- And here I am with Don Saladino
We just finished our workout.
We're going on eight years together at this point?
Guy has changed my life.
(upbeat music)
- Hey everyone, I'm Don Saladino and welcome to my house.
I'm about to run you through one of my go-to chest workouts.
Before we even get started on the workout,
I'm gonna run everyone through a three movement
mobility circuits. This workout is probably gonna take
roughly about an hour.
This is a great way to develop strength fibers
but also density in the muscle and then after that,
we're gonna go for that hypertrophic response.
We're gonna try and build some good symmetry to that chest,
good upper top shelf and I don't feel pretty good
about this today, let's go.
(upbeat music)
Alright, starting in the 90-90 position
if you do not have access to a kettlebell
then just hold the 90-90 position for about 20 seconds.
But what I'm taking is a horns down
and I'm gonna take that kettlebell which is allowing
that area of my hips to release.
I'm gonna switch sides, three rounds.
Now what we're gonna do is we're gonna go
into our thoracic bridge, right?
And when we're getting into that down dog position
and from there, I'm gonna flip my dog over
drive my hips to the ceiling.
Good thoracic rotation, allowing my glutes to activate
by pushing my hips to the ceiling
which in turn is allowing my hip flexors to loose it.
So we're gonna go to the other side.
So, I did three breaths on one side
taking roughly three breaths on the other side
and we're gonna go back and forth three times.
Okay, we're gonna go to the third movement now
it's called the couch stretch.
All you're really gonna need here is a chair.
We're gonna go into a half kneeling position.
You know, you can use a pillow
or some sort of a mat if it is uncomfortable.
So we're gonna go overhead with our arms
and I'm gonna tilt to one side for about three breaths.
(upbeat music)
So we're gonna start out with an incline barbell press,
five by five. Fortunately, I have a barbell in my house,
if a lot of you don't, you can go right to dumbbells
that's fine, it's a great variation.
What I'm gonna do now is I'm gonna go into
my inclined pressing, I am not gonna kill myself.
The purpose of my two to three warm up sets
are just about getting that body prepped
ready for my heavier sets, where I'm gonna try and hold
a specific weight for five sets of five today
with a good time and attention.
Alright, so grip on the incline press,
it's definitely preference.
It all has to do with arm, legs, et cetera.
So what I wanna do is I wanna find a good position
where at the bottom of that movement
I'm gonna be at about 90 degrees
that looks about good there.
So, it's not always about grinding reps,
it's not always about taking your sets too far here
I think that's the biggest misconception
about getting stronger and putting muscle on.
This first movement, it's about the reps looking crisp,
the concentric of being fast,
obviously getting a good contraction
and getting under some good weight.
Alright, the purpose of that just to get the body
prepared and primed. I do not want to burn myself out
with doing too many reps 'cause the objective
of this first movement is the whole five sets of five.
Alright, to now the second set,
we're bringing it up to about 185.
I'm gonna hit a really clean single or double.
I'm focusing a lot on bar speed here.
So that's slow dicentric and that explosive concentric
is what I'm looking for here.
I just wanna make sure that that concentric
at bar speed is fast on the way up.
So some of you guys were trying to develop some strength.
I love five by five, just a very old school approach
and I think some of the most basic approaches
are what works the best.
Yeah, I'm doing five sets of five,
that's 25 total reps with 225 pounds.
Set number four.
I want to feel like I am trying to break that bar.
That's helping me receive more of that engagement
pretty much and it's allowing me to recruit a lot more
in my forearms and my shoulders and even my chest.
Alright, so we just got through a good solid incline.
Now, we're gonna pick up the pace a lot.
Our dumbbells only go up to 90 pounds with the power blocks
so, rather than taking a lot of reps,
we're gonna break it down a little bit
and I'm gonna try and get anywhere
from three to four sets of 10.
I might start with a lighter set and progressively increase
or I might just go to my weight and try and hold
that for a period of time.
There's no right or wrong there.
So I think that last set with me was about 80 pounds,
I'll probably take it up to 90, try and hold that
for another two sets.
Or keeping your feet on the floor obviously,
you're gonna keep much more of a stable base.
The only time I'll ever put my feet up
is if I feel like my ribs are starting to flare.
Now, I'm not a power lifter.
So, I don't need to create that type of wedge
that a power lifter would create where they would utilize
their laps on the press, okay.
I am trying to use a lot more chest.
So, I'll do this set with my feet up
and you'll see that the ribs slowly start coming down
but there's obviously a little bit of a risk there
of losing balance you gotta be careful
and make a good decision for yourself.
So, don't try this at home.
(upbeat music)
So now we're moving away from the compound movements.
And now what we're gonna do is I'm gonna start
a little bit on the lighter side and really just feel
like I'm getting a good isolation out of my chest
and then see how I'm feeling and then progressively go up.
Whether I'm at a gym or whether I'm at my home,
my workouts revolve around free weights.
I mean, I just love dumbbells, barbell, kettlebells, bands.
When I'm at home 85 to 90% of my training
it's doing the stuff that we're doing right now.
Alright, so now we're gonna downshift from the workout
a bit. So where we started with strength,
we started going into hypertrophy,
we're gonna add it a little bit more stability here
so, you could go grab it any band
if you have access to a band
you do not need what I have right now, I prefer this.
This is called a Vector.
What I'm gonna end up doing is I'm gonna do 10 presses
to the right, 10 flies to the right, then 10 presses
to the left, 10 flies to the left, okay.
Not a heavy movement, just getting a good contraction.
Crazy about doing these movements
is you're not only feeling it differently up in the area
that's the primary mover but my hips are engaging,
my core, stabilizing. So, I love these exercises so much,
a lot of bang for your buck.
So fun, little, a new exercise for a lot of you,
I'd be really careful.
If you don't feel incredibly comfortable with the pushup
do not do this. This is called the earthquake pushup.
I'm using two bands because I weigh about 215 pounds
so that band is gonna fold if I only use one of them.
I'm gonna go on a little bit of an elevation,
I'm gonna pump my pushups out like this
getting about 10 to 15 reps on all three sets.
I'm not grinded, I'm just getting the room pretty clean
understanding that that time of retention,
that balance and stability is really what I'm looking for
on this movement.
So you never wanna see your hips moving during a pushup,
probably the most incorrect thing I see on most pushups.
I'll see individuals pressing with their upper body
and their lower back arches and their hips stay down.
Your pushup is a plank.
You should be squeezing your glutes
creating tension with your entire body.
So everything lowers and raises in one piece.
So if you do wanna start experimenting with this
I would not try it off in elevation
just keep your foot on the floor.
Maybe you have a workout partner get underneath you,
be safe, be careful.
This is something that I would never have another client do
maybe only one or two to be honest.
But this is something I like throwing in
as a finishing movement.
The amount of stability that's required
out of my shoulders though, is incredible.
Hope you guys loved this video.
Of course, if any questions
fire them off to the comments below.
Thanks guys.
(soft music)