It doesn’t matter how much you lift, but since you asked, I’m a beast and lift 130’s for reps… 
In all seriousness though, the Martinez partials that Prof X mentioned have been a godsend to me. Tried them a few years ago and found the ridiculous weight you can use unlocked some serious growth, which just can’t always be found by following anyone else’s ‘rules’.
at 3:50, nice looking machine
[quote]Professor X wrote:
Stu, I do them with my arms bent and I will challenge you on overall shoulder development even though you may be leaner than me currently. Let’s not think in a box.
I have gone up to 75lbs for side lateral raises. That was right before I started using the machine more for this movement because it causes less strain on my upper arm. My lateral head didn’t really begin to sit out there until I was using greater than the 45lbs dumbbells. I do swing a little. I have seen Vic Martinez do partial raises with the heaviest dumbbell he can hold for that movement.
I think the one thing that can hold people back (assuming they understand the difference between swinging a little and all out cheating to the degree of promoting injury) is the belief that you need some sort of straight armed perfect form with no swinging EVER to build great shoulders.
My guess is, most of the guys with really big shoulders do swing a little the heavier they go…and it works.[/quote]
i know this is not a recent post, but here is jay cutler doing his laterals with a very noticeable bend in his elbows…and he is not even going extremely heavy.
With god awful form,I might have gone up to 100 pounds or so. Hehe. Like others,I’ve seen (other) pros doing laterals with some amount of swing; no way in hell they could handle those weights strict even though they were big. There’s a point where it just starts feeling retarded,like with a smaller weight does not feel much or alternatively just gets too heavy and awkward and feel it in my core a lot. I think a machine would fix that but fortunately there’s simpler things like upright rows.
Anyway,405 laterals? Hahaha. I guess they deadlift it in pain and then lean over like they were training posterior delts and activate a little bit posterior as well as lateral delt as they rock the weight back and forth for momentum before doing reps. That or it is (probably) a typo.
i meant 45lb, dumbshits.
I’ve found the heavier I got the more likely I am to incorporate my traps, when that happens I guess you’re going too heavy for what you can handle if you’re goal is to isolate the delts. I prefer dumb bell and military presses and do laterals with 30-40s when do my rotator cuff work.
bench 350
squat 475
deadlift 450 (might be able to do more but I have a bad habit of neglecting this lift)
I’m thinking though that those numbers don’t mean as much as your form and how well you isolate the delts when your doing the movement.
[quote]The Austrian Oak wrote:
Professor X wrote:
Stu, I do them with my arms bent and I will challenge you on overall shoulder development even though you may be leaner than me currently. Let’s not think in a box.
I have gone up to 75lbs for side lateral raises. That was right before I started using the machine more for this movement because it causes less strain on my upper arm. My lateral head didn’t really begin to sit out there until I was using greater than the 45lbs dumbbells. I do swing a little. I have seen Vic Martinez do partial raises with the heaviest dumbbell he can hold for that movement.
I think the one thing that can hold people back (assuming they understand the difference between swinging a little and all out cheating to the degree of promoting injury) is the belief that you need some sort of straight armed perfect form with no swinging EVER to build great shoulders.
My guess is, most of the guys with really big shoulders do swing a little the heavier they go…and it works.
i know this is not a recent post, but here is jay cutler doing his laterals with a very noticeable bend in his elbows…and he is not even going extremely heavy.
- YouTube [/quote]
Jays lateral raises always remind me more of a loose dumbell upright row…
I have always been partial to the way ronnie does them…its looks like he is cheating…but the more I watched and paused it…at the top of the movement where he holds it for a second is all side delts…
check it out…
[quote]mtotry wrote:
The Austrian Oak wrote:
Professor X wrote:
Stu, I do them with my arms bent and I will challenge you on overall shoulder development even though you may be leaner than me currently. Let’s not think in a box.
I have gone up to 75lbs for side lateral raises. That was right before I started using the machine more for this movement because it causes less strain on my upper arm. My lateral head didn’t really begin to sit out there until I was using greater than the 45lbs dumbbells. I do swing a little. I have seen Vic Martinez do partial raises with the heaviest dumbbell he can hold for that movement.
I think the one thing that can hold people back (assuming they understand the difference between swinging a little and all out cheating to the degree of promoting injury) is the belief that you need some sort of straight armed perfect form with no swinging EVER to build great shoulders.
My guess is, most of the guys with really big shoulders do swing a little the heavier they go…and it works.
i know this is not a recent post, but here is jay cutler doing his laterals with a very noticeable bend in his elbows…and he is not even going extremely heavy.
Jays lateral raises always remind me more of a loose dumbell upright row…
[/quote]
They aren’t. That is pretty much how I do them. I think I may bend my arms more and the heavier you go, the more this is necessary.
I get the feeling that “perfect form” is holding some of you back.
[quote]MODOK wrote:
I think doing a lighter weight with straight arms, a heavier weight with bent arms, or the heaviest weight with arms at 90 degrees, if its in the same plane of motion and the same rep range, its virtually the same.[/quote]
I had never really thought about this until recently, but I think it happens naturally, at least for me. Using lighter weights my arms were straighter. I’m in the 50’s now for my top set of raises and my arm is bent at about 120 or 130 degrees or so.
That slight bend also takes a hell of a lot of stress off the shoulder but I still feel that medial delt working.
Also, a long time ago I read that that movement is really effective when the elbow/pinky is higher at