I’ve always noticed that when you’re wrong on something , you always address it and admit you were wrong. Like with the chest flys for example. It’s good to be open minded. Truly a real one.
Oh yeah and in general, learning from other coaches who have vastly different viewpoints. What I've come to realize is that extremist training ideologies are usually wrong.
Hi Alex. Recently I've just started to focus on getting lean and focus on calisthenics exercises. I'm really excited to see where this goes and I'm also excited to see what the bodyweight program will have. Already lost 3 pounds. 17 more to go.
Awesome tips. I like how you did not refrain from accepting that you might have been wrong earlier but with the additional knowledge and experimentation, your opinions have changed.
How to build a chest: incline bench between 315-405. Preferably for reps. It really is that simple for 98% of people. The hard part is the incline bench and that's why nobody does enough of it. Another tip to prevent injury is to pre-exhaust with flys before every chest workout. Sets of 12 up to 30 reps is what I aim for. And as someone who has a pec tear doing fly's first is the only thing keeping me from re tearing my injured pec.
Hey Alex, after you reach your lower body strength goals, maybe you could train to get a straigth arm gymnastic skill like a full planche or an iron cross for example. It would be cool seeing your approach to training for this skills and seeing your progress with having already such a huge base of general bent arm strength. Greetings from Brasil, keep it up.
As a years-long decline bencher, I can tell you that it’s going to save your shoulders if you’re the kind of person who experienced *any* shoulder pain on flat benching.
Hey Alex, not on the topic of the video but i started doing neck harness curls with a cable setup, slow pace, high weight in the 10-15 rep range, and holding the weighted stretch position for 2-3 seconds. So far seems to be working but i would love to hear your thoughts on it because you're big on neck training and you made awesome progress with your neck, thanks in advance.
My argument to this is that we know for a fact that the chest is primarily made up of fast twitch muscle fibers. So doing the traditional heavy weighted dips and bench press are going to give you enough stimulation to grow optimally. No need to isolate the pecs on top of that. You are best off doing your horizontal press, a vertical press, then just doing isolation for triceps and side delts.
Potentially, but not everyone has the right physical structure for presses only being good enough for chest development. For me, I can't barbell bench cos it just grinds my shoulders, but dips and dumbbell bench is great. Anyone can benefit from doing at least one flye variation, and they can give a better pump than pressing, which is in itself hypertrophic.
Feel a much better contraction using chest press, luckily I have a converging chest press machine in my gym. Never used it for a year might consider making it part of my program, the contraction and pump is crazy. Also do you keep your feet on the floor for decline benching?
It's fuvking 100 degrees plus here in states. Don't know what's happening in Canada where you are at but for those of us not using a.c. training is tough. St. Louis got 100 every day, thank God for big ass fans. Keep hitting the trenches.
@@AlexLeonidas Ironically would rather have fan than ac, but fans can beat you up after a while. Think white noise helps getting into the zone, l train alone, plus radio, put two together then hit it till you can walk through a wall. Is this not ecstasy?
Been saying DB have something special. Definitely attribute some of my chest gains to them. Stopped really watching gym content on UA-cam and follow my gut more.
Hey Alex I have a serious question…I am an intermediate lifter focusing mainly on my pushing movements and working 3 days per week full body …. I only do barbell movements and very very rarely dumbbells….Was progressing well as I train very intensely and also rotate the pushing lifts…but from the past 1-2 weeks all my pushing lifts are going down rapidly and weights r feeling very heavy… should I take a deload as I have not taken any on purpose becoz I like training a lot….or should I just completely switch to dumbbells and try progressing on that? Pls suggest something….love from India💪🏻
I used to keep my elbows flared out on bench when I was young and I feel like it helped my chest development even if it wasn’t great form. If you think about it it’s almost an overloaded fly/ press combo
I've found that basically every lift can have it's place and the dogma around lifts are purely born from a lack of knowledge. You've shown me that over time, so thanks ma man
Tushaar Davies // YoungFIRE People in this comment section who are now saying that dogma around lifts isn’t something that we should do are the same people who are saying that bench, squat and deadlift “are not optimal” if your goal is hypertrophy. That’s interesting.
@@marksmith2806 haha exactly. The only reason they say that is due to stabilisers and joint stress. But the importance is so overstated in naturals it doesn't even matter. If you will make 99% of the same hypertrophy gains why not also get good at time tested movements and spend less time in the gym
@@tjravend And this whole “stabilisers” thing is what they created with their own training because they focused on machines all the time. It’s not the fault of exercise. If they focused only on big barbell exercises since the beginning of their training instead of using only machines then they would never have that “stabilisers” problem. They created an imbalance that shouldn’t even exist in the first place with their own training and now they’re trying to blame an exercise for that.. but let’s be honest. Alex made 99% of his current gains from compound exercises (barbells and weighted dips / pull ups). I know that Alex is not one of them, but fitness youtubers who are now preaching machines forget that they made all gains that they have now with barbell compound exercises.
