Shoulders?

Hi, I just joined and this is my first post. I have been working out on and off for the past 5 years or so. I have lately gotten pretty serious about it. I have had a heck of time building any size to my shoulders. I just cannot seem to get that wide shoulder look. It is more so the upper part of my arms, not the bicep, and not the tricep, but that muscle on the outside of your arm.

The problem is, i am limited to the exercises i can do considering my shoulders pop when doing some exercises. Can you please give me a few good exercises for this part of the arm. Thanks

Welcome to the forum!

Make sure to introduce yourself in the "Introductions" section.

For width, you want to work the lateral (side) deltoid or 'delt." Doing military presses are a good exercise to start with, after a warm-up, since you can use your heaviest shoulder weights here and hit the entire delt. You can do these with a barbell or dumbbells--I prefer the latter, because it allows me to find a hand position that is better for my touchy shoulder, and doesn't lock me into a fixed pattern of movement.

Add in some lateral raises (try them one arm at a time to isolate the muscle and have more control) and rear shoulder flyes (the posterior delt is often overlooked in workouts). I agree with those authors who say to omit isolated anterior shoulder work, like front raises, because the front shoulder is worked plenty with chest work, and it's important to counterbalance the forward leaning/pushing movements we do in everyday life with more work for the rear postural muscles and rear delts).

And about that shoulder 'pop,' definitely something worth looking into before you get more into shoulder work. What merely 'pops' now could be a warning of impingement or some other chronic injury in the future.

And make sure when you do shoulder work, or any upper body work, for that matter, to keep your shoulders back and down (scapular retraction). I can have problems with impingement if I'm a bit lazy about my form, but when I keep my scapula retracted, I don't.

And don't increase your weight load too quickly, as the shoulder joint can be somewhat unstable compared to other joints, and more easily injured as well. Go up in weight in rather small increments.

Also, don't overwork the shoulder, as recovery is also important to growth. For example, if you do a split routine where you are working chest one day, back the next, and shoulders the next, you are actually using the shoulders 3 days in a row (they are agonists, or 'helpers' for both chest--front shoulder--and back---rear shoulder). I sometimes do a three-day split, where I divide the upper body into two parts, the third workout being lower body (which I may do twice in the week). I do upper body workout 1 on day 1, lower body on day 3, and upper body workout 2 on day 5, to put more recovery time between the upper body, especially for the shoulder.

(FYI: it's "bicep" and "tricep," no "t" at the end.)

This exercise is good for building shoulders http://exrx.net/WeightExercises/DeltoidAnterior/DBShoulderPress.html

The best exercise, IMO, for building shoulders is push pressing. It also carries the least risk of injury. Any exercise like lateral raises should be avoided if you have shoulder problems as it will only accentuate them.

I had a rotator cuff injury just after I started training, and that kind of silly shoulder isolation just made it worse. Stick to heavy compounds and you will be fine.

Powercleans are very good for building the area around the shoulder, namely lats, traps, rhomboids, rotator cuff, posterior delts, as well as obviously almost the entire rest of the body.

Jonathan

I always loved doing arnold presses...I've got a really bad left shoulder but the rotation doing arnold presses alowed me to build my strength back after injuries and it also hits more heads of the shoulder than simple presses. Lateral raises are good to but I only did them when my shoulders felt perfect.

Hey, thanks for the useful information. I have a few different exercises I can try and see how they effect my shoulder popping. Jonathan, I dont know what "powercleans" are. Can you explain. Thanks to everyone.

The best exercise, IMO, for building shoulders is push pressing. It also carries the least risk of injury.

Why would the risk of injury be less that for the military press?

Yeah, I second staying away from lateral raises if you have any sort of shoulder issues. My right shoulder pops when I do them unless I have my elbow bent at a nearly 90 degree angle, and it just feels downright uncomfortable when the popping occurrs. Any size I have on my shoulders was made from overhead pressing, both dumbbell and barbell, and even a little bit of machine pressing work (if you can find one of the rare ones that aren't too bad such as the Hammer Strength machines.) Shoulders are one of those silly smaller muscle groups that like abs, some people have great ones right off the start and others have to work hard to develop size in them, and I know I'm in the "hard work" group on that one. Just keep pressing overhead and it'll come in time!

This exercise is good for building shoulders http://exrx.net/WeightExercises/DeltoidAnterior/DBShoulderPress.html

What about barbell front and neck press? What's better? Barbell or dumbell press?

More risk of injury due to the movement starting from a dead stop at quite a low position, which is uncomfortable for most people's shoulders. It's like only doing bottom position paused benching, as opposed to normal touch and go benching.

Didn't this come up on the debate on VF on strict vs push?

Plus, look at oly lifters - they don't do strict presses and they have fantastic shoulders

thirteenptbuck - Powercleans are where you have the bar in a deadlift position, and you pull it off the ground, launch it upwards until it is at chest height, and then catch it on your shoulders. There are two videos I can use to explain it. The first is one of a full clean. Don't do this - there is no need to fully squat down, but the movement is similar:

http://www.exrx.net/WeightExercises/OlympicLifts/Clean.html

Then this is the high pull which is essentially a powerclean without the catch. So take the movement from the high pull, and the catch from the full clean, and you have a power clean

http://www.exrx.net/WeightExercises/OlympicLifts/HighPull.html

Jonathan

This exercise is good for building shoulders http://exrx.net/WeightExercises/DeltoidAnterior/DBShoulderPress.html

 

What about barbell front and neck press? What's better? Barbell or dumbell press?

I like dumbbells because you use more stabilizers, and you can use different grips, like Arnolds or hammers.