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Getbig Bodybuilding Boards => Training Q&A => Topic started by: Cap on January 09, 2007, 01:46:55 PM
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In your opinion do you think wider grip benches will help stretch and build the inner chest or should I go more narrow? DO you think that flat flyes will also bulk up that area quickly? I am thinking about keeping chest simple and doing a butt load of presses for a while, just flat and incline.
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I've found 2 particular exercises that really target the inner chest area- cable crossovers( not just bringing the hands together, but actually crossing the hands over/under each other for an amazing squeeze) and a narrow grip barbell press( pretty much just a close grip press , but at the top of the movement squeeze the chest for an awesome pump in the inner chest ) hope this helps-
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I have the same problem. Chest is growing fine, but my inner chest looks pathetic.
Is there any db excercise that would help it?
Maybe i'll try flies more, i've been doing a lot of db incline and pullovers lately to bring up my upper chest.
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ive read this many times beforeand theres no possible way to work any different 'part' of one muscle , the pectorious major is ONE muscle and the only way to have more inner chest is to build a bigger pectorious major
eg , get stronger in any of the pectorial movements and keep doing that , the bigger they are the more 'inner' you will have
the rest is genetics or drugs and genetics
and its late and im tired , again.......is it pectorial major or pectorious.....pecosauro ustransdominus..... :-X :o
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It's one muscle,
there is no inner, outer, upper, under side.
One muscle, three parts,
upper, lower, side. You can emphasize a part by changing the angle, but that's got nothing to do with inner or outher.
Change the ROM by changing the grip or use dumbells,
and/or use cables cause they have a constant pressure during motion and no dead point.
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your chest grows as a unit...the bigger your entire chest gets, the better your inner portion will look.
Flat/incline DB presses and Flyes will help...remember to flex and squeeze each rep for maximum contraction. always use full range of motion.
8)
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Ya I just want to accentuate the inner part because it is weak. I am thinking maybe the wider grip on BP or DB press will stretch it out and hit it a little more. I think I'm gonna do some cable crossovers (which I have been neglecting for some time).
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Cap,
Similar to cable crossovers, you can also try unilateral peck deck flies.
The advantage to using one arm at a time is that you can increase the range of motion past where your hands normally stop when they meet at the center of your torso.
I usually bring the working hand to the opposite shoulder and pause for a beat to really squeeze and contract.
I agree that you can’t build just one part of the chest, but you can “emphasize” and add some detail to an area with certain exercises.
But you're wise to keep doing your heavy presses for the foundation and size. You can’t "whittle a twig."
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One more thing...
I’ve heard some people report a feeling of inner chest activation when doing close grip presses.
But usually it’s from people who flare out their elbows during the movement, as this form recruits and activates more chest fibers.
I usually feel my outer pecs more when taking a wider grip, but everybody is different.
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I was thinking dips too. I get a good stretch at the bottom so maybe that will help.
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I was thinking dips too. I get a good stretch at the bottom so maybe that will help.
Everything will help...dips, flyes, BB press, DB press, pec-dec...etc.
it just takes time to build a soild chest...
there was a guy on here years ago who only did flyes and dips for his chest routine and his chest looked like armoured plates...he had been training drug free for 15 years.
it doesn't really matter too much what you do or in what order you do it, it just takes years of training and proper nutrition to build muscle. change up your routine often and stick with the basics. in time you will have a solid chest. it took me about 5 years before my inner portion of my chest looked well developed.
8)
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I don't agree with the idea that it's not possible to hit various areas of a muscle because the muscle isn't configured to allow it. The same theory's been used for other muscles as well. IMO various exercises will in fact hit different areas & angles of a muscle. If this wasn't true, everyone would do only 1-2 exercises for each muscle and never change them.
Use a wide range of exercises over time, that way max. angles will be covered. Doesn't have to be every workout, different exercises can be rotated in over weeks or months.
Wide grip BP will generally hit outer chest, as someone mentioned.
IMO for inner chest use pec deck, lying cable flys or pulley crossovers, something with constant tension. Towards the top of the motion, keep the elbows fairly close together.
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Ya I never do crossovers and that could be one reason why my inner chest lacks. I will start incorporating them just to hit from diff angles like you said Pump. Although all these guys like Ronnie and JOJ say all they do is free weights, they have to do other things as well.
