Hitting weak points and bringing lagging muscles into lifts, from Thib’s forum.
-Some kid is like “my pecs are whack.”
Some guy responds;
“All that variation is hurting you. Pick one barbell movement (Incline or flat). Build up your strength with that. (5x3, 6x3, 4x5, 5x5). Then do the opposite one (flat or incline) with dumbbells for 4x6-8. Bench twice a week. Eat food. Cheers!”
C. Thibaudeau says;
"While that is sound advice 9 times out of 10, I do not think that it will solve his issue. This is clearly an issue of not being able to involve the pectorals optimally in the big pressing exercises, compensating by using either the delts or triceps more.
Simply getting stronger on the big basic presses will simply make the dominant muscle group grow even faster and the pectorals will still lag behind; it fact if he only do the big basic press without addressing the mind-muscle connection issue with his pectorals the problem might be getting even worse by simply trying to get a stronger press.
Why?
Because, as I mentioned, the dominant muscle groups will get stronger at a faster rate. This will accentuate the difference between the dominant muscles (either delts or triceps, or both) and the pectorals, making the body relies even more on those dominant muscles.
The first time I bench pressed 405lbs I literally had ZERO pectoral development. That’s because I had monster delts from my 7 years training exclusively on the olympic lifts and having super strong and efficient shoulders and my triceps were also very dominant (I’ve always done way more triceps than biceps work ever since I was 15 and read an article saying that the key to getting big arms was training the triceps since they are 2/3rd of the upper arm mass).
To make my chest catch up to my delts I had to do a lot of mind-muscle connection work; isolation exercises for the pectorals and constant tension methods.
Basically to fix a lagging muscle group (assuming that the problem is from poor mind-muscle connection/improper recruitment and not insufficient training) you need to:
Improve your skill at contracting that muscle (this means isolation work where the dominant muscles cannot compensate) as well a constant tension methods.
Once you are better at recruiting and contracting the lagging muscle group you need to practice integrating that muscle in the big lift, this will require moving back down in weight on the big lift to focus on feeling the lagging muscle doing the work… the heavier you go, the more the body will want to go back to his default setting of utilizing the dominant muscle(s) to compensate. Pre-fatigue is also a good tool to use here.
The third step, once you get a better feel for involving the lagging muscle is the big lift you need to gradually work toward maintaining the involvement of that muscle as the weight gets heavier (once again, the heavier the weight gets, the more you will tend to go back to your default neural programming). Here a contrast (1 lighter set, 1 moderate set, 1 lighter set, 1 heavier set, etc.) or pyramid (for example 12, 10, 8, 6) can work great. You are using the lighter sets to “practice” contracting the lagging muscle and you try to maintain the same feeling with the heavier weight.
Finally once you are capable of maintaining the tension on the lagging muscle even with heavier weights you will focus on greating as much growth in that muscle as possible while still practicing doing the big lift with that muscle. The post-fatigue method is great here.
When that is done you can focus on getting back into heavy pressing and now the chest will grow like everything else, maybe even more,
Here is an example of how it can be done… not that I only write down a sample of the chest portion of the workout, writing a full 5 phases program would be way too long and outside the scope of a forum.
STEP 1 - BUILD MIND MUSCLE CONNECTION
Duration: 3 weeks
Approach: use more isolation work in your session to practice contracting your pecs, DO NOT focus on the weight, focus on contracting the pecs against a resistance
Frequency: 2 chest workouts (you can train another muscle with it, for example with delts the first session and with triceps on the second one) per week BUT do one isolation for the pecs (the one where you feel the contraction the most) at the beginning of every single workout for 4 sets of 8-12 reps… see that as “chest contraction practice”
SAMPLE CHEST PORTION OF WORKOUT
A. Pec deck (this is to activate you pecs so that you can feel them more)
3-4 sets of 8-10 reps squeezing the peak contraction hard for 2 seconds on each rep. Don’t focus on weight, focus on contracting your pecs.