This is why John Meadows was even more of a legend than I already thought he was because it seems he worked out the “bro partials” intuitively and knew about it ages ago. Like he did the side delt partial swings in the bottom range with super heavy dumbbells which people thought was ridiculous but clearly they worked, and John knew they worked!
Johnjohntv The only reason why they "worked" is because John Meadows is a extreme genetic exception and he was also using tons of gear. When you're a genetic outlier on gear, everything is going to work. From scientific perspective, partial reps don't work. Saying that partial reps work better than full ROM is same like saying that less work done by muscle and less tension equals more growth. How does that make sense? I recommend you to check the video of Mike Israetel who was a competitive bodybuilder / powerlifter where he explained why partials don't work.
Mike Israelite said that stretching under load is more hypertrophic than other parts of the range of motion, also it's a free stretch, when I do dumbbell flyes I do a 4 seconds eccentric and hold for 3 seconds at the most stretched position, I feel like my pecs are being ripped apart and I also stretch my pecs for free, it's like how I gained range of motion in my squat by going as low as I could and then held at the bottom for 2 seconds(also the pause at the bottom is really good for glutes). This was explained by another guy from reinassance periodization where the guy said that he worked training a rugby team , and in order to get them to gain flexibility stretching under tension was more effective than static stretching , like doing a straight leg deadlift and letting the weight pull you down for two seconds at the bottom, I also do the same for calves.
Nice to see Scooby getting a shout out, he helped me a lot when I was a teen. Even though I now disagree with some of his advice, I still think he's a great resource for novice lifters who want to look good and be healthy, a true legend
Hey Alex. I got some anecdotal evidence about the lengthened position. At the beginning of quarantine, when I was a newbie. All I did was dumbbell flyes and pull ups just at the bottom since I didn’t have the strength to do the full range. I only did this exercises and four months later my pecs were 41 inches already. And my back grew a lot, like, a lot. Almost as double as of what it was before. All of this just by focusing on the stretching exercises.
It is good that you're questioning today's conventional thinking. The more I do strength training, the more I understand that the nuances of exercise are not that cut and dried. Your discussion on machines is spot on. I've grown a lot with the chest press machine vs a standard bench press. I fond the medial squeeze very beneficial.
@@AlexLeonidas i mean yeah sure you can do that. But it's just more conveniant to use them as additional sets for volume addition. For me nothing can top the bench press when it comes to building the pecs; it's such a fun and exciting lift in itself.
Try decline reverse grip bench! It feels amazing and it allows you to bench every day since its so alleviating to the rotator cuff. It gives incredible carryover to flat bench. I am not as strong as you but it gave me an increase in flat bench regular grip from 235 to 330 lbs and reverse grip flat bench from 225 to 350 lbs in less than 6 months. I have been working out for almost 14 years.
@thespiritbomb I started working out weighing 50 kg. Right now I weight 89 kg. During my journey I have suffered an iliopsoas tear, a triceps tear in my right arm a a pec major tear in my right chest, on top of that I have had several luxuations of my right humerus. I don't judge anyone and I know people have made greater PRs than me at a faster rate but I am who I am and I do what I can with what I have. So really I have no excuses, I don't let my injuries stop me. I just keep working. Having your mentality is what caused me my injuries, trying to rush the progress and feed the ego to push beyond my need of recovery.
I always look forward to getting your deep thoughts on matters of weight lifting, and this vid did not disappoint. I’ve always liked DB chest flys but had a nagging thought in the back of my head about all the people that dump on them. Now I can articulate what it is in like about them. Keep up the great work, man.
I still can't understand why the dumbbell fly would be a good movement. You train the lenghtened position with any press (essentially emphasizing it since there's also no tension at the top of presses) but you do it in a mechanically stronger and safer position. If anything you need to pair presses with machine/cable flies or press arounds to hit the shortened position incase regional hypertrophy is an actual thing.
When you were talking about partials at the bottom, it reminded me of the late John Meadows always preaching about heavy partial dumbbell flies and swings with high reps when it came to doing shoulders, and then when you wanted to go full ROM, just lightened the weight.
You reminded me of scooby preaching dumbbell flyes many years ago. He was saying to squeeze at the top for mind muscle connection, which he may have overemphazised. But now we are stepping into the waters of how important the psychological part of lifting is, which the scoob was touching on. Basement Bodybuilding and Stand Strength have been pressing the bodybuilder mindset in their vids lately. For example, "muscle confusion" by switching up exercises, not to confuse the muscle, but to TRICK your brain into thinking you're progression, giving you that satisfying feeling. And what is one gem NH discovered? That always progressing, even if you have to ration it by slowing it down is highly beneficial. I think scooby's old videos are a gold mine, for they seem like crude/less in-depth versions of what current youtube bodybuilders are saying. Like the grandma giving you raw garlic and sugar while you're sick while not understanding the science of why it helps.
