Building A Bigger And Better Chest

Walk into any gym on a Monday, and the majority of them are working on their chest. Milos Sarcev, an IFFB Professional Bodybuilder, spoke of an incident during his early years of bodybuilding where he walked into a gym in Yugoslavia to see 2 guys training in the gym - one was doing 80kg bench presses and had an enormous and well developed chest. The other was benching over 200kg and had literally no chest. He was an average guy with decent development but his chest was really underdeveloped. So, if this guy can lift so much weight, how come he doesn’t have an impressive chest?

You see, in bodybuilding - we are building our body. The important thing is to stimulate the muscle we are training… so if you’re doing chest, then stimulate your chest, and nothing else. Plus it might also help you focus on your workout if you stop looking at the chests of other women :P.

Leave your ego outside, don’t just go for power and try to lift heavy weights which only causes you to use all your supporting muscle groups (delts, triceps, even lats) to do the lift. This is where it become counterproductive and you deserve to feel like a moron at the end of your workout.

The chest (pectorals/pecs) is a very important muscle group for bodybuilders and I’ve always believed that when well developed, the chest differenciates between a serious lifter and an ordinary gym rat. Women too, stand to benefit from a well developed chest. See my write up on Exercise Tips for Firm and Bigger Breasts here ;)

Sadly, i see too many people in the gym clueless, not knowing how to stimulate their chest correctly. Guys, don’t let your mind wander. Im talking about muscle stimulation, so stay with me. :P

1. Do the bench press wiith perfect form
- You need to keep your elbows out in order to isolate and stimulate the chest ONLY. If they’re not angled out enough, then your triceps will take over.
- Your goal should not be just to push the weight up from your chest, but to ’squeeze’ and feel the muscle on the way up

2. Vary grip distance to target specific areas
- Go for a closer grip if you want to develop your inner chest
- Go for a wider grip if your outer chest is lacking and you want to develop it

3. The angle of the bench can determine which part of your chest is involved
- a declined bench will target the lower chest
- a flat bench will target the middle part of your chest
- an inclined bench will target the upper chest
- If you are limited to a flat bench, you can still more or less target these different areas of your chest by lowering the bar closer to your stomach if you wish to develop the lower chest, and closer to your neck for the upper chest.

I’ve also always believed and made sure that the lowering of the weight must be in a controlled movement, and not just a matter of dropping it down in sloppy form. Some even bounce the weight off their chest! Hopeless!

Always control the weight down, touch, and squeeze it up for a full range of motion. Full movements give you full development. Partial, half-hearted movements will only give you partial, half-hearted development. An ideal bench press movement:

The Bench Press - A full range of motion:
1. Lift weight off the bench
2. Concentrate/Focus - establish a ‘mind-muscle’ connection
3. Lower the weight slowly, feeling your pectorals work
4. Touch (not rest) your chest just briefly with the bar
5. Squeeze the weight up
6. End of movement

May you feel the pump in your chest like never before.

Your friend and coach,
DM

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