B. Decline bench press (to minimize deltoid compensation)
4 work sets of 8-10 reps, try to squeeze the weight up with the chest
C. Cable flies
4 work sets of 8-10 reps, squeezing the peak contraction 2 seconds and doing the eccentric in 4 seconds, focusing on maintaining pec contraction
D. Push-ups
4 work sets of max reps using a 3030 tempo (3 seconds up, 3 seconds down) focusing on contracting the chest. To do that imagine trying to bring your hands closer together as you are pressing up
STEP 2 - LEARN TO FEEL THE PECS WORKING IN THE BENCH
Duration: 3 weeks
Approach: Pre-fatigue
Frequency: hit chest twice a week, also maintain the daily pec exercise as in phase 1
SAMPLE CHEST PORTION OF WORKOUT
A. Pec deck (this is to activate you pecs so that you can feel them more)
3-4 sets of 8-10 reps squeezing the peak contraction hard for 2 seconds on each rep. Don’t focus on weight, focus on contracting your pecs.
B1. Squeeze press
4 sets of 8-10 reps, focus on squeezing inward during the whole concentric portion. Do the concentric (lifting) in 3 seconds to maximize the time the pecs are being contracted
30 sec of rest between B1 & B2
B2. Bench press
4 sets of 6-8 reps, try to get the same feeling as you did in the squeeze press
C. Cable cross-over
4 sets of 8-10 reps squeezing the peak 2 seconds. Focus on contracting the pecs, not moving more weight. Play with hand position to see where you get the strongest pectoral contraction
PHASE 3 - PRACTICE MAINTAINING PECTORAL CONTRACTION AS THE WEIGHT INCREASES
Duration: 3 weeks
Approach: contrast sets and pyramid
Frequency: 2 chest workouts per week, drop the daily chest exercise
SAMPLE CHEST PORTION OF WORKOUT
A. Squeeze press
4 sets of 8-10 reps, focus on squeezing inward during the whole concentric portion. Do the concentric (lifting) in 3 seconds to maximize the time the pecs are being contracted
B. Bench press
6 sets
Set 1 = 8 reps, light, slower reps focusing on squeezing the pecs
Set 2 = 6 reps, moderate weight, focus on maintaining the same feeling as in the preceding set
Set 3 = 8 reps, same as set no.1
Set 4 = 4 reps, fairly heavy but still in full control, try to keep the same feeling as in set no.3
Set 5 = 8 reps, same as set no.1 and 3
Set 6 = 2 reps, heavy, try to keep the same feeling as the lighter sets
C. Decline bench press
1 x 10, 1 x 8, 1 x 6, 1 x 4, 1 x 2
Here all the sets are like a 7-8 on the effort scale. You leave around 2 reps in the tank on all sets so that you can focus on the quality of the contraction
D. Pec deck
3 sets of 8-10 reps with a 3030 tempo (3 seconds up, 3 seconds down)
PHASE 4 - FOCUS ON MAXIMUM CHEST GROWTH
Duration: 3 weeks
Approach: post-fatigue
Frequency: 2 chest workouts per week
SAMPLE CHEST PORTION OF WORKOUT
A. Pec deck
3 sets of 8-10 reps with a 3030 tempo (3 seconds up, 3 seconds down)
B1. Bench press
4 sets of 4-6 reps
NO REST between B1 and B2
B2. Squeeze press
4 sets of 8-10 reps, focus on squeezing inward during the whole concentric portion. Do the concentric (lifting) in 3 seconds to maximize the time the pecs are being contracted
C1. Decline bench press
4 sets of 6-8 reps
NO REST between C1 and C2
C2. DB flies, or Cable flies, or Cross-over
4 sets of 8-10
PHASE 5 - BACK TO HEAVY LIFTING
Duration: 4 weeks
You will do bench press and decline bench with the following loading schemes:
Week 1: 1 x 6, 1 x 4, 1 x 2, 1 x 6, 1 x 4, 1 x 2
Week 2: 1 x 5, 1 x 4, 1 x 3, 1 x 2, 1 x 1
Week 3: 1 x 5, 1 x 3, 1 x 1, 1 x 5, 1 x 3, 1 x 1
Week 4: 1 x 3, 1 x 2, 1 x 1, 1 x 3, 1 x 2, 1 x 1
Then do 3-4 sets of 6-8 on incline DB press
Then you are fixed for life."
. Haven’t thought about that one in a looong time