Great video. I'm glad you talked about machines for chest because I really like them so much more than free weights. In fact I barely do free weights anymore for chest and hammer strength is my primary movement
Talking about chest stretch, I recently bought rings for dips/ deficit push ups after years of only doing push ups on the floor and my chest is very sore after every workout, it feels so good.
Funny I’ve been itching to hit up a chest press machine and my gym will be getting a bunch of those Hammer Strength machines. Plus Faz is always posting his workouts on Instagram and they always include a machine chest press. The stars are aligning. I may have to add it into my rotation.
Ring dips / ring push ups are KING! I remember you made a video on this on your chanel👌. I love the fact that it requires high stability and emphasizes the pecs / low chest ! These alone have done so much for me you don’t even understand !
I think you nailed it with the dumbbell flyes. They're great for the chest in the same way the bench press is great for your chest. You work that stretch hard.
Traditional fly movement w lengthened arms strains my biceps and elbows a bit too much. I prefer more bent arms - sort of a press-fly or press-around movement, still allowing a good stretch w a heavier load.
I thought about the point of being too burned out to do another press opposed to a fly and I wouldn’t tell someone not to do flies but I personally still don’t really like them. For me it just feels like I’m working my arm. I’ve never tried the cable or band version though bc I’ve never been in a gym nor own bands. I’m always doing a lot of benching or push ups relative to the volume I need and even I did want to do extra chest stimulation I’d just do another set of those under a lighter load Nice to hear your thoughts on machines, it’s something I’ve always wanted to hear from someone like you. It’s completely out of my element and I’m not against questioning traditional ideas. In fact the more I learn the more I tend to disagree with mainstream ideas
I've been hugging trees for the last 6-months and I won Mr Olympia. Thank you Alex Serious talk, i've been doing decline chest press for a while, and im loving em. I dunno if effective but my shoulders hurt way less/chest gets more pump. Not a fan of the bench version tho
I think the big reason why the dumbell fly is vilified is due to the injury risk. Specifically when elevated on a bench. For me, it's less the effectiveness for gains, and more the risk-reward when alternatives exist. One easy solution is just to not load the weight as much/not push it to failure - both things you can do safely on a cable variation
There's one chest press in my town that actually works for my anthropometry and feels amazing. Too bad I'm contracted to a gym that has the WORSE machines
I've found that the KEY to the db fly is having a very good mind muscle connection. When we have that "aha" moment of using our chest to move the weight rather than arms/shoulders its a complete game changer imo. I also found to hit the clavicular portion by allowing the dbs to travel basically over my head pretty much on a 15 degree incline my upper chest gets stimulated heavily!
Even though I love compound movements for my chest incorporating machines can be beneficial also going to start incorporating some DB flys in my workout s💪🏽👊🏽thanks for the advice brother!
I love this can you please do this for other muscle groups or previous claims you have made in the past that you have changed your opinion on? Such a healthy discussion
I love Decline Bench Press! Have you tried decline dumbbell bench press with a neutral grip? Out of all variations I feel the strongest stretch and contraction. I’d love to hear your thoughts on it.
Flies are for sure good for the stretched position. The muscle is actually never uniformly worked, so having different exercises with different resistance profile is not a bad idea.
Hey Alex. Question about RIR/RPE. Lets say you did 3 reps on bench with 2 rir on one set and on the other 8 reps with 2 RIR. Would the second set be higher effort or no? Seeing as on the first one you've done 60% of your possible reps and the second 80%. To me it seems like a higher percentage of your max reps would be higher effort but still be the same RIR/RPE. Hope that makes sense
Hey Alex, your talk on machines has made me consider replacing the overhead Extension (for me lying flat on a bench cuz it's too awkward upright) with the cable version. Do you think there is any carryover from cables to barbell pressing strength, or is it purely for size (running your novice program as is)
to dig into something new is always exciting! when i practised athletics (javelin thrower), more than 30 years ago, we had oldschool gym just with basic equipment, no dumbells. there were increadibly jacked athletes, among them discus throwers usually most impressive (although shot-putters were even stronger in general, but not so impressive physique and v-taper). they did a lot of interesting work. a lot of specificity work for their discipline but also general work. they were of course usually crazy strong in benchpress. but they did also flies and "around the world" exercise, but with plates. if you have just these big olympic dumbells, try to use also plates for flies, lateral raises or so. it is quite interesting and actually very good. most of plates are usable for it...
Very solid video. I’ve been going through the same myself with my thoughts on machines. I alternate between 10-12 weeks of SSB as my main quad builder and then 10-12 weeks with the Hack. There’s other examples as well.
Yo Alex, as a novice I wanna ask why I never feel my chest working during bench but can feel it contract during dips? Bench press feels weird to me even though I retract my shoulder blades etc.
Potentially a deeper stretch on dips, which can allow for more bloodflow, meaning more pump. I rarely feel my chest on dumbbell bench even when I try, and I've been training for 9 years. I feel it more on flyes etc
@@HrsHJ if it works for you then why not, you have to figure it out yourself, its not the best chest exercise but some peole get very good results with it some not.
