Notes
If you want to learn how to build a perfect chest with dumbbells only, then you have come to the right video. I’m going to show you how to build your upper chest, lower pecs, and get more defined middle pecs with 8 specific chest workout techniques that will help you to start sculpting your chest like never before.
It starts with a couple of mechanical keys that you want to make sure you are not abandoning just because you are using dumbbells to perform your chest exercises. First thing is making sure to keep using leg drive on the dumbbell bench press. Think about pushing your feet into the floor as if you would try and slide your body up the bench as you press the dumbbells away from your body at the bottom of the rep.
Keep in mind, it is important that you use heavier dumbbells to do this as they will be important to keep your shoulders pinned down to the bench and prevent your body from actually sliding.
Next thing you want to take advantage of is the fact that when you build bigger pecs with dumbbells you have the independence of the weights that you can use to your advantage. When using a barbell, your hands are fixed to the bar and it is impossible to get any independent freedom of them during the press. With dumbbells, you can tilt your thumbs up, which will allow the dumbbells to be brought closer together into adduction at the top of the rep and get a better contraction of the pecs muscles as a result.
Next, you want to explore the use of the underhand dumbbell bench press in order to build a perfect chest. This is particularly helpful when you are training at home and don’t have access to an incline bench. The flip of the grip helps to better engage the lats (always a good thing when learning how to bench press heavier) but also gives you the low and away to up and in path that gets a better contraction of the upper chest fibers.
From here, you want to be sure that you are not forgetting to include drop sets in your chest workouts to build a bigger chest. This is helpful because it limits the number of dumbbells that you will need to build a big chest. In fact, you may not need any additional dumbbells at all if you simply drop to the floor immediately following your heavy set of bench press and rep out on pushups until failure.
Next, the static dumbbell bench press technique is another great way to levy a powerful attack against your chest muscles without needing a heavy barbell. Hold one arm steady as you press with the opposite arm. This is great for exposing one sided imbalances of the chest. The position you hold the dumbbell in makes it more or less difficult. Hold the dumbbell down near the chest for an even greater challenge.
Finally, three chest exercises for building a bigger chest are important to make sure you’re not overlooking. The first is the dumbbell pullover. Here you want to make sure you’re not pulling with the elbows with them flared out to your sides. This will engage the lats more than the chest. Instead, if you pull your hands together and squeeze your upper chest together you will drive the movement more with the chest and help it to grow bigger.
The UCV dumbbell raise is a great move for getting pecs muscle growth as it gets your chest into a more complete contraction with dumbbells, with more adduction possible at the top of the rep. Keep in mind that the weights used here will have to be lighter.
Finally, the chest fly is one of the better exercises for overloading adduction, but you can also take advantage of eccentric stress for chest growth by slowing the weights down and safely performing this on the floor rather than a bench. This chest exercise is one that often times gets done on a bench with light weights rather than as shown here with heavier weights, and your ability to build a bigger chest is compromised because of it.
