How to pump up the sternum muscles for a man: a set of exercises, implementation features, tips

A little anatomy

Knowing such an aspect as the anatomy of the pectoral muscles, it is easier to achieve the desired result - you need to know which muscle works how and how to pump it up.

The pectoral muscles belong to a large muscle group, so in order to fully train, serious loads are needed. She is capable of performing very heavy power work for a long time. It follows that basic exercises, which are multi-joint, are mandatory. The training takes place with fairly heavy weights, with progression - a gradual increase in weight.

The structure of the pectoral muscles is unique and different muscle fibers run in different directions, so the load should be applied at different angles with an emphasis on the upper part.

The importance of technique

Without the correct technique for performing any exercise for the chest, it is difficult to cause their full growth, however, as for any other muscle group.

Equally important is maintaining correct breathing: exhalation should occur during the most difficult part of the exercise.

The number of repetitions and approaches is individual, and depends on the goals set by the bodybuilder and his physical training today.

Work for mass involves 6 to 12 repetitions, for relief - 12-15 or even more. The numbers, of course, are approximate and are not a dogma - each organism has its own secrets.

The number of approaches at first is 3, and after that it will again depend on the tasks and experience.

When working on mass, basic exercises are used more; when working on relief, isolating exercises are used.

Best exercises

The pectoral muscles, like all others, develop best under the influence of basic exercises. You shouldn’t use isolation, as well as working on blocks, if you want to build up good mass - for this you need to work out for at least a year. And when it’s time to work on the relief, that is, what is usually called grinding, do that too. Basic exercises for the pectoral muscles:

1. Bench press. Without this fundamental exercise, you will never get a powerful chest. In addition, if an athlete dreams of competing in competitions in the future, it will be even more useful, since it is included in powerlifting. The grip of the bar can change, as well as the angle of the bench: when pressing, when the head is higher than the body, the upper chest is worked, and when parallel, the middle part (middle or center, as it is also called), and if the head is lower, the lower chest is worked.
2. Dumbbell flyes lying on a bench. This exercise works the chest more than the arms, so it is more for isolation. You can do it either on a horizontal bench or vary the angle of the backrest.
3. Dumbbell up press using an incline bench.
4. Dips. Without powerful triceps, you cannot take on good working and maximum weights, which is the key to a developed chest. With sufficient physical fitness, it is advisable to use weights attached to the belt. The width of the grip needs to be varied - from wide to the narrowest. In order to concentrate the load on the chest, and not just the triceps, the body needs to move forward a little during execution.
5. Pushups. In this case, the triceps also work. A more complicated version of this exercise is push-ups on one arm and with a jump (clap). The width and angle of the arms should change, and you can work both with your own weight and with weights - it could be a backpack with barbell discs, or you can use the help of a partner.

It is recommended to change the angle of the body, remembering that the higher the legs, the greater the load and vice versa. There are also special devices that allow you to do push-ups with greater amplitude.

Hypertrophied chest muscles are the source of stoop, so we must not forget about training the back, which is an antagonist. With excellent physical fitness, splits (super series) are advisable.

The bench press must be correct - that is, smooth, measured, unless of course we are talking about a bench press with cheating.

In addition, it is important to monitor your breathing - exhalation always occurs during the more difficult phase of the exercise.

The optimal grip is slightly wider than average, and a narrow one helps eliminate chest depression, if any. When performing presses with heavy weights, it is necessary to use an assistant for protection.

Alexander Shestov

TRX Certified Trainer

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Basic chest exercises are the key to success.

How to lift the barbell correctly

The question of how to lift a barbell correctly can be answered like this:

• It’s good to warm up your muscles before lifting.
• Breathe correctly.
• Do not bend your back or swing your body along with the apparatus (except for lifting with cheating).
• Increase weights gradually.

Asymmetry

Sometimes athletes, especially beginners, experience muscle asymmetry, including the pectoral muscles. This is explained by the fact that each person loads one or another muscle differently: a left-hander – more on the left side, a right-hander – more on the right. This is especially noticeable among those who are engaged in heavy physical labor. Asymmetry can be “eternal” if you don’t train at all, eliminating this drawback.

