Shoulders are one of the most important muscle groups on a physique for its ability to frame the upper body so well. I have found that shoulders respond best to volume and intensity. Shoulders are like what the eyes are to the face – they are what will make you stand out from others. It’s no wonder you see someone with broad shoulders and think to yourself how marvelous it looks!
Here are a couple of shoulder exercises I think are highly effective, and deserve your time and attention.
Lateral Raises
The best exercise for round shoulders are lateral raises, if you do it right. I have found that raising the shoulders past the shoulder line is self debilitating and no effective. The sweet spot is to stop right below the shoulder line and slightly bend the elbows as you raise.
Close Grip Shoulder Press
This movement targets the chest and shoulders so if you’re looking for a stronger and more well developed upper chest, then check this exercise out. It’ll train you to go a little lighter on presses because you are using more anterior delt than shoulder/upper back with regular strict military presses.
Magical front, side, up Raises
This is a funky one. You’ll want to go light for this exercise as it will challenge you to really force those shoulders to raise the weight with slightly less bend in the elbows.
Incline Bench Front Raises
This is a phenomenal one, and will really pump blood into the anterior delts. You are really isolating the delts in this one so it’s highly rated one. I have found that using the incline bench to do front and rear raises are highly effective due to the position of the shoulder and more emphasis placed by gravity.
Theraband Rotator Cuff Exercises
There are a million and one different ways to train the rotator cuff muscles, but this one I show in the video is my go to especially for warm ups. I specficailly use a band and not weight like most guys use. I have found that the band allows for more tension to be put at the top range of motion aka when pulling the band apart and allows me to not stress the muscle too much. Rotator cuff muscles are there to stabilize the shoulder joint so it doesn’t make much sense to use a heavy load – it’s potential is not to grow, but rather to secure the shoulder joint.
Those are my picks for shoulders, for now. When you are training upper body be sure to not neglect the rotator and upper/mid back musculature as it is essential in stabilization, safety, and overall nice development of the upper body. Too many people only train the back and arms and sometimes neglect the shoulders leaving them looking unproportionate.
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Be well,
Yelena
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