Bodybuilding Tips and Tricks

Performance: Attach a narrow grip handle to a cable row pulley station. Keep your knees bent with your feet flat on the support platforms in front of you. Keeping your torso perpendicular to the floor and your eyes straight ahead, pull the handle slowly toward your midsection until it nearly touches your navel. Focus on feeling the contraction in your back muscles. Squeeze your shoulder blades at the peak of the contraction, then slowly return the handle to the starting position. In order to allow for a good stretch in your lats, lean forward very slightly with your arms extended at the end of each rep. You should not, however, allow the weight to pull you forward a great deal as this will create a rocking motion while performing your reps which may lead to injury and will lessen the stress on the targeted muscle groups.

Muscle Emphasis: trapezius, latissimus dorsi, and erector spine; strong stress is also placed on the posterior deltoids, biceps, brachialis, and forearm flexors

This is a good exercise to finish your back workout with because it works the back without involving the biceps. (This also makes this move one of the few exercises that can be used to pre-exhaust the back.) Don’t worry about using a ton of weight; heavy poundage is not necessary to achieve good results with this exercise. Concentrate on maintaining perfect form and feeling the exercise in your lats.

Performance: Attach a lat pulldown bar to a high pulley cable attachment and take an overhand shoulder-width grip. Stand with your arms outstretched toward the bar, with the bar at shoulder level. Bend your knees slightly and try to keep your bodyweight on your heels. Lean forward slightly and tighten your abdominals. Keeping your elbows slightly bent and wrists locked, contract your lats and push the bar down and in towards your body in an arcing motion. Your torso should not move. Squeeze you lats at the bottom of the movement (the bar should be close to your thighs), then slowly allow the bar to come back to the starting position.

Muscle Emphasis: latissimus dorsi, serratus anterior; secondary stress on abdominals

Performance: Face a weight bench. With your feet fairly close together, lean forward and rest your free hand on the bench so you’re supporting the weight of your upper body with one arm. Bend your knees slightly and keep your chest slightly lifted and back arched. Reach down and grasp a dumbbell while keeping your other arm locked and supporting your torso. Keeping your torso stable throughout the movement, slowly pull the dumbbell all the way up to your chest, moving your shoulder backward as your elbow comes toward the ceiling. Then lower the dumbbell straight down to the start position. Try to focus on feeling the contraction in your lats when you raise the weight and make sure you get a good stretch in your lats at the bottom of the movement. You can also perform this exercise with your body parallel to the bench and one knee resting on the bench if the unsupported version is too difficult for you.

Muscle Emphasis: latissimus dorsi, biceps, brachialis, and forearm flexors; secondary emphasis is on the trapezius and posterior deltoid

Performance: Hold a relatively lightweight dumbbell at your side with your feet a little less than shoulder-width apart. Maintaining an erect posture, bend to one side as far as you can and return to the startting position. Keep the arm not holding the dumbbell straight and try to feel it “reaching” for the floor when performing the movement. Repeat for reps on each side. You can also perform this exercise using a the low pulley (with D-handle attachment) of a cable apparatus.

Emphasis: Obliques and serratus muscles

Squats are quite possibly the best lower-body exercise around and also, in my opinion, one of the most difficult. However, once mastered, you are well on your way to building huge, powerful legs. In addition to their ability to build a strong, muscular lower body, squats are also an awesome movement for stimulating a full-body, anabolic metabolism which of course is always a plus.

Concentrate on getting comfortable with proper squatting form before going too heavy; it’ll be worth it in the long run. You also might want to start out using the Smith Machine when you perform squats. The Smith will make things a bit easier and help you get the feel of the movement down.

Performance: Stand under the bar with your feet in a comfortable shoulder-width stance. With your eyes straight-ahead, place the bar across your upper back and trapezius. Keeping your head up and your body tensed, slowly bend at the knees At the point where your thighs are parallel (or a little past) to the floor, reverse your direction, driving forcefully through your heels to a standing position.