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I think Ron knows what he's doing re: training, and some of his methods are progressive & also include cables, but also keep in mind that some of these guys are genetic freaks who don't necessarily need to know every last detail about training to grow. For example, Ron when asked didn't know what HIT was.
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I think Ron knows what he's doing re: training, and some of his methods are progressive, but also keep in mind that some of these guys are genetic freaks who don't necessarily need to know every last detail about training to grow. For example, Ron when asked didn't know what HIT was.
What I mean is these guys say they only do one thing all the time but I don't think it's true. Ronnie is a true freak for sure but even he needs machines such as cable crossover. Ronnie would be the worst to ask for in terms of bicep advice considering the dude had 20 inch arms before he touched weights seriously.
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dude your complicating this like never before , lift heavier and heavier over time on any exercise , muscle grows
:P
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dude your complicating this like never before , lift heavier and heavier over time on any exercise , muscle grows
:P
Yea but doing things differently will hit certain areas. Kind of like wide grip presses will hit the outer chest...
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Kind of like wide grip presses will hit the outer chest...
Kinesiology says you are incorrect. the chest muscles major and minor work as a unit.
Chest muscle shape is genetic...it can only grow bigger as a whole.
i will not respond to any baseless attacks gentlemen/pumpster...lol
8)
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Kinesiology says you are incorrect. the chest muscles major and minor work as a unit.
Chest muscle shape is genetic...it can only grow bigger as a whole.
i will not respond to any baseless attacks gentlemen/pumpster...lol
8)
Different grips will affect things differently, I think you would agree with that. I feel a difference with Tbar rows with a parallel grip as opposed to a wide pronated grip, etc. You know what I mean? Even Luke Wood told me that wide grip flat and incline benches put a better stress on his chest and made the difference.
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I don't agree with the idea that it's not possible to hit various areas of a muscle because the muscle isn't configured to allow it. The same theory's been used for other muscles as well. IMO various exercises will in fact hit different areas & angles of a muscle. If this wasn't true, everyone would do only 1-2 exercises for each muscle and never change them.
Use a wide range of exercises over time, that way max. angles will be covered. Doesn't have to be every workout, different exercises can be rotated in over weeks or months.
Wide grip BP will generally hit outer chest, as someone mentioned.
IMO for inner chest use pec deck, lying cable flys or pulley crossovers, something with constant tension. Towards the top of the motion, keep the elbows fairly close together.
ditto. Peak contraction exercises like pec deck, especially where the resistance is centered around the elbows, is superior for chest (inner) development.
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Kinesiology says you are incorrect. the chest muscles major and minor work as a unit.
Chest muscle shape is genetic...it can only grow bigger as a whole.
i will not respond to any baseless attacks gentlemen/pumpster...lol
8)
Baseless? No offense overload, but for '07 challenge yourself to disagree on concepts without interpreting everything as an attack & being defensive without cause. ;D
The reality is that we all know that different exercises hit different areas-those who get bogged down in kinesiology are forgetting that. It doesn't matter whether technically it's all 1 muscle, 2 muscles or more, the reality is that different exercises hit different areas. Whether this amounts to hitting different muscles or simply different regions is semantics that some get bogged down in by focusing on the anatomy rather than the end result.
As i already said, if different exercises didn't act differently on different areas, BBs would only do 1 exercise per muscle. Instead, virtually 100% of BBs inherently agree with what i've said by doing multiple exercises per muscle.
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Kinesiology says you are incorrect. the chest muscles major and minor work as a unit.
Chest muscle shape is genetic...it can only grow bigger as a whole.
Overload is right.
You can’t single out a specific area of the chest and work ONLY that part.
But it is possible to EMPHASIZE an area over the others.
Hence, incline work targets upper chest, decline targets lower, etc.
Your chest is all connected, but you know you are hitting primarily different parts of it.
How?
Everybody knows the differnce between DOMS in the upper vs. lower pec region.
Same holds true for outer/inner, major/minor.
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Overload is right.
You can’t single out a specific area of the chest and work ONLY that part.
But it is possible to EMPHASIZE an area over the others.
You've just contradicted yourself by saying that an area can only be trained overall while also acknowledging "emphasis". It can't be both.
In effect, he and you are confusing one issue with another, something commonly done BTW. The thread wasn't about physiology and the structure of the muscle. The structure of a muscle has nothing to do with targeting different sections of it. This is confusing to some here and many elsewhere.
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I see your point.
I think in my mind (that's a scary place) I was thinking along the lines of isolating vs. targeting/emphasizing, etc.