This situation is corrected when the athlete loads his hands evenly, using the following equipment:

1. Barbell.
2. Bars.
3. A block machine that loads both hands at the same time.

Even push-ups have an effect on correcting asymmetry.

Using these techniques, you can correct asymmetry or reduce it to a minimum.

Many people prefer a different method: on the contrary, by pumping each side separately using one dumbbell, a single block, or even doing push-ups on the uneven bars, they tend to load the lagging arm more.

Dips

The question is often asked on forums about how to pump up your chest muscles at home and on the street. The timbers that are installed in almost all courtyards of apartment buildings are ideal for these purposes. Leaning your hands on this sports equipment, you should do push-ups and straighten your arms, then slightly round your back and turn your elbows outward. This will help load the front of your body.

This version of the exercise loads the chest muscles even more than the previous options. To create the correct and targeted load, you should spread your arms as wide as possible, so you should choose wide bars for exercise. If your arms are brought close to your body, it will be more difficult to load the sternum during push-ups.

You need to do 4 sets of 15 repetitions. The break should be no more than 5 minutes. It should also be noted that a narrow grip on the parallel bars will develop the triceps.

Start swinging from scratch at home

How to start swinging from scratch without any experience? After all, don’t immediately grab the iron, thoughtlessly and understanding the essence of training!

You need to start small, and you can do it at home. What do you need to pump up your breasts?

• Shoulder expander. Spring or with rubber bands - the first is regulated by the number of springs working in tension (usually there are 5 of them), the second works on the same principle. The expander needs to be stretched by stretching your arms forward in front of your chest. The load should be such that you can do 8-12 repetitions - this is more than enough to start with.
• Horizontal bar or crossbar. This is not the most effective method, but it is quite suitable for a start, which will give the opportunity to engage many muscles in the work, including the pectoral ones. Not everyone has such a device in their apartment, and in the warm season you can use one available in the yard. It will be most effective to pump the chest on the bar when the body is in the upper position with outstretched arms.
• With weight(s). In the second case, the same exercise is done while lying on a bench with weights in your hands. The weight of the shells is 16 kg. The arms are bent at the elbows to relieve tension so as not to injure the ligaments. The same can be done on an incline bench, working the upper chest.
• Bench press with kettlebells. If preparation allows, then you can use shells of 24 or 32 kg.
• “Pullover” with a weight. Weight is selected individually. Lying on your back, on a bench, weight on your chest, grab the handle with both hands from the sides. Then follows the lifting of the outfit above the chest, followed by lowering the weight behind the head - the arms are bent. The main goal of the exercise is to increase the volume of the chest. It stretches the pectoral muscles well, and together with them the latissimus dorsi, anterior delta, and triceps work.
• Push ups. To complicate the task, you can do push-ups between two chairs - the amplitude increases significantly. If you have a wall bars at home, and there is a need to increase the load, then you can put your feet on one of the steps - the higher, the more difficult it is to perform. However, the absence of this equipment should not become a significant obstacle to training - you can use any elevation suitable in height: a sofa, chair, etc. As already mentioned, you can use a backpack for additional weight, in which you can put a load of the required weight.

Of course, such a bench press at home will not replace a full barbell press in the gym, but you have to start somewhere. Moreover, not everyone has the goal of becoming a world-class athlete, but you can keep yourself in good physical shape this way.

When it comes to push-ups, many novice athletes ask how many push-ups should be done per day in order to achieve impressive results as quickly as possible. The answer is: the process of bodybuilding is energy-intensive and not so fast, and working for mass involves fewer repetitions with a higher load - this is the main principle of bodybuilding. Without doing anything for many years, it is naive to hope for a miracle in the shortest possible time.

The scheme of push-ups from the floor for effective muscle growth is also ambiguous - in bodybuilding there are no rigid schemes at all! It is advisable, as an option, to start with smaller loads, warming up, and then increase them by all available means. Having reached the peak, you can reduce them - it will be something like a pyramid. However, it all depends on each person individually - who is more suitable will be seen from the results.

