Can Disappointing Muscle Mass In The Chest Require Weight Training Pre-Exhaustion?

One of the most popular muscle groups to focus upon is the chest, with many bodybuilders seeking substantial muscle growth in the pecs through performing many sets of intense bench pressing. Despite most weight lifting routines centering upon the bench press as the primary upper body muscle building exercise, there are many bodybuilders who produce frustrating progress in the chest region, and are searching for an alternative to the bench press for significant muscle gain.

Many bodybuilders may still be unaware as to the true reasons why the chest in many cases does not develop as quickly as other smaller muscle groups, and substituting the bench press is not a viable resolution, since this particular exercise is very effective in adding chest muscle, that is, assuming that the triceps and shoulders do not fail prior to the pecs, which occurs far too often. This is the factor that many forget when analyzing how to produce a powerful chest building routine, as there are numerous smaller muscle groups that participate in compound exercises such as the bench press, and if they offer less stamina than the target muscle that a bodybuilder wishes to train (such as the triceps or shoulders experiencing fatigue prior to the chest during bench press), the supporting muscle groups (triceps or shoulders in this example) will fail initially, and this will cause frustrating results in the primary muscle group (chest).

How this applies to building larger chest muscles specifically is that the shoulders and triceps are frequently insufficiently powerful to allow the pecs to fail first during bench press, which leads to poor muscle gain in the chest. Therefore, to transform this scenario, a bodybuilder must institute pre-exhaustion, a technique that targets the chest in a more direct way, which tires the pectorals sufficiently to allow them a far larger chance for failure prior to the triceps and shoulders during the bench press, and this will lead to far faster and more impressive chest muscle growth.

The most effective pre-exhaustion weight lifting movement for the chest is pec deck, where both hands or elbows are brought together from an outstretched position either holding handles or placing the forearm behind padding, and this greatly overloads the pecs, causing them increased fatigue. When performing this exercise prior to bench pressing, the triceps and shoulders will in most cases outlast the pecs due to performance of this pre-exhaustion exercise (pec deck), and this allows the chest to receive the majority of stimulation during bench pressing.

Some decide to use dumbbells instead of the pec deck, performing a weight lifting movement known as dumbbell flies, but doing so is less effective than using pec deck since the dumbbell fly exercise forces less weight to be used, in addition to requiring the bodybuilder to balance the two dumbbells above his or her chest as if executing the bench press, which introduces unwanted shoulder fatigue (and the goal is to target the pecs and avoid as much shoulder or triceps overload as possible). The pec deck targets the chest in an isolated fashion, which is the goal of any pre-exhaustion technique, and thus pec deck should be implemented immediately prior to the bench press for any bodybuilder who experiences disappointing chest muscle growth.

For weight lifters who do not have access to a pec deck machine, the cable crossover is a somewhat less effective, but acceptable alternative, yet the chances are that those who are unable to use a pec deck likely also cannot integrate a cable crossover unit, therefore, in such a scenario, dumbbell flies are suitable for chest muscle pre-exhaustion before bench pressing. You will find that the weight used during bench press will decline as compared with what you were able to lift before introducing the pec deck as a pre-exhaustion technique, as your pecs will have experienced fatigue from pec deck prior to executing the bench press exercise, but this should not be concerning, as the total amount of overload will increase due to a combination of the extra pec deck exercise and the greater focus upon chest fatigue during bench press that occurs as a result of pre-exhausting the pecs. The goal is to use the most weight while targeting the primary muscle group, and for quite a number of bodybuilders, when performing bench press as the initial exercise of a workout, without pre-exhaustion, the pecs never receive sufficient overload to begin achieving their impressive muscle growth potential.