One quick point/question. When using 100s+ for dumbbells, couldn’t you use a neutral grip but still go out to 45° from your side? I have done that myself and it seems to hit my chest pretty well and doesn’t destroy the triceps. It keeps the range of motion deep too
I remember the podcast you did with team3dalpha and he was talking about the weighted stretch you get from Dumbbell chest flyes. BTW did your high volume upper body workout this morning gonna make that my routine now!
Alex! Big thanks brother. I was having elbow pain from doing my heavy compounds and your video with the band push downs eliminated the pain completely!!! Can’t thank you enough!
Love how you keep your mind open and make even more gains- also funny with the timing as I'm about to add next week hammer chest press to my program (I do paused cgbp and paused weighted pushups, but feel like I could be doing more for my chest)
@Matthew Connor Alex has 2 interviews with Meckanimal you might want to check those out, his latest one with him talks about how he incorporates conjugate with weighted calisthenics
Hey Alex, thanks so much for the great content. Quick question from a beginner powerlifter, i’ve been lifting for about 3 months now and I have had great deadlift gains running a PPL split, pulling twice a week conventionally. I have perfected my form but i’ve been running into lower back pain and i’m having trouble progressing due to fatigue, despite all my other lifts increasing greatly. Would you recommend only pulling from the floor once a week and then doing a variation on my 2nd pull day? if yes, which variation would you recommend if my first priority is increasing my conventional deadlift? Thank you!
Hey, I’m not Alex but I do something similar where I deadlift on my first leg day of the week and then do Good mornings and paused RDLs on my 2nd day. May not be perfect for you but it works great for me so far
I’ve always noticed that when you’re wrong on something , you always address it and admit you were wrong. Like with the chest flys for example. It’s good to be open minded. Truly a real one.
A lot of my biases were challenged when I started working with a coach. There is a whole new world of gains on the other side of our biases.
Oh yeah and in general, learning from other coaches who have vastly different viewpoints. What I've come to realize is that extremist training ideologies are usually wrong.
"There is a whole new world of gains on the other side of our biases". Impossible to put it in better words.
Love my man Alex, don’t marry to ideas but continuously improving himself and produce better content
Hi Alex. Recently I've just started to focus on getting lean and focus on calisthenics exercises. I'm really excited to see where this goes and I'm also excited to see what the bodyweight program will have.
Already lost 3 pounds. 17 more to go.
Hell yeah man, calisthenics + fat loss is the best combination!!
Awesome tips. I like how you did not refrain from accepting that you might have been wrong earlier but with the additional knowledge and experimentation, your opinions have changed.
Let me give a simple "thank you" to you Mr Alpha Destiny. You are a true sportsman and gentleman...old school style. Much respect.
Thank you, Chris!
How to build a chest: incline bench between 315-405. Preferably for reps. It really is that simple for 98% of people. The hard part is the incline bench and that's why nobody does enough of it.
Another tip to prevent injury is to pre-exhaust with flys before every chest workout. Sets of 12 up to 30 reps is what I aim for. And as someone who has a pec tear doing fly's first is the only thing keeping me from re tearing my injured pec.
That is a high AF standard my man but it would work for sure. Interesting point on the pre-exhaust
The best lifting youtuber by far, appreciate you Alex. Thanks for making me a beast in the gym with your amazing advice.
DB Flyes and DB Skiiers are a great superset.
Preach bro!!
Hey Alex, after you reach your lower body strength goals, maybe you could train to get a straigth arm gymnastic skill like a full planche or an iron cross for example. It would be cool seeing your approach to training for this skills and seeing your progress with having already such a huge base of general bent arm strength. Greetings from Brasil, keep it up.
As a years-long decline bencher, I can tell you that it’s going to save your shoulders if you’re the kind of person who experienced *any* shoulder pain on flat benching.
I'm not sure why decline helps, but it definitely does
only if done correctly.......i.e. the bar should be lowered to lower chest area ......not on middle chest while doing
@@ghatakprahar4692 very true
I would do it, but my home gym doesn’t have a decline bench
@@keelanenns4548 just need a decline bench!
Hammer strength chest press is a legit machine. They absolutely have their uses.
All im seeing on youtube is alex getting huge and rick boogz getting huge
Hey Alex, not on the topic of the video but i started doing neck harness curls with a cable setup, slow pace, high weight in the 10-15 rep range, and holding the weighted stretch position for 2-3 seconds.
So far seems to be working but i would love to hear your thoughts on it because you're big on neck training and you made awesome progress with your neck, thanks in advance.
Sounds perfectly fine. Your neck responds to quality so make sure you’re doing good full ROM reps.
@@droningcity6775 Thanks!
My argument to this is that we know for a fact that the chest is primarily made up of fast twitch muscle fibers. So doing the traditional heavy weighted dips and bench press are going to give you enough stimulation to grow optimally. No need to isolate the pecs on top of that. You are best off doing your horizontal press, a vertical press, then just doing isolation for triceps and side delts.