Replacing shells with simple devices

There are two reasons why a novice athlete cannot train on some equipment:

1. Lack of such.
2. Insufficient physical training. For example, a novice athlete is not able to do push-ups or pull-ups on the horizontal bar.

You can do pull-ups using a lighter program: changing the lifting angle to a sharper one. To do this, you need to place a pipe or a strong stick on the seats of chairs and armchairs. Pull yourself up from a reclining position, being between these two supports. This is more suitable for home workouts.

You can use gymnastic rings in the same way, lowering them to the desired height - the method of doing pull-ups is the same. In both cases, having reached 10-12 pull-ups, the rings or stick need to be raised a little higher, continuing training in the same way until the future athlete is ready for the horizontal bar in its classic form.

Part of the pull-ups (if preparation does not yet allow) can be replaced with the pull-down of an upper block located directly above the head, or you can fasten a tourniquet (rubber) so that you can do the same movements.

Not everyone, especially women, can perform push-ups due to weak muscles. But this does not mean that you can forget about push-ups forever. Here, as in pull-ups, you need to change the angle of inclination, but to a larger one, doing push-ups from a wall, for example, or a window sill. So you need to do push-ups until the strength of your own muscles is enough for classic push-ups from the floor.

As an option at home, you can use a light barbell for bench press, which may well be lying around somewhere in the basement or garage, and even if it is light, it is quite suitable for training at home, at least at first. However, this depends on the goals set - it is quite possible that a person will work with this weight constantly if his goal is not to increase strength and mass.

This will be working out the pectoral muscles at home, and such training is much better than complete inaction, lying on the couch in front of the TV.

When the desire to train is stronger than your own muscles that are still weak, you can always find a way out.

Blatant nonsense

Very often, inexperienced athletes perceive all sorts of sources of information that mislead them, taking them at face value. In such an article or other medium of information you can see the following:

• Exercises to enlarge the sternum - pump up in 3 days.
• Build muscle in a week (2 weeks).
• Build muscle in a month.

We can say with complete confidence that such categorical statements are pure nonsense. No supersets, exercise machines, techniques, articles, video materials, tables, trainers, etc. will help. in order to achieve similar results.

During this time, you can only slightly prepare your muscles for further work, no more, and in order to get even more or less involved in the training process, you will need at least 2-3 months. And it’s still very early to talk about such a fact as a metabolic explosion.

Training process

The training process can be accompanied by the fact that muscles are injured, stretched and torn. After any load, the body simply needs a time period to restore muscle fibers and form a new correct muscle mass. Thus, frequent training without rest will not give good results, and may cause damage to muscle fiber tissue.

If your muscles hurt after training (and they should and will hurt with the right loads, especially at first), then you need to reschedule your next sports activities until the pain goes away. It is unacceptable to train with acute muscle pain.

Let's look at how to properly pump up your breasts at home. The optimal number of home workouts is first two and then three workouts weekly with equal intervals between them. In this case, it is necessary to perform from four to eight different exercises for two to four approaches. As your body gets used to the new strength loads, you can increase the training interval.

For men starting to exercise, it is recommended to perform no more than four exercises per workout, two to four repetitions. But at first it will be difficult to do the required number of approaches, so do as many as you can handle. Everyone's body is individual, and it needs time to adapt to new stress.

For teenagers

Many teenagers dream of getting rid of the hated fat, because it doesn’t make anyone look good, and it doesn’t improve their health. And I no longer have the strength to endure ridicule from my peers, listening to “compliments” addressed to me regarding my fat “reserves.” And as a result, complexes develop, depression sets in, there are fewer and fewer friends... A guy at 12-13 years old wants not only to lose weight, but also to pump up his shoulders, biceps, chest, to become stronger and more resilient.

In this situation, with the musculoskeletal system not properly formed, you should under no circumstances force events! It’s very easy to overtrain, damage your heart, and develop a bunch of illnesses. Before you start losing excess fat, you should definitely consult a pediatrician - this is his direct responsibility and the concern of the parents. And he, in turn, will most likely refer the teenager to a pediatric endocrinologist - this is quite logical.

