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Question on Chest

The picture shows the bar doesnt have an inner knurl so therefore all the info is void??

95% of people I see in the gym do inclines, 95% of bodybuilders do inclines, why? Because it helps build the upper chest more than flat bench more than military press and more than dips. Upper chest lags behind the lower part in most people.

It's been studied,, its been practised by bodybuilders since before I was born.. Yes some people dont need to do it, yes genetics play a role as they do in everything, and yes its irrelevant for those just training for strength.

Just because its irrelevant to you doesn't mean its not true or its not relevant to other people, I train for size and strength, I do bicep curls, I do cable exercises, and I train more like a bodybuilder than a powerlifter.. I also do inclines. Oh and im also not a troll
 
ebagz said:
I specifically said you cant isolate one part of the muscle.. what I said was that using different exercises you can provide more stimulation to a part of the muscle for example the upper chest can be stimulated using wide reverse grip bench or inclines more so than in other exercises such as flat bench. There are studies for this.

Yes genetics has alot to do with it and possibly play a bigger role than exercise selection. I dont know if concentration curls work the peak more, I havent seen any studies that show it.

Does any of this matter to most of you guys who train deadlift squat and bench? No. Is it going to make you stronger in any way? Most likely no. But from a bodybuilding perspective symmetry and full, even muscular development is important, even for those who lift more for aesthetic reasons.

I just love it how you have a closed mind and how its your way or the highway. Typical Guru attitude. Is arnold and 99% of bodybuilders both natural and those on performance enhancing drugs ass clowns for doing inclines?
Click to expand...

To labz, see, as direct as I am, I still get posts like this.

Mate, its not my way, my quote was from someone else, did you even read it.

Labz, tell me a better way to stop ignorant people giving advice on a subject they know nothing about
 
Sticky said:
Im not endorsing it, Markos just asked to show him.
Here you have a text book effectively saying that:
close grip hits your inner pec
incline hits the top
decline hit the bottom.

Isolating parts of a muscle.

This is what I believe most PT's would have read. I got it with my course.
Click to expand...


Scott, if your going to make it in this industry, you'll need to get a little sharper.

Please produce an ANATOMY chart SHOWING all the different pecs. Not a crappy excersise text book, an ANATOMY chart please.

I can show you 5,000,000 articles in BB magazines that talk about our 13 different pecs, I asked for an ANATOMY chart, please.

Ebag, got an ANATOMY chart showing me this mysterious upper pec you speak of, or are you just speaking rubbish trying to impress the uneducated?
 
Markos you can take things from here. 'Most people do it so it must be right' - im not good enough to argue with that...
 
LOL, I was waiting for this response, Im not trying to impress anybody......

Im showing you why you will keep getting threads and posts like this one. This is the kind of stuff that PTs get taught, in exercise text books, not just magazines. They teach clients, clients come here.
I know you have a short fuse, but going nuts at noobs isnt really helping the matter, just getting them offside.

I do not believe in the whole isolating thing, and to be honest I dont really care. I want to get stronger, not look pretty.

Oh and I said dont shoot the messenger. Dont turn this into some sort of fight, I was mearly sharing the information I had at hand.
 
Last edited:
Im not trying to impress anyone mate, this is my opinion which I have based on a combination of research, observation and experience.

I did read your comments, as I read through all comments that I respond to, id appreciate if you read mine properly too. I respect your experience and opinion, but not when you make comments that belittle people for their difference of opinion.

If you had read my post you would have seen I stated that I was talking about the upper part of the pectoralis major I believe, not a completely different pec, There are only two different pectoral muscles however I was referring to the upper part of the pec not implying it was a different muscle.

You obviously dont take anything I say seriously because your a guru, and im not. Like I said there are studies to back up what im saying and 95% of bodybuilders pratice it everyday, Its not just coming out of my ass, and I dont believe it just because I read it in a magazine.

I realise it doesnt matter to you or alot of people, all im saying is that inclines and wide reverse grip bench press stimulates more of the upper portion of the pec compared to other exercises, and that this is relevant for bodybuilders and people like me. If you disagree tell me why

If i disagree with something I dont tell the person what they think is crap and there a moron I say why I disagree, have a civilised convo and address each point they make. I also keep an open mind, Im here to learn and also to share my thoughts.
 
What research? what investigation?

Go read the work of lon kilgore or mark rippetoe - the bench press works the whole muscle belly. Flyes are an okay isolation, incline presses are pretty much useless because the bench press and overhead work all muscle heads of the chest and shoulders.

You claim that 'every bodybuilder does this, it must work' - have you ever noticed that pretty much every pro bodybuilder has a 500lb bench press? isnt that interesting that they have enormous chests unlike the guys at fitness first benching 135? most of their other exercises would help by allowing them to accumulate volume as opposed to 'shapeing' muscles which is pretty much impossible.

And don't assume everyones goals in training, because 'powerlifting nerr' certainly doesnt express mine.
 
There are two heads to the pectoralis major. The sternal and clavicular heads. I have seen it in cadavers no charts needed. But it is smaller than you all think. It is also hit with benching, dips, MP etc so you don't have to go do incline, decline and flat benching to hit it properly. Unless you have pecs nearing arnolds booby size there is no point doing an exercise that hits it 5-10% more because it both heads are small and both get hit with benching, dips and weighted pushups.
 
