The speaker discusses the challenges of building up the chest muscles, especially the upper portion, and the importance of maximizing muscle growth for everyday tasks. They provide several tips backed by scientific research to help the listener's chest grow.
1. **Bench Pressing Style**: The speaker recommends using a bodybuilding bench press style rather than a power lifting one. The main difference is the range of motion. Power lifting focuses on keeping the range of motion as short as possible to lift the most weight, while bodybuilding bench pressing style requires a full range of motion for maximum muscle growth.
2. **Hand Pressing**: The speaker suggests focusing on pressing hands inwards during barbell bench pressing and dumbbell hex pressing movements. This technique increases chest activation as one of the primary functions of the chest is to perform shoulder horizontal adduction.
3. **Workout Frequency**: The speaker advises increasing chest workout frequency. For beginners, training each muscle just once per week is enough for optimal gains. However, as an intermediate or advanced lifter, it's ideal to train each muscle at least twice per week.
4. **Lowering the Weight**: The speaker emphasizes the importance of fully lowering the weight during dumbbell presses and barbell presses. This is because the lockout portion of the movement is primarily done by the triceps instead of the chest.
5. **Varying Rep Ranges**: The speaker suggests alternating the amount of weight and reps for major chest exercises. Research suggests that training with a wide range of different rep targets produces more muscle growth.
6. **Incline Presses**: The speaker advises not going overboard with incline presses. A recent study showed that an incline angle of 30 degrees was able to produce greater activation of the upper portion of the chest.
7. **Cable Presses**: The speaker recommends using cables for cable presses. This allows for a full range of motion and a more favorable strength curve.
8. **Flies**: The speaker suggests performing cable flies with hands in a pronated position for an added benefit.
9. **Progressive Overload**: The speaker emphasizes the importance of consistently trying to increase the weight load that can be lifted for a particular rep range without applying progressive overload.
The speaker concludes by encouraging the listener to subscribe to their channel and reach out for extra help if needed. They also mention that their team has helped many people add muscle in a relatively short time frame.
Here are the key facts extracted from the text:
1. Building up your chest can be very challenging for many guys especially the upper portion of the chest.
2. Developing your chest will enhance your physique and make everyday tasks easier.
3. A bodybuilding bench press style is more effective for muscle growth than a power lifting one because it allows for a full range of motion and higher muscle activation.
4. Pressing your hands inwards during barbell bench pressing and dumbbell hex pressing movements can increase chest activation by mimicking shoulder horizontal adduction, which is one of the primary functions of the chest.
5. Training each muscle at least twice per week promotes more muscle growth than once per week, especially for intermediate or advanced lifters.
6. Lowering the weight fully on both dumbbell presses and barbell presses is important to optimally stimulate the chest, unless you have shoulder problems that prevent you from doing so.
7. Alternating the amount of weight and reps that you do for your major chest exercises can produce more muscle growth than always sticking with the same rep range, because it trains different types of muscle fibers and prevents adaptation.
8. An incline angle of 30 degrees produces greater activation of the upper portion of the chest than higher or lower angles, and most gym equipment manufacturers haven't caught up to this finding yet.
9. Using cables for chest presses and flies can provide more benefits than dumbbells, such as a more favorable strength curve, a full range of motion, a smaller weight increment, and a better line of pull for the chest muscle fibers.
10. Increasing the weight load that you can lift for a particular rep range over time is essential for progressive overload and muscle growth, and it requires consistency, a good diet, and enough protein intake.