The same actions should be taken by the parents of an overweight girl who wants to become slimmer and fit, attracting attention to herself in this way, and not by being overweight.

If the child is healthy and playing sports does not cause concern, it is better for him to engage in play activities. The main causes of excess weight in adolescents:

1. Bad heredity.
2. Diabetes.
3. Heart diseases.
4. Sedentary lifestyle.
5. Improper (irregular) nutrition.
6. Non-compliance with the daily routine.

In order for a teenager to evaluate himself objectively (and his parents too), you need to subtract 100 from your height - you will get his approximate correct weight in kilograms.

The principle of combating excess fat deposits is as follows:

• Refusal of fast food and sweets.
• Meals should be balanced and split - about five or even 6 times a day.
• And, of course, physical activity, and not “friendship” with a tablet and a sofa.

Running (if there are no contraindications), roller skating, swimming, a fitness club, as well as morning exercises and exercise therapy are recommended.

At home, we can recommend a jump rope - this simple equipment has saved more than one generation of ballerinas, athletes and just people who take care of themselves over many decades, as well as light dumbbells, a horizontal bar, a wall bars, etc.

Fundamentally, the training method for girls is practically no different from the training of their peers of the opposite sex, the only difference may be in the set pace and amount of load.

Girls, women

Girls and women are very concerned about the condition and size of their breasts: for some it seems too small, for others too large, for others the shape and size of the nipples do not triple, etc.

How to change breast size and shape through exercise?

It’s enough to look at the famous “bodybuilders” to understand the absurdity of this idea at its root. The shape of their breasts, as a rule, is more similar to the chest of a male athlete - the “tiles” of the pectoral muscles give it away. The problem is that a woman's breasts are mammary glands and fat - there are no muscles as such. And most of the fair half of humanity are not satisfied with breasts like those of a muscular man - this is quite understandable.

As for the pectoral muscles, they are located under the mammary glands, and they have virtually no effect on the parameters of the female breast.

Therefore, through training, neither the shape of the breast nor its size can be changed - it can only be strengthened.

However, by doing exercises on the pectoral muscles, a woman or girl creates a certain frame that helps to slightly lift the breasts and at least visually improve the shape of the mammary glands, as well as prevent (slow down) their sagging and sagging.

So this is what is meant by the concept of pumping up your chest.

It is easier to reduce breasts - you just need to remove fat - one of the components of the female breast.

The main factor influencing breast type is still individual anatomy and genetics, and it is very difficult to change anything with training.

The mammary glands tend to enlarge during pregnancy.

There is another method that can increase a woman’s bust – plastic surgery, but this is not suitable for everyone, and not everyone can afford it.

As for the exercises, they are no different from those for men, and the only difference is in the weights and number of repetitions - these are the exercises for beautiful breasts, or rather, to strengthen them. Women's pumping of the correct breasts means light weights and more repetitions. This can be done both in the gym, where there are exercise machines for the pectoral muscles (the well-known and beloved “butterfly”), and at home, even without weights.

If there are no dumbbells, then they can be successfully replaced with plastic bottles filled with water, sand or small metal objects - it all depends on how much weight you need for the workout.

Breasts don't grow

An athlete trains, but his breasts do not grow, or their growth wants to be better. Why don't breasts grow?

1. Low load on the pectoral muscles.
2. Violation of execution technique.
3. Poor recovery is a violation of the daily routine.
4. Low amount of protein in food.
5. Stagnation. Occurs due to monotonous, monotonous work - complexes also need to be changed as necessary to overcome this phenomenon.

How to learn to move your pectoral muscles?

if you're a man - f*ck FUCK YOU? And if your girlfriend, then she needs it more)

First you need to pump it up so you have something to move!

But what they say is true.
Physical exercise develops neuromuscular communication. Or practice straining, what else can you recommend? Is this how you wanted it? ))) https://youtu.be/YfgYM3SV6sU

Watch an excerpt from an Indian film about musclemen on YouTube

what do you want to hear when you ask not to write the correct answer?

they need to be downloaded for 3-5 months

is there something to move?