Wouldn't they do incline to add more shoulder in to help take over from other tired muscles to get greater volume without using too much shoulder as to disturb a shoulder only day?

Thus more volume more reps ...

Not for working specific parts though?

The only way I can see other "parts" of the chest working is not really other parts but with cable cross and dumbbell press / flys there is a greater rom and greater contraction of the chest.
 
I agree that bench hits all the chest and shoulders, I am saying that incline and reverse wide grip stimulate more upper pec than flat bench.

I do claim every bodybuilder does it, but thats not why I believe its true. Also I know alot of natural pro's whoz bench is more like 360 which is still heavy they have great upper pec development.

I also agree you cant shape a muscle, inclines also hit your whole chest and shoulders, but stimulate more upper than the flat bench..

By no means are inclines essential in any way and If I skip anything its the incline. My only point was that inclines and reverse wide grip bench do stimulate more upper chest compared to flat bench, the latter is apparently alot more effective than incline. The difference is obviously not going to be major and genetics are probably more of a determining factor.

I apologise for assuming your training goals, if I may ask what do you train for/at?

Bodybuilding.com - Jim Stoppani, PhD Video Article: Are You Using The Wrong Chest Exercise? - Video Articles
Yes I know its bodybuilding.com but check it out.
 
From your link
Most people think that to develop the upper chest you need to focus on the incline bench press. A recent study however shows that muscle activity of the upper pectoralis during an incline press increased by only 5% as compared to the flat bench press
Click to expand...
 
5% more than flat bench is still more than flat bench.. but yes its negligible.. reverse wide grip bench on the other hand increased muscle activity of upper pec by 30% compared to flat according to the study.. which is quite substantial.
 
Hi, I just joined this site and wonder if this is the correct thread to introduce my self at the risk of getting flamed but here it goes..

To my knowledge, the clavicular and sternal heads can each be slightly targeted. Let it be clear that both heads are activated together when doing any exercise but different actions recruit more or less of either sections. Now i'm not saying inc bench puts X amount of muscle on the portion Z and blah blah BUT i am saying the pec m's two separate origins work at slightly different rates when exercising different motions.

Mark.
 
I came to this conclusion from experience studying anatomy at uni (i too have 1st hand experience with cadavers examining muscles and such. As well as my brief experience as a gym goer / pt.

I should also point out that the only real exercises i do is squat, dead, clean, bench and chins and mostly the same with clients/friends. So perhaps my physical experience should be taken with a grain of salt.

None the less it is a very interesting and juicy topic.

P.s. forgive my grammar it's late.
 
Woot!

Eight pages on how to hit the floppers, when we first start out on our quest we all had a fascination for them, I reckon Markos would also agree, it becomes clear after some time that "bombing" the pec's from all different angles leads to a very unstable shoulder.

I have the solution.

Stop looking at yourself in the mirror, it's interesting that I've never seen a topic on how to hit or develop certain areas of the latissimus or trapezoids.

You cannot make chicken soup out of chicken shit people, a muscle becomes thicker but it's shape will always remain the same.
 
Original Question

This is the owner of this thread speaking. I have no idea if this thread is even still alive, I'm checking back in now, and it's been a month or so. Couple of things I'd like to say.

Thanks for the opinions I got to my original question, I'd like to go ahead and phrase it again though to help anyone better understand my question. When I say 'very bottom part of the pec' I am referring to a specific area of the muscle, not an individual muscle. Now, I know that as the 'lower part of the pec' grows it gets thicker, b/c mine has, that's no issue there... but my chest does not look like Arnold's, or any other of the pro bb's. These person's pecs have grown so much mass that the muscle has started to overlap the inferior origin... basically, in ex. Arnold's pecs got so big it started to hang over like a woman's breast, this is just b/c the weight of the muscle overcame the ability of the tendon to hold it up and stay 'perky'. So up until this point the 'lower pec' has got thicker and thicker as it grows. My inquistion is, once the pec is this big/at this stage of development-(where now it's overlapping slightly/hanging slightly) as this 'very lower part of the pec'-(in ex. on Arnold, his nipple area down) continues to hypertrophy, will this area keep getting thicker and increase in depth/thickness? OR AS the pec grows, does the 'very bottom part' get thinner as it gets longer/hangs down further? I don't mean atrophy or 'shrink' but as the fibers grow, could perhaps, b/c of the way gravity pulls on the muscle and/or combined with the stretching of the conn. tissue which might cause it to get weaker, cause the 'lower area' to get thinner/lose depth/thickness, as it grows?... Basically, when Arnold was in his prime and his chest was its biggest, I assume age 27/28, was this 'lower area', (nipple area down), the MOST thick/had the most depth, ever? Or at any previous point in development could this same 'lower area' techincally have been thicker? Thanks.
 
maybe what you are experienceing is just you have different shaped muscle bellies, some folk have perky muscles, other had braod faty muscles

you see it in bicep shots some have broad fuller bis, some have a very perky head, maybe this is influenced by how people train , not sure!
 
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