. Maybe you just did some exercises and thought that was it. Now, imagine other workouts.
I give you all this on Muscle 60D, with complete periodization, and that's why it gives you 1 year of results in two months. You finished with the side delts. Now, we go to the rear delts.
It gives you a rounder aspect to your shoulders, and even improves your posture. If you don't train it, your shoulders will look small even if you train your side delts. You'll be lacking this arc, which rounds your shoulder.
Again, this fella works with the back, and you already gave it some stimulus. Think, since we needed all that for the side delts, and we gave it around 9 sets, if you worked the rear delts with the back and gave it one more exercise, we just need one more. We'll get the best rear delt and use it.
Machine rear delts. It isolates the shoulder. You remember all we said about torque and lever?
This exercise's got it all. As it has a circular vector, the lever is constant. A round of applause for the professional.
You'll get a huge torque when you stretch it, and also when your shorten it. My tip here is to pay attention on your posture. If it's hunched over, you dissipate the work to other muscles, even the lats.
Always have a locked in posture to keep the exercise focused on the rear delts. You may do 3 to 4 sets in this exercise, it's the only one. If you developed the side delts and the rear delts, we are still missing the front delts.
It completes the rounder look for the shouulder and also will build something which goes together with the chest, leading to a better aesthetic to your physique, and the same idea applies: we used 3 exercises for the side delts. With the chest, you activate the shoulder too, and then you did one more shoulder exercise. Now, for the anterior delt, let's find something which can give it a great work and can lead to a great torque in all the angles.
An exercise which works well is the front raises. I want you to do it with a rope, back against the pulley. The cable will move between your legs.
When your arms are down, as the cable goes back diagonally, it causes torque, and as you go up to shoulder height, slightly more, you also get that torque. We are including that in all angles. If you are thinking "What about the traps?
" Comment down below. If there is a good moment to include the traps in this periodization, it's with the shoulders. But I warn you, you don't need to.
Unless you want to change it a lot. It works with the back, the shoulders, stabilizing a bunch of things. But if you want it, do dumbbell shrugs.
It's an isolated trap exercise. It's good to handle a good weight and do it carefully to shorten and stretch the muscle. If you're gonna do it, do 3 to 4 sets, because it can take it.
Now, a very important tip: if you develop the shoulders, they will get big, but if your arms don't follow, it won't be nice. Here, we put together the perfect triceps training, as it will give your arms the most volume. It's important to do both things.
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