As in you can't isolate lower abs, but you can put greater stress (emphasis) on them using the right movements.
You're right, though.
Different context.
Don't ever make the mistake of thinking I know anything. ;D
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I see your point.
I think in my mind (that's a scary place) I was thinking along the lines of isolating vs. targeting/emphasizing, etc.
As in you can't isolate lower abs, but you can put greater stress (emphasis) on them using the right movements.
You're right, though.
Different context.
Don't ever make the mistake of thinking I know anything. ;D
I think we all meant the same thing but said it differently.
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What he said. ;)
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You have sternalcostal and clavicular heads( upper and lower) not outer and inner, so yes train the cest as a whole and all aspects of it will grow
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You've just contradicted yourself by saying that an area can only be trained overall while also acknowledging "emphasis". It can't be both.
In effect, he and you are confusing one issue with another, something commonly done BTW. The thread wasn't about physiology and the structure of the muscle. The structure of a muscle has nothing to do with targeting different sections of it. This is confusing to some here and many elsewhere.
Off course you can emphasize a certain part, chest has got three parts,
pectoralis major sternal, clavicular and pectoralis minor.
They all are activated if your training, but by changing the corner you can emphasize a certain part.
The TS is talking about a cleavage at the sternum, that is genetically determed cause it has got nothing to do with the actual muscle but with the tendons. Short tendons, nice cleavage,
with shitty tendons you have to have a hell of a chest to compensate that.
Increase the size of your chest by using other methods like increasing your ROM, heavy cables, prefarably on a bench and/or dumbells.
Also bring down your fat and you will see you muscles and maybe have a nice cleavage.
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I had a non-existant chest before i started working out. Then it started growing, but no upper chest. I fixed that, mostly doing incline presses and pullovers. Now the inner part is lacking seriously. Dips, pullover and mostly dumbbel inclines have been my thing.
Yesterday i concentrated on flyes (incline) , pec-deck and dumbbel incline, but at the top you turn your hands inside and try to squeeze.
Chest kinda feels different afterwards. I had a nice pump as well. I'll try working like this for a while and see how it goes.
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By inner chest, what do you mean exactly?
If you want striations, just get low bodyfat. But doing things like static holds on cable crossovers will help bring those striations out more than normal. Also, wide grip chest focus on outer chest. Close grip if you want to squeeze your chest in a tight ball to create those striations.
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By inner chest, what do you mean exactly?
If you want striations, just get low bodyfat. But doing things like static holds on cable crossovers will help bring those striations out more than normal. Also, wide grip chest focus on outer chest. Close grip if you want to squeeze your chest in a tight ball to create those striations.
The central part of my chest, close to the sternum. Most of the muscle mass is on the outside of my chest.
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In your opinion do you think wider grip benches will help stretch and build the inner chest or should I go more narrow? DO you think that flat flyes will also bulk up that area quickly? I am thinking about keeping chest simple and doing a butt load of presses for a while, just flat and incline.
u can't work one part of the pec, its one muscle. and you think flys build mass? haha
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u can't work one part of the pec, its one muscle. and you think flys build mass? haha
I can accentuate a part of it with different angles and grips, just like any other muscle. Flyes do build mass, ask Cutler or Strydom.
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u can't work one part of the pec, its one muscle. and you think flys build mass? haha
Poll:
Someone comes to you and complains his/her UPPER chest is lagging.
As a personal trainer do you:
a.) recommend decline presses
b.) recommend incline presses
c.) tell them "ha ha."
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I say incline.
But for inner chest there is no great answer, train hard and it comes with greater development.
My chest is good imo but efforts to grow my inner chest are useless, growth overlall has led to gains in this area.
However flat and incline is essential, this is just my experience so if you have had a differing experience then great
ta ta
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u can't work one part of the pec, its one muscle. and you think flys build mass? haha
Yes ???
Heavy cables do build mass,
bigger rom, almost no help of the triceps and shoulders. Not the most ideal exercise but it helps. Cables have the advantage of no dead point.
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For your pec major sternal you need to do bench press (Decline or flat)
For your pec major clavicular ("upper" chest) its incline bench (40degree angle for me)
For your pec minor you need to do dips
True, different exercises build different areas, but if the area doesn’t exist then you can not build it. There is no "inner" chest, so you can not build that area. Your chest shape is purely genetic, but no one has an "inner" chest.