The trick here is how do we make 20kg dumbbells feel much heavier. This will be a common theme for the next few months and fortunately we have a few tools to achieve this. Today we are going to do all our isolation exercises first to pre-exhaust the shoulders and then finish up with some compounds (pressing) when our Delts are already trashed.
Pre-exhausting the target muscle with isolation exercises before the compound exercise is just one of the many tricks we will be using in the coming weeks.
|
EXERCISE |
SETS & REPS |
Rep Tempo |
|
Dumbbell Side Raises (lateral raises) |
4 x 12 |
2:0:2 |
|
Seated bent-over Dumbbell raise (rear delt) |
4 x 12 |
2:0:2 |
|
Leaning One Arm Side raises |
3 x 12 |
2:0:2 |
|
Seated Dumbbell Presses |
3 x 12 or failure |
2:0:2 |
Sets here are a little high compared to when I’m using heavier weights in the gym. Beginners or females may need to reduce the number of sets too. Don’t get caught up in the numbers, however. The primary goal is to stimulate muscle growth and if we can do that fully with only half this volume then well done, put the weights down and go home (damn, we are already at home).
Next week we will pick another muscle group and use a different technique to trick the muscles into growth. Light Weight Baby!