Here it is – the best shoulder workout for gaining muscle mass and width in the shoulders, and developing overhead pressing strength to boot.In my opinion, effective shoulder training is the key to building a broad, powerful upper-body. Shoulders are pretty much the only bodypart that, if neglected, can ruin an otherwise well-built physique
In the gym you may see a guy with huge arms, thick back, and deep well muscled chest but if his shoulders are undeveloped, he just doesn’t look … powerful. In contrast, perhaps you’ll see a builder or manual labourer who may have never touched a barbell in his life, but just has that broad, capable look about him
The reason? Well-built shoulders from swinging heavy bags and overhead lifting. Shoulder development can often be the make-or-break factor in whether you look “big” or not, and whether you ARE strong, or whether it’s all just for show
Contrary to popular belief, your shoulders are actually composed of three muscles. The anterior, medial and posterior deltoids. That’s front, middle and back in English
The shoulder is a ball and socket joint, and each shoulder muscle pulls the upper arm in a different direction. The front delts pull the arm forward and up, the medial delts pull it out and to the side, and the rear delts pull it backwards
That’s why to develop well rounded shoulders you really do need a variety of exercises – the “shoulder” is actually three different muscles, each of which pulls in a different direction. The best shoulder workouts work the shoulder in all three directions
The best shoulder workout contains both compound and isolation exercises. As you may know, free-weights are by far and away the best choice for gaining strength and size
Compounds are important for overall size and mass-building, as well as developing functional real-world strength. They also have favourable side effects such as increased testosterone production due to their taxing nature
With shoulders, more than one isolation exercise is needed to really hit each part of the shoulder and stimulate growth from front to back
Front delt training: the Standing Shoulder Press