Potentially, but not everyone has the right physical structure for presses only being good enough for chest development. For me, I can't barbell bench cos it just grinds my shoulders, but dips and dumbbell bench is great. Anyone can benefit from doing at least one flye variation, and they can give a better pump than pressing, which is in itself hypertrophic.
Feel a much better contraction using chest press, luckily I have a converging chest press machine in my gym. Never used it for a year might consider making it part of my program, the contraction and pump is crazy. Also do you keep your feet on the floor for decline benching?
It's fuvking 100 degrees plus here in states. Don't know what's happening in Canada where you are at but for those of us not using a.c. training is tough. St. Louis got 100 every day, thank God for big ass fans. Keep hitting the trenches.
That's rough bro, here it's usually in the 20s (Celisus) but I also don't train without AC. We got this bro, try to stay cool and make those gains.
@@AlexLeonidas Ironically would rather have fan than ac, but fans can beat you up after a while. Think white noise helps getting into the zone, l train alone, plus radio, put two together then hit it till you can walk through a wall. Is this not ecstasy?
Been saying DB have something special. Definitely attribute some of my chest gains to them. Stopped really watching gym content on UA-cam and follow my gut more.
Hey Alex I have a serious question…I am an intermediate lifter focusing mainly on my pushing movements and working 3 days per week full body …. I only do barbell movements and very very rarely dumbbells….Was progressing well as I train very intensely and also rotate the pushing lifts…but from the past 1-2 weeks all my pushing lifts are going down rapidly and weights r feeling very heavy… should I take a deload as I have not taken any on purpose becoz I like training a lot….or should I just completely switch to dumbbells and try progressing on that? Pls suggest something….love from India💪🏻
thumbs up for pragmatism 👍
killer gains!
The gains never stop!
I used to keep my elbows flared out on bench when I was young and I feel like it helped my chest development even if it wasn’t great form. If you think about it it’s almost an overloaded fly/ press combo
Hey Alex, it’s been a while since your Novice program, would you make any changes to it now?
It's good for what it is, but I'd consider making a novice program 2.0
@@AlexLeonidas you should look into it man especially with the influx of new lifters
@@AlexLeonidas Awesome! Looking forward to it
A hypertrophy focused novice program would be awesome
I've found that basically every lift can have it's place and the dogma around lifts are purely born from a lack of knowledge. You've shown me that over time, so thanks ma man
@Matthew Connor can't really give an answer but your far ahead most people in terms of thinking and structuring your program, props for that 🙏
Tushaar Davies // YoungFIRE People in this comment section who are now saying that dogma around lifts isn’t something that we should do are the same people who are saying that bench, squat and deadlift “are not optimal” if your goal is hypertrophy. That’s interesting.
@@marksmith2806 haha exactly. The only reason they say that is due to stabilisers and joint stress. But the importance is so overstated in naturals it doesn't even matter. If you will make 99% of the same hypertrophy gains why not also get good at time tested movements and spend less time in the gym
@@tjravend And this whole “stabilisers” thing is what they created with their own training because they focused on machines all the time. It’s not the fault of exercise. If they focused only on big barbell exercises since the beginning of their training instead of using only machines then they would never have that “stabilisers” problem. They created an imbalance that shouldn’t even exist in the first place with their own training and now they’re trying to blame an exercise for that.. but let’s be honest. Alex made 99% of his current gains from compound exercises (barbells and weighted dips / pull ups). I know that Alex is not one of them, but fitness youtubers who are now preaching machines forget that they made all gains that they have now with barbell compound exercises.
This is why John Meadows was even more of a legend than I already thought he was because it seems he worked out the “bro partials” intuitively and knew about it ages ago. Like he did the side delt partial swings in the bottom range with super heavy dumbbells which people thought was ridiculous but clearly they worked, and John knew they worked!
I do those as well the partials for your delts
learned them from Mr. Meadows
They feel phenomenal!
John was super ahead of his time!!
He didn't like chest flys though. I'm with him. I don't like them either,unless I'm on the floor.And even he said in one of his videos it's ok.😏
Johnjohntv The only reason why they "worked" is because John Meadows is a extreme genetic exception and he was also using tons of gear. When you're a genetic outlier on gear, everything is going to work. From scientific perspective, partial reps don't work. Saying that partial reps work better than full ROM is same like saying that less work done by muscle and less tension equals more growth. How does that make sense? I recommend you to check the video of Mike Israetel who was a competitive bodybuilder / powerlifter where he explained why partials don't work.
