Have you stopped training specific areas of your chest because someone told you that it's
impossible?
There's an old saying in the gym that says 'Believe nothing of what you see and even
less of what you hear'.
I'll explain why today.
What's up guys, Jeff Cavaliere, ATHLEANX.COM
That old saying in the gym, believe none of what you see and even less of what you hear.
What I'm trying to emphasize here guys, there's a lot of stuff that people say that just simply
isn't true.
And a lot of us know it.
Because we do things on our own.
And we see results and we see things happen that sort of rely on what we've been told.
So what I want you to do is start rethinking those that have told you that you can not
target specific areas of your chest.
And the argument that they'll use is, the chest muscle contracts all or none.
And it does.
But you have to acknowledge, as we have in one other video that we've done, that the
upper chest actually has a region ok, the clavicular portion here,
that is actually separately innervated by a different nerve.
And it's capable of a different contraction than the major, the pec major area of your
muscle, here in the chest.
So basically we do have a possibility of doing that but beyond that too, even within a muscle
group.
Because of the different arrangement of fibers, and the direction of fibers, we have different
lines of pull that we can attack it with, that will recruit in a different pattern,
motor units in a different pattern.
So if you think about that, it is possible to work areas like, inner chest, upper chest
because we're able to again upper chest,
clearly because we have the separate innervation but the inner chest because we have different
ways we can attack it.
So what about that upper chest?
Is there a way we can incorporate an exercise that really targets it using some key principles?
And I think there is.
I like to call it the Crossover Shrug.
And all you need to do it, is a single dumbbell.
Before I even pick up the dumbbell though, what I want to show you guys is how do we
really activate the upper chest?
The first thing is we want to get internal rotation of the shoulder.
So I've shown you before internal rotation can happen with a straight arm or it can happen
with a bent arm, ok.
These are all internal rotation.
But if we're even out here, ok, I've externally rotated.
When I internally rotate, ok
just in here like that, you can see right here this area of the chest actually gets
sort of a line going up.
These are the clavicular fibers, ok.
Just by internally rotating, like that, you should be able to see a little bit of that
activation up at the chest.
We know that adduction, horizontal adduction, which is taking your arm and bringing it across
your chest, that clearly will activate the chest right, we're contracting it.
Which again, sidenote, I always say that's why it's much more important to do all of
your pressing with a much narrower grip than what people are used to.
Because you simply don't get that adduction, you know, yes you can with dumbbells but with
a barbell, no.
So you want to be a little bit more narrow.
So if we can get this internal rotation and this adduction at the same time, we have a
good contraction.
Which is the next key point.
You have to contract your muscles when you're trying to get them to grow guys.
You've got to try to make sure that you're feeling that muscle work.
And if you aren't, you aren't going to be getting nearly the results you could if you
focused on that.
So we want contraction, we want internal rotation, we want horizontal adduction and the third
component to really help contract the chest.
If we have the two and we're already through here, we can bring this area of the clavicular
portion even more together by actually shrugging up at the end, ok.
So we're taking this spot, you can see it right here between my two fingers.
And if I do this, we've shortened it even more.
So you talk about real peak contraction that's what you have to do.
So how do we incorporate that with the dumbbell.
Simple, we pick the thing up and we do the same exact thing.
Now the cool thing about this exercise is you will see a difference in what happens
to my chest after even one rep, one set of this, alright.
So, you see what it looks like now.
Basically, take this across, I'm going to turn this dumbbell in first like this, ok.
Then I'm just going to bring it up and across, so just like that.
Ok.
I'm shrugging and I'm bringing it up and across my body as high as I can, and down.
Up, and down.
A peak squeeze at the top.
Just like that.
Now, you can see, up at the top, the whole upper portion of the chest is contracted.
Up and down.
Up, and down.
You can see, again, here that line, upper chest.
And just a couple more.
And put it down.
Right there.
One set, as I contract, I can contract the left side.
Doesn't near pop out as much as we have there with just a single set.
So, point being guys, you can clearly attack, first of all, make the whole chest contract
more by actually putting it in it's position of peak contraction.
But beyond that, because of the line of pull, and incorporating the moves that are necessary
to target specific areas of the chest
and recruit the fibers in a different manner, it's very important to attack it from all
different angles.
Don't listen to those guys that say all you need to do is benchpress, especially the guy
that said do them out wide.
There's a lot more that goes into your chest training if you start approaching your training
scientifically, alright, and that's what we do at ATHELANX.COM.
We add science back to strength.
If you haven't already guys, our complete program adds science back to strength to not
just get you to be talking bigger in the gym,
but to be getting bigger and getting better results, because you're working the muscles
the way they are meant to.
Head over to ATHLEANX.COM right now.
Get our 90-day training program and see what it's like to train like an athlete, and I'll
be your coach every step of the way.
Alright guys.
I'll be back here in just a few days.
Leave me a comment.
Try this.
You don't even need a dumbbell.
Do it.
Put your arm in that position and squeeze, and you'll feel the difference.
And I'll be back here in just a few days.