Muscle emphasis: Primary stress is placed on the quadriceps, glutes, and lower back muscles; secondary stress is placed on the hamstrings, upper back, and abdominal muscles

Performance: Stand holding a dumbbell in one hand with your arm at your side. Hold onto a solid structure or another dumbbell with your other hand for balance and support. With your elbow in fixed position, slowly raise the weight until your arm is parallel to the floor, pause for a moment, then return to the start. Repeat for reps. These can also be performed with both arms at the same time or alternating right and left until the desired reps are completed.

Muscle Emphasis: Medial head of the deltoid.

The Cable Crunch is an extremely effective upper ab exercise that’s a bit tricky to master but well worth the extra effort. As with all cable exercises, the constant tension provided by the cables make these a great exercise for feeling “the burn”.

Performance: Attach a rope attachment to a high pulley on the cable apparatus. Grasp the two ends of the rope and kneel down about a foot back from the weight stack. Allow your body to extend toward the pulley. The “action” portion of the exercise is comprised of two simultaneous movements. You will, at the same time, bend over at the waist until your forehead touches and floor and do a small, pullover movement to bring your arms from an extended position to one in which they are bent at 90 degree angles and your hands are near the floor. Your hands should remain just in front of your head throughout the movement. As you perform the exercise, forcefully exhale all of your air. Hold the contraction for a second at the bottom of the movement and then return to the starting position. Repeat for the desired rep count.

I like to perform these near the end of my biceps routine. They hit the biceps from a different angle than other exercises and will really help bulk up your forearms.

Performance: Stand upright with your back and head straight, knees slightly bent. Grasp a barbell with an overhand grip about a shoulder width apart. Slowly raise the weight with your elbows tight into your body, feeling the contraction in your biceps and forearms. Once the weight has reached the top, slowly lower it with control back to the starting position. These can also be performed using an E-Z curl bar if your wrists bother you.

Muscle Emphasis: brachioradialis, brachialis, biceps brachii

The Incline Barbell Press targets the often lagging upper pectoral region and some people believe that Incline Presses are a more effective mass-builder than Flat Bench Presses. Whether this is true or not, it’s definitely an exercise you should include in your chest routine. The Incline Press is a more difficult exercise than its flat-bench counterpart, so you should expect to lift quite a bit lighter than when you’re flat benching.

One last thought: although you should periodically mix up every aspect of your workout to avoid stagnation, it’s usually a good idea, in my opinion, to do incline presses before your flat-bench work. Doing flat-bench barbell presses first may leave your muscles too worn out to get the most out of the more difficult incline work. If you do Incline Barbell Presses first however, you should be able to get some good sets in and still have plenty of gas in your tank and muscle power left to recruit for some Flat Bench Presses.

Performance: Lie back on an incline bench and take hold of the barbell with a moderate-grip, palms facing the ceiling. Unrack the bar and raise it until your arms are fully extended. Bend your elbows to lower the bar to just below your neck. At the bottom of the rep, your elbows should be out and away from your body but slightly in front of your shoulders. Feel the stretch in your pecs and then contract your chest muscles and rasie the bar up until your elbows are almost locked out. Repeat for reps.

Muscle Emphasis: Primary stress is on the pectoralis major and minor, anterior deltoids, and triceps. Secondary stress is felt in the medial deltoids, and upper back muscles.

Seated Barbell Shoulder Presses (whether performed on a regular pressing bench or a Smith Machine) are a great mass-builder for shoulders (deltoids). While shoulder presses primarily work the anterior (front) head of the three-headed deltoid muscle, the other two heads (medial and posterior) are involved in the lift to some degree as well. I recommend starting your shoulder workout with these for a nice muscle-building pump before you move on to the (typically) lighter weight isolation shoulder exercises. Try to lift heavy on this one but, as always, stay in good form and be careful of straining or tearing your shoulder. Choose a weight you can manage as shoulders are prone to injury.

Performance: Set an adjustable bench at 90 degrees and adjust either the bar or seat height so you can comfortably reach up and unrack the bar. Sit up straight and make sure that, when lowered, the bar passes just in front of your face. Take a larger than shoulder-width grip (palms facing away from you) on the bar and unrack it. Slowly and in a controlled motion, lower the bar to approximately chin height, then flex your shoulders and power the bar forcefully back up. Try to keep the motion of the bar as perfectly up and down as possible, with your elbows under the bar during each rep.

Muscle Emphasis: anterior, medial, and posterior deltoid