Need to shake up my lifting routine-- favorite upper body ex

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Ral263
Ral263 Posts: 318 Member
in Fitness and Exercise
My arms and chest are the first place I show weight loss and the last place I gain muscle-- frustrating, because I don't want to look unbalanced and scrawny! What are your favorite arm and chest exercises? I prefer to use free weights instead of machines, but I'm open to whatever.

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  • princesslmc2
    princesslmc2 Posts: 264 Member
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    I love all the upper body workouts!! Bicep curls, tricep extensions, chest presses, shoulder presses... a whole slew of them. My arms have amazing muscles and strength now - though some of it is still hiding under the flab. LOL!

    My recommendation... push yourself! Try to "fail" before you hit 10-12 reps. Currently, I'm lifting 15 pounds with the bicep curls, 10 with the tricep extensions, and up to 20 pounds on the some of the others.
  • Amber030583
    Amber030583 Posts: 490 Member
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    I like the arnold press personally. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OFNYWtOjlXw
  • pftjill
    pftjill Posts: 488
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    Push ups are amazing-especially if you do them with an isometric hold after the concentric and ecentric contractions. You can do them in so many variations that they provide such a nice chest work out and you can target different areas of the pecs by the different hand placements. I like chest press-again with those you can do incline, decline and different hand positions on the bar. I also enjoy chest flies.
  • koosdel
    koosdel Posts: 3,317 Member
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    Awesome on the free weights! I don't like machines either.

    I prefer compound excersises like the Arnold Press, military press, chin ups, and unsupported seated chest flys (killer abb/chest exercise) for upper body.
  • britia1
    britia1 Posts: 21
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    For biceps I like 21's. Easy curl bar 1/2 up for 7 then bring all the way up and go 1/2 way down for 7 then go all the way down and do the whole curl for 7.
  • Newfiedan
    Newfiedan Posts: 1,517 Member
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    well for mass gains the rules are simple, starting work the arms no more than 2 days a week. The more muscle you add the longer the recovery phase. I gained 3 " on my arms in 5 months using that principle with lots of protein and just a few exercises.
    1) The reverse curl
    2) yates row
    3) close grip chin ups.

    the key was to lift to exhaustion and to keep the muscle under strain throughout the exercise. The diet is what really gives you the gains though, you need to have an excess of calories and protein there for the growth to take place. The same rule applies to the bench press program to build chest.
  • dave4d
    dave4d Posts: 1,155 Member
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    Pushups, dips, pullups, bench press, flyes, lat pulldowns, bicep curls.

    If you work your lats to give you that v-shape, it will help to keep you from getting the scrawny look, and help your chest to look bigger too. Work both the bicep, and tricep on your arms to help tone them. Compound exercises work the best.
  • pyro13g
    pyro13g Posts: 1,127 Member
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    Look into pre-exhaustion routines too. You can pre-exhaust the biceps before pull ups and pull downs. YOu can pre-exhaust triceps before bench press and also use chest fly's before bench press.
  • FordEXP
    FordEXP Posts: 22
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    This site is pretty awesome for targeting specific muscle groups and providing detailed exercise instructions. Check it out:

    http://www.exrx.net/Lists/Directory.html
  • Sigra
    Sigra Posts: 374 Member
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    Triceps dips

    Get a chair or bench of some kind. Rest your palms behind you on the bench, legs extended in front of you and dip yourself down, using your triceps to pull yourself back up.

    If you need to ease into this you can bend your knees so that you're helping pull yourself up with the balls of your feet.
  • hroush
    hroush Posts: 2,073 Member
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    I am doing dumbbell press and dumbbell row with variations there of. I do the following for each:

    set of 5: 55, 65, 75, 85.

    till exhaustion - 90, 80, 70, 60.

    I can do about 5 of 90, soon I'll bump all the weights up 5 lbs, so that doing my max weight I'll only do 2-3 reps.

    I take minimal breaks between each set, usually the time to put one set of weights back and grab the next. My arms are nice and dead when I finish this.
  • Ral263
    Ral263 Posts: 318 Member
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    Awesome on the free weights! I don't like machines either.

    I prefer compound excersises like the Arnold Press, military press, chin ups, and unsupported seated chest flys (killer abb/chest exercise) for upper body.

    I think my core works so much harder when I don't have a machine to rest my body on-- standing up, you have to stabilize the rest of your body; even when doing upper body lifts, it makes you work your core a bit too.
    Definitely forgot about the unsupported seated chest flyes-- that move is killer.

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