Mike Israelite said that stretching under load is more hypertrophic than other parts of the range of motion, also it's a free stretch, when I do dumbbell flyes I do a 4 seconds eccentric and hold for 3 seconds at the most stretched position, I feel like my pecs are being ripped apart and I also stretch my pecs for free, it's like how I gained range of motion in my squat by going as low as I could and then held at the bottom for 2 seconds(also the pause at the bottom is really good for glutes). This was explained by another guy from reinassance periodization where the guy said that he worked training a rugby team , and in order to get them to gain flexibility stretching under tension was more effective than static stretching , like doing a straight leg deadlift and letting the weight pull you down for two seconds at the bottom, I also do the same for calves.
Dr. Mike is super on point with his talks on weighted stretching for hypertrophy!!
So pec tear or no pec tear with this if you go too heavy ❓
Nice to see Scooby getting a shout out, he helped me a lot when I was a teen. Even though I now disagree with some of his advice, I still think he's a great resource for novice lifters who want to look good and be healthy, a true legend
Always impressed with these type of videos. Its rare to see someone make a correction and actually explain it.
Hey Alex. I got some anecdotal evidence about the lengthened position. At the beginning of quarantine, when I was a newbie. All I did was dumbbell flyes and pull ups just at the bottom since I didn’t have the strength to do the full range.
I only did this exercises and four months later my pecs were 41 inches already. And my back grew a lot, like, a lot. Almost as double as of what it was before. All of this just by focusing on the stretching exercises.
Pretty damn awesome man!!
It is good that you're questioning today's conventional thinking. The more I do strength training, the more I understand that the nuances of exercise are not that cut and dried. Your discussion on machines is spot on. I've grown a lot with the chest press machine vs a standard bench press. I fond the medial squeeze very beneficial.
The only problem is that machines and flies are boring as hell.
Treat them like "competition movements" and they become a lot more fun! Like I wanna get stupid strong on these exercises especially the flyes.
@@AlexLeonidas i mean yeah sure you can do that. But it's just more conveniant to use them as additional sets for volume addition. For me nothing can top the bench press when it comes to building the pecs; it's such a fun and exciting lift in itself.
I've been such a minimalist with chest. I need to mix things up more!
An if we say that flyes lost tension at top of movement, the same is for bench press
Exactly
Try decline reverse grip bench! It feels amazing and it allows you to bench every day since its so alleviating to the rotator cuff. It gives incredible carryover to flat bench. I am not as strong as you but it gave me an increase in flat bench regular grip from 235 to 330 lbs and reverse grip flat bench from 225 to 350 lbs in less than 6 months. I have been working out for almost 14 years.
Now that sounds like a super unique variation!! Also very cool that you made such impressive gains from it even with your years of experience.
@@AlexLeonidas Thank you for your reply and feedback! 🙏🏻👊
@@AlexLeonidas would actually be cool to see you try this
How did you train for 14 years and only get to 235 on bench? Must be super small ...
@thespiritbomb I started working out weighing 50 kg. Right now I weight 89 kg. During my journey I have suffered an iliopsoas tear, a triceps tear in my right arm a a pec major tear in my right chest, on top of that I have had several luxuations of my right humerus. I don't judge anyone and I know people have made greater PRs than me at a faster rate but I am who I am and I do what I can with what I have. So really I have no excuses, I don't let my injuries stop me. I just keep working. Having your mentality is what caused me my injuries, trying to rush the progress and feed the ego to push beyond my need of recovery.
Rings are the ultimate way to train chest...and honestly the whole upper body.
Thought the title said "addictions" and thought "honestly, same"
I always look forward to getting your deep thoughts on matters of weight lifting, and this vid did not disappoint. I’ve always liked DB chest flys but had a nagging thought in the back of my head about all the people that dump on them. Now I can articulate what it is in like about them. Keep up the great work, man.
Cheers Craig!
I still can't understand why the dumbbell fly would be a good movement. You train the lenghtened position with any press (essentially emphasizing it since there's also no tension at the top of presses) but you do it in a mechanically stronger and safer position. If anything you need to pair presses with machine/cable flies or press arounds to hit the shortened position incase regional hypertrophy is an actual thing.
Thanks for another gem Alex, I tried the seated OHP after seeing your video on it, man I like it.
Awesome brother, glad you're liking it!
This channel has changed my perspective on so many fitness related topics, it's nuts. Thank you for the fantastic content. Keep it up.
Alex is looking full and massive in the recent time !
@@willyhawkins6596 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣no
Not the exercise that's bad, its when and how the exercise is performed that determines if it's good or bad.
When you were talking about partials at the bottom, it reminded me of the late John Meadows always preaching about heavy partial dumbbell flies and swings with high reps when it came to doing shoulders, and then when you wanted to go full ROM, just lightened the weight.
Lesson Learned - DO EVERYTHING EVERY WAY
You reminded me of scooby preaching dumbbell flyes many years ago.
He was saying to squeeze at the top for mind muscle connection, which he may have overemphazised.
But now we are stepping into the waters of how important the psychological part of lifting is, which the scoob was touching on. Basement Bodybuilding and Stand Strength have been pressing the bodybuilder mindset in their vids lately.
