Used to love flys but they just don’t agree with my shoulders anymore. Fortunatly I’m chest dominant when pressing.
I think it’s misleading to assume that heavier pressing weights translate to more pec load compared to flyes.
If I’m tri-dominant (and I think I am), my chest may be doing less work with presses than with flyes, even if the pressing weight is double. All that extra weight is being carried by my tris, not my pecs. The pec load may actually be lower with presses, despite pushing more overall weight.
[quote]BONEZ217 wrote:
[quote]forlife wrote:
Interesting that most think isolation chest exercises won’t cause as much growth as lifts involving the tris. Why is that?
[/quote]
It depends solely on the person. If pressing doesnt hit the pecs well it doesnt matter how strong your bench gets.
Mind muscle connection is more important than the weight used[/quote]
This makes sense to me.
[quote]forlife wrote:
I think it’s misleading to assume that heavier pressing weights translate to more pec load compared to flyes.
If I’m tri-dominant (and I think I am), my chest may be doing less work with presses than with flyes, even if the pressing weight is double. All that extra weight is being carried by my tris, not my pecs. The pec load may actually be lower with presses, despite pushing more overall weight.[/quote]
Dude, you know what youre doing.
If you want to converse for the sake of it, by all means, go for it. But dont second guess yourself.
[quote]tolismann wrote:
[quote]TommyGunz32 wrote:
I think flies can be > pressing for chest development especially if the person is a shoulder/tri dominant presser[/quote] Wouldn’t it be better for a shoulder/tri’s dominant presser to find ways to become more chest dominant at pressing first?
[/quote]
Are you implying that that’s even POSSIBLE?
I think most of the people talking about dominance are referring to biomechanics. Not the form used when lifting.
How about both, flys as a means to pre fatigue then immediately drop the DBs and press away?
Has anyone seen a change in how much they feel DB pressing in their pecs based on their grip (neutral vs pronated)?
[quote]therajraj wrote:
Has anyone seen a change in how much they feel DB pressing in their pecs based on their grip (neutral vs pronated)?
[/quote]
Only in the respect that, at least for me, it feels awkward to bench widely with DBs in neutral grip, so I tend to tuck my elbows more in neutral grip.
Obviously, this makes neutral grip db pressing into more of a DB close-grip, in which my triceps take a fair amount more of the load and the chest takes less.
[quote]therajraj wrote:
Has anyone seen a change in how much they feel DB pressing in their pecs based on their grip (neutral vs pronated)?
[/quote]
I do notice with DB’s that if I hold them in between neutral and pronated, it feels more “natural” for me, and it seems its the ‘natural’ movements I can:
A) get the most growth from and strength gains with
B) build a better mind-muscle connection with (I can feel my chest working to push the weight with this grip, instead of pronated where I feel my chest only because it’s getting stretched)
However, I’m not an advanced lifter at all, so take what I say with a grain of salt
I think the advantage of dumbbells is that my hands are not in a fixed position. I use a regular grip and get a big stretch at the bottom (elbows flared) and on the way up I sort of bring my hands in. This really helps me feel my chest and get a great squeeze at the top. Obviously, the bigger the bells get the more difficult this becomes but even if it is very slight it helps me feel my chest.
I have seen a lot of advanced guys press the bells like they have a bar in their hand so who knows.
For me, DB pressing is sorta like back training in the sense you should forget about your hands and concentrate on your elbows. When you pull, thinking about your hands tends to activate your biceps more where thinking about your elbows helps concentrate on your back.
When I DB press I try to think about my elbows moving toward and away from each other and forget about “pushing” the weight up, which tends to activate the triceps.
It seems apparent (now) that concentrating on your hands would activate your limb muscles, where concentrating on your elbows would activate the torso muscles.
*edited
[quote]waylanderxx wrote:
I for one began to see much better chest growth withe the bulk of my routine being heavy fly movements, I still do 3 working sets of HS incline but aside from that? All flies[/quote]
At what stage did you make this transition? Is it possible that the reason for that is, that the isolation movement taught you how to connect with your chest muscles, and by now all chest movements are more efficient at targeting the pecs?
[quote]forlife wrote:
I’ve noticed a lot more chest stimulation and soreness when I do flyes instead of bench presses. Not surprising, since flyes are an isolation exercise. Just wondering what people think about a program using flyes exclusively for chest, and doing separate isolation work for tris.
Has anyone tried this? I obviously wouldn’t do it permanently, but seems like it might be good for a change of pace.[/quote]
I was forced to do this due to a wrist injury last year. The strength gains I made didn’t shoot over to my presses unfortunately, and when I was able to start pressing again I made greater size gains than with doing flyes only.
Not bad for a change of pace but I personally think it sucked compared to my regular routine (in regards to pressing strength+chest size)