HST and my chest

J

Joe.Muscle

Active Member
Well guys I have been improving on my physique since I have started HST. When i first started HST one of my several questions that I asked was how to bring up my Chest. For those that dont remember I tore my bicep tendon doing heavy benchpress and It took a while to rehab. Well after going through every search function and reading posts as far back as almost 2 years old I kept seeing the same responses.

Well here I am 2 years later and while my chest has def. improved I figured it was time to give it some more attention this coming up cycle. So its back to the drawing board. Just wanted to run this by the more expierenced HST guys to see what they can add.

So for lagging chest every answer was do flys...some say pre exhaust some say post exhaust? Do we have any studies on which way is better. Also back in the day Vicious said do Flys with dumbells, well I have never felt dumbell flys as good as I do say pec dec or cable crossovers.

I would love to see what the experts have to add to bringing up my chest. I dont want to add volume b/c I have been at 4 sets for chest the past year and it is working however I have recently been doing compounds only and though I know compounds are the best for overall growth maybe I should switch to 2 sets compound 2 sets iso b/c its still lagging a little.

Long story short i bring up this topic a year later too see if anyone can add any new advice.

Thanks, Joe
 
Joe

I can't see why some metabolic work after your set of compounds would not work.

Some pulse stretches followed by one set of loaded stretches should give it some inpetus!
 
Using compounds your chest grew? How much?

Did your other body parts grow? Better/Worse/Same as your chest?

How much did strength change?

How often did you hit the chest?
 
DKM as far as growth in numbers I am not sure I didn't measure.

Everything else grew as well, I know what you are getting at..lol !

I hit my chest 3 times a week with compounds only strength went up some but I would say more than anything tolerance to the heavier weights went up. I went with a more heavy HST routine my last cycle.

I am convinced compounds are the way to go, and also I have quit doing shrugs b/c I have realized your traps can get to overpowering make your upper chest longer and flater than it really is.

I only ask how to bring up chest b/c when I first started lifting prior to injury it was my best bodypart now its getting way better however when I hit a side chest pose it still lacks definition. And this is even at 8.5% bodyfat.

From the front it looks great, so I am thinking maybe I just need to bring it up more, which is were my last cycle concentrated greatly on rows for better posture and dumbell presses.

I dont know maybe I am out in left field with this question b/c how many times can you re invent the wheel...i Just didnt know if I should stick with all compound b/c compounds give great overall growth or switch to all compounds except for chest were 2 sets compounds with 2 sets fly?

Thanks guys!
 
IMO deep breathing is important to chest development.

You don't need much weight when performing deep breathing exercises. I'm not doing them now, but when I did I would drop in a few sets between some difficult exercises and they were a real aid to faster recovery. Kinda like a rest and get your breath exercise.

Lie flat on a bench, take a light weight barbell/or empty bar with a wide grip and arms fully extended. Swing the bar in a full arch ams fully extended past your head with your arms parallel to the floor. Then swinging the barl back slowly in an arc keeping your arms fully extended to your crotch. and . During the exercise movement take a very slow deep breath throughout the movement, then expell the breath slowly as you reverse direction.

Try this for a while and you should get results from the inside/out. LOL

You can do a bunch of reps since the weight is not really the issue your concentrating upon. Deep controlled breathing is your purpose.
 
Hi Joe,

I know you're asking the question to see if there's any extra tips out there etc but it also seems it's a kind of 'if it ain't broke don't fix it' situation as you say your chest is growing, maybe you're already on the right track!

You might want to try a different exercise just to mix it up a bit although I don't think you mention specifically what you are doing and whether your 4 sets are all of the same exercise. I like alternating between incline db press and dips.

Personally I build my routine pretty much according to Vicious's e-book which means adding isolation exercises to the compound in the 10s, loaded stretches (with the isolation exercise) and pulse sets in the 5s.

Whether you'd want to sacrifice a set of a compound movement for a set of flies or cable flies I guess is up to you! But it would give you something different as would the loaded stretches. I'm hoping you already do metabolic work in the 5s.

I should point out that this theory of how to use isolation exercises contrasts with what appears to be in vogue here at the moment where they are used in the 15s and 10s but with heavier weights and then ditched when the compounds get heavy - I'm still waiting for vicious or someone to come back and debate the differences (I myself am not scientifically knowledegeable enough to do it!)

Cheers

Rob
 
Hey Joe,
What is your current chest routine? Which exercises and how many sets each? Do you alternate or not? How heavy do you go (5RM, 3RM, negatives)? Have you been growing steadily or not? How's your form? A common mistake with chest training is too much shoulder involvement. What about metabolic work during the heavy phases? Give us some more info please.
 
9to5 Thanks for replying.

Current routine his past cycle was 10 degree incline Bench press with Dumbells for 4 sets.

Form is perfect, the reason I know is b/c after my injury benching many years ago I have always made form a priority.