For example, "muscle confusion" by switching up exercises, not to confuse the muscle, but to TRICK your brain into thinking you're progression, giving you that satisfying feeling. And what is one gem NH discovered? That always progressing, even if you have to ration it by slowing it down is highly beneficial.
I think scooby's old videos are a gold mine, for they seem like crude/less in-depth versions of what current youtube bodybuilders are saying. Like the grandma giving you raw garlic and sugar while you're sick while not understanding the science of why it helps.
Great video. I'm glad you talked about machines for chest because I really like them so much more than free weights. In fact I barely do free weights anymore for chest and hammer strength is my primary movement
Talking about chest stretch, I recently bought rings for dips/ deficit push ups after years of only doing push ups on the floor and my chest is very sore after every workout, it feels so good.
Funny I’ve been itching to hit up a chest press machine and my gym will be getting a bunch of those Hammer Strength machines. Plus Faz is always posting his workouts on Instagram and they always include a machine chest press. The stars are aligning. I may have to add it into my rotation.
I think I am one of the few guys in my gym doing dumbbell flys. Everyone else runs for the cables. I have always loved dumbbell flys.
We need more limb training advices if possible.
100% will do my man
Ring dips / ring push ups are KING! I remember you made a video on this on your chanel👌. I love the fact that it requires high stability and emphasizes the pecs / low chest ! These alone have done so much for me you don’t even understand !
The incline bench is king. Go get your incline to 315+ for reps
@@antonhallergren588I do both bro inclines good for the upper chest/frontal delts
I think you nailed it with the dumbbell flyes. They're great for the chest in the same way the bench press is great for your chest. You work that stretch hard.
Traditional fly movement w lengthened arms strains my biceps and elbows a bit too much. I prefer more bent arms - sort of a press-fly or press-around movement, still allowing a good stretch w a heavier load.
I thought about the point of being too burned out to do another press opposed to a fly and I wouldn’t tell someone not to do flies but I personally still don’t really like them. For me it just feels like I’m working my arm. I’ve never tried the cable or band version though bc I’ve never been in a gym nor own bands. I’m always doing a lot of benching or push ups relative to the volume I need and even I did want to do extra chest stimulation I’d just do another set of those under a lighter load
Nice to hear your thoughts on machines, it’s something I’ve always wanted to hear from someone like you. It’s completely out of my element and I’m not against questioning traditional ideas. In fact the more I learn the more I tend to disagree with mainstream ideas
always thought db flyes were the best. Was doing 75s in HS. Stopped doing them cuz my chest got so much bigger than everything else.
That's super strong man, even crazier that you did that in HS.
Not surprised, your chest is massive!
dude i swear slow pause db flys are great im so sore from yesterday
Oh yeah holding it in the bottom is tough!
Decline press is amazing for sure! Dorian Yates said it was one of his main mass builders 💪.
I love the objectivism. Just trying to achieve greatness anyway possible!
I've been hugging trees for the last 6-months and I won Mr Olympia. Thank you Alex
Serious talk, i've been doing decline chest press for a while, and im loving em. I dunno if effective but my shoulders hurt way less/chest gets more pump. Not a fan of the bench version tho
I’ve use db flys to stretch rehab some gummed up pecs after too much pressing👍
i tried the machine chest press without leg drive (similar to larsen press) and i felt it really good on my chest. Try it out!
I think the big reason why the dumbell fly is vilified is due to the injury risk. Specifically when elevated on a bench. For me, it's less the effectiveness for gains, and more the risk-reward when alternatives exist. One easy solution is just to not load the weight as much/not push it to failure - both things you can do safely on a cable variation
Thank you so much for the videos,, honestly diamond in the dirt content. Dirt being the whole youtube fitness industry lmao
Thank you sir! The only fitness world is indeed a big mess.
My gym has a decline bench, I'll give it a try for wave or two as an accessory
There's one chest press in my town that actually works for my anthropometry and feels amazing. Too bad I'm contracted to a gym that has the WORSE machines
Yeah if the machines aren't designed well screw em
I have always used this analogy the compound movements are the doughnut and chest flys are the icing sugar glaze on top
I've found that the KEY to the db fly is having a very good mind muscle connection. When we have that "aha" moment of using our chest to move the weight rather than arms/shoulders its a complete game changer imo. I also found to hit the clavicular portion by allowing the dbs to travel basically over my head pretty much on a 15 degree incline my upper chest gets stimulated heavily!
Are you Eastern European?
Even though I love compound movements for my chest incorporating machines can be beneficial also going to start incorporating some DB flys in my workout s💪🏽👊🏽thanks for the advice brother!
7:57 some people like getting pinned in the bottom though, know'm'say'n' .... 😅
I’ve got great gains from doing dumbbell bench press, I use the barbell bench press too so I guess I can say I got the best of both worlds
Based on the logic about machines, wouldn't a pec deck machine be superior to a dumbbell fly?