Pump it up first. Don't swear, but that's how it is...

just like a member

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Insulation

When the essence of the training is more or less clear, it’s time to move on to some specifics, that is, to an explanation of the isolation exercises that are already required for experienced athletes, although this educational program will not harm beginners either. Many beginners start with this, never reaching the basic programs due to complete satisfaction with their own appearance.

Pump up the inner chest

For the inner pectoral muscles:

• The supine press on a bench with one dumbbell is how you can concentrate the tension on this part of your chest. The dumbbell is squeezed with hands held in a lock. The projectile is positioned coaxially with the body.
• Reduction of arms on a block machine - standing or sitting.

These exercises are needed for precise development, which is so necessary in competitions - this is how the inner part of the chest is pumped.

Outer side

The outer pectoral muscles get a good workout with a wide grip on the barbell. In addition, a good effect is obtained when lifting dumbbells. This is how the side breast develops.

Chest on top

The chest on top develops, as already mentioned, during presses and flyes on an inclined bench, when the head is higher than the horizontal.

Lower chest

Pumping the lower part of the chest is most effective when doing bench presses (flyes) on a bench upside down - at a slight angle.

Serratus muscles

In order to pump up the serratus anterior muscles - they resemble a comb - there are no special isolation exercises. It is very important to feel them when performing exercises on the deltoid, pectoral muscles and back training.

Their pumping can be achieved during posing by learning to strain them at different angles in front of the mirror. Concentration is important here, and these exercises are in no way light, despite the fact that no weights are used in them.

It is very important to remove subcutaneous fat - this will help the serratus muscles to appear more clearly.

Only complete and harmonious pumping of the chest makes it possible to effectively move (play) the pectoral muscles.

Biceps

How to pump up your biceps – the so-called “cans”? And again, a beginner is captivated by misinformation like this: “How to pump up your arms in one week” or something like that.

Pumping up the biceps requires a lot of effort and time; it’s better to pump them up in supersets together with the triceps - it’s more effective.

To correctly understand which exercises to choose for this, first of all you need to remember the golden rule: biceps are a flexor, and triceps are an extensor. Based on this, you need to build your training.

Nutrition and recovery

During training, an athlete expends a large amount of energy when performing physical exercises. Therefore, it is very important to rest properly after working out in the gym. Taking a break between classes helps your muscles relax better. Following basic recommendations will help the athlete improve their performance.

After your main workout in the gym, it is recommended to do stretching exercises. This will reduce tension and restore muscle elasticity. An experienced trainer will help you choose the right exercises. A set of stretching exercises is recommended to be performed after each workout.

To restore muscles after training, you need to properly organize your diet. After strength training, it is recommended to use a gainer or whey protein shake. These sports drinks contain beneficial amino acids, vitamins, and minerals that quickly restore muscles. Some sports disciplines require less energy than strength training in the gym.

Stretching, Pilates, yoga, and aerobics are very popular in fitness clubs. After such physical exercises, it is good to use fruits, natural yogurt, and a sports bar. An additional meal after training may consist of protein foods. It is better to use chicken fillet, beef, cottage cheese. When performing physical activity, you need to restore your water supply.

It is important to follow a training and rest regime when playing any sport. Professional athletes usually train every other day. When preparing for competitions, athletes can exercise at a fitness club with greater intensity. At the same time, at each training session, exercises are performed for individual muscles, which allows the athlete to rest consistently.

Experienced trainers can always help beginners and experienced athletes in creating a training program. The average gym goer doesn't need that kind of intensity. It is recommended to exercise three times a week. The duration of the workout depends on the number of exercises and the recommendations of your trainer. Before and after training, it is recommended to do a short warm-up and cool-down.

A good option for relaxing after class is a massage. Massage helps you relax, reduces tension, and improves muscle nutrition. Some fitness clubs offer massage programs to visitors. Massage is best done after exercise or in the evening to better relax.

When doing fitness and strength sports, it is important to choose the right intensity of exercise. When creating a complex, be sure to consult with your trainer and doctor. Experts will help you choose the best course option. Additionally, you need to follow a diet. The menu should be based on regular products. Protein shakes should be used after training and between meals.