I dont go any heavier than my 5 rep max b/c of the injury. I got injuried doing my 1 reps max so i dont venture anythinig below 5 b/c its mostly strengh gains and dangerous for and already injured area. I have not done to much metabolic work for my chest. I normally just do 4 sets of dumbells after my light 2 set warmup and then I move on to the rest of training.

I agree with shoulder involvment. I feel the burn definatly in my chest with I do say cable crossovers first...but if I am trying to gain mass, i didn't know if I should just stick to compounds.

As far as my current routine as a whole it looks like this

10 degree incline dumbell press 4 sets
Rows 4 sets
Standing barbell shoulder press 2 sets
lateral raise 1 set
biceps 2 sets
triceps 2 sets
squats 2 sets
abs 3 to 4 sets

Thats it! 30 to 60 second rest periods and all weights are done with great form!

Thanks :D
 
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]I would love to see what the experts have to add to bringing up my chest. I dont want to add volume b/c I have been at 4 sets for chest the past year and it is working however I have recently been doing compounds only and though I know compounds are the best for overall growth maybe I should switch to 2 sets compound 2 sets iso b/c its still lagging a little.
Click to expand...

Is it working or not...?


Tried doing BBs instead of DBs? Dips? Decline Bench (more pecs less delts) ?
 
Can you do negatives with dips? As long as it doesn't kill your shoulders or wrists, it is great for mass in my experience.
 
Totentaz... I cant do negative with dips. Just got to the point now were I can do dips thanks to HST.

The reason is b/c again when I tore my left bicep tendon in the chest area dips were out of question and agravated the area. I still cant do dips but every other workout at best.

I have been doing chest exercises on 10 degree incline...Brian said that the slight incline doesn't make a difference??

I think I am going to continue to work on progressive load however I think I am going to start doing pre-exhaust fly's first before bench. At least once a week. The other two days I might do post exhaust flys or vice versa???

What do you guys think about me maybe going to flat dumbell bench press instead of 10 degree incline...or should I just stick with 10 degree incline and start doing post and pre flys for chest?

Jester to answer your question...I have got some improvement definatly...I have been eating slightly above maintenance so I have gained about 6 pounds from summer till now. I did not want to do a big sloppy bulk b/c I spent all summer trying to get the abs out and I vowed I would stay in good shape year round until next year???
 
It is true that a 10 degree incline is not that much different from the flat bench... Anyway, I would suggest what the others have already said, i.e. dips. If you can't perform heavy dips, try a similar exercise, like decline bench.

If you intend to continue with 4 sets for chest, then you could try something like this; 2 sets dips/decline bench (your decision) followed by 2 sets of incline bench. Use dips/decline as your first chest exercise and try to increase the weight as much as you can. These exercises will allow you to use more weight that the incline bench. If you can perform negatives (or even 3's), that's great. If you can't, don't lose any sleep over it; try a good SD and start all over again.The important thing here is to find something that is comfortable for you/doesn't aggravate your problem.

I don't believe that iso's can help that much... Stick with compounds for your main workout, go as heavy as you can (staying safe, of course) and use chest iso's as metabolic work inducers when the number of reps is low.

My suggestion would be to try the "2 sets dips/decline, 2 sets incline" scenario for a cycle or two and see if that helps. Focus on increasing the weight especially on your first exercise during 5's and post-5's. Given that this exercise will allow you to use more weight than incline, you can achieve new levels of stress on your chest.

Best of luck,
Dimitris
 
Thanks 9 to 5 for your answer.

just came off a SD of about 8 days should of beeen longer but I just wanted to get back in gym.

I started my chest off yesterday with some older techiniques.

I pre-exhausted my chest with flys for 2 sets and then hit the incline bench. I will still be able to increase load it just will not be at the highest level. I am not sure if this is smart to do or not...but I sure felt the movement in my pecs better...so I am hoping doing this takes out the shoulders as much as possible.

I am going to follow your advice on the dips to. I will most likly rotate the pre exhaust routine with dips routine you suggested every other workout.

I have also thought maybe I should just start slamming more calories in by truckload, however as I said in my earlier post I would rather slowly get the gains then have to cut big time again.

Plus I like the slimmer look.

Thanks again for your input!!!

Joe :D
 
Do post-exhaust rather than pre-exhaust.

How is your benching technique?.. Squeezing your shoulder blades together?
 
Technique is real good!

Any reason for post exhaust instead of pre-exhaust, I am guessing you are recommending this b/c of load??? Or are there other factors
 
Post b/c I don't want to risk my chest failing/tiring before my delts and tris.

Also if the warm up, grip width and technique is good then the best still works the chest relatively well. BIZ recommended post-exhaust - check the last few pages in the Basic Training forum, or search it.
 
Jester thanks for reply.

Now forgive me for being dumb..hehe.

But if your chest is a lagging bodypart and you said that you recommend post b/c you dont want your chest to give out before your delts and tris...then isn't that what we are shooting for?

I mean if chest is lagging you want that to be the first muscle to give out there for taking away the delt involvement making chest catch up with the delts.

Do you see what I am getting at or did I do a bad job of explaining?

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