Chest Workouts

Everybody loves a classic chest workout. What guy doesn’t look forward to benching heavy weight. For many of us, a pump in the chest comes quick as well. This combo of a quick pump and challenge of benching heavier makes training this muscle very popular. For my pec workouts I like to start with incline benches and go from there. If you prefer to start with flat bench presses, by all means, do it. Being creative with your routine will keep you from becoming stagnant. This holds especially true with a muscle group like the chest as many lifters may be afraid of change while training it. I have a couple of favorite chest workouts I like to do to keep the muscles guessing.

Incline Barbell Bench Press – 4 sets starting with heavy weight for low reps, then decreasing the weight and increasing the reps on each subsequent set

Flat Barbell Bench Press – 2 sets, the first 8 to 10 reps, the second 15 to 20

Weighted Dips – one drop set, taking weight off of belt after going to failure with 2 or 3 drops

Weighted Pushups on a Bosu Ball – do pushups on Bosu with rounded side down, elevate feet to make it tougher, go to regular pushups after failure to add intensity

Standing Incline Cable Fly/Cable Crossovers – Superset of these 2 exercises. 

The other workout I like to do for chest involves dumbbells and machines. This gives you a different challenge from the other workout. This alone will enable your pecs to not be too used to always doing the same thing. Try doing this one every other chest workout.

Incline Dumbbell Bench Presses – 4 sets starting with heavy dumbbells while decreasing weight and increasing reps on your subsequent sets

Flat Dumbbell Bench Presses – 2 sets, one medium weight and reps, the other lighter for high reps

Machine Decline or Wide Grip Bench – I like to do one of these exercises using one arm at a time for a different way to train the chest than usual. I go from lifting with one arm to the other a few times to really hit it hard

Seated Incline Fly or Machine Fly – one drop set with 3 or 4 drops

Dips – done with bodyweight or a small amount of added weight, go to failure and rest for 5 to 10 seconds before continuing with more reps.