I like chest press machines, I feel they are like belt squats but for bench
I love this can you please do this for other muscle groups or previous claims you have made in the past that you have changed your opinion on? Such a healthy discussion
Yo Alex what’s ur opinion on using chains now that u mentioned that machines can be good for using brute strength?
The sound bro
Is it fixed now? I hear it perfectly fine on my end
@@AlexLeonidas fixed
I love Decline Bench Press! Have you tried decline dumbbell bench press with a neutral grip? Out of all variations I feel the strongest stretch and contraction. I’d love to hear your thoughts on it.
Nothing hit mu chest like pushups! I train 10+ years and I try everything!
Same man, paused weighted pushups, nasty pumps.
Flies are for sure good for the stretched position. The muscle is actually never uniformly worked, so having different exercises with different resistance profile is not a bad idea.
Hey Alex. Question about RIR/RPE. Lets say you did 3 reps on bench with 2 rir on one set and on the other 8 reps with 2 RIR. Would the second set be higher effort or no? Seeing as on the first one you've done 60% of your possible reps and the second 80%. To me it seems like a higher percentage of your max reps would be higher effort but still be the same RIR/RPE. Hope that makes sense
Hey Alex, your talk on machines has made me consider replacing the overhead Extension (for me lying flat on a bench cuz it's too awkward upright) with the cable version. Do you think there is any carryover from cables to barbell pressing strength, or is it purely for size (running your novice program as is)
appreciate the intellectual honesty as always. this is the kind of transparency us nattys need
I always get ac joint pain when i heavy bench. When i do ring/normal dips pushups its okay
to dig into something new is always exciting! when i practised athletics (javelin thrower), more than 30 years ago, we had oldschool gym just with basic equipment, no dumbells. there were increadibly jacked athletes, among them discus throwers usually most impressive (although shot-putters were even stronger in general, but not so impressive physique and v-taper). they did a lot of interesting work. a lot of specificity work for their discipline but also general work. they were of course usually crazy strong in benchpress. but they did also flies and "around the world" exercise, but with plates. if you have just these big olympic dumbells, try to use also plates for flies, lateral raises or so. it is quite interesting and actually very good. most of plates are usable for it...
Very cool man!
I dont use tiktok or insta im a sigma i dont have social media just youtube
Very solid video. I’ve been going through the same myself with my thoughts on machines. I alternate between 10-12 weeks of SSB as my main quad builder and then 10-12 weeks with the Hack. There’s other examples as well.
Yo Alex, as a novice I wanna ask why I never feel my chest working during bench but can feel it contract during dips? Bench press feels weird to me even though I retract my shoulder blades etc.
Potentially a deeper stretch on dips, which can allow for more bloodflow, meaning more pump. I rarely feel my chest on dumbbell bench even when I try, and I've been training for 9 years. I feel it more on flyes etc
@@RDS_Armwrestling aahh I see so should I continue doing bench then?
@@HrsHJ if it works for you then why not, you have to figure it out yourself, its not the best chest exercise but some peole get very good results with it some not.
One quick point/question. When using 100s+ for dumbbells, couldn’t you use a neutral grip but still go out to 45° from your side? I have done that myself and it seems to hit my chest pretty well and doesn’t destroy the triceps. It keeps the range of motion deep too
I remember the podcast you did with team3dalpha and he was talking about the weighted stretch you get from Dumbbell chest flyes. BTW did your high volume upper body workout this morning gonna make that my routine now!
True that Migan used to talk about this. Nice man I'm happy you're doing that workout!!
You look incredible, alpha stud!
Alex! Big thanks brother. I was having elbow pain from doing my heavy compounds and your video with the band push downs eliminated the pain completely!!! Can’t thank you enough!
peak contraction is almost dead. studies telling us
Doesnt that make the pec dec a good exercise aswell 0:00
Love how you keep your mind open and make even more gains- also funny with the timing as I'm about to add next week hammer chest press to my program (I do paused cgbp and paused weighted pushups, but feel like I could be doing more for my chest)
@Matthew Connor Alex has 2 interviews with Meckanimal you might want to check those out, his latest one with him talks about how he incorporates conjugate with weighted calisthenics
Hey Alex, thanks so much for the great content. Quick question from a beginner powerlifter, i’ve been lifting for about 3 months now and I have had great deadlift gains running a PPL split, pulling twice a week conventionally. I have perfected my form but i’ve been running into lower back pain and i’m having trouble progressing due to fatigue, despite all my other lifts increasing greatly. Would you recommend only pulling from the floor once a week and then doing a variation on my 2nd pull day? if yes, which variation would you recommend if my first priority is increasing my conventional deadlift? Thank you!
Hey, I’m not Alex but I do something similar where I deadlift on my first leg day of the week and then do Good mornings and paused RDLs on my 2nd day. May not be perfect for you but it works great for me so far
Tip for a good chest- train only incline
Unilateral band Flys were the difference for me👍
Time to build a massive chest.
Arms also starting to look real juicy
The best of the best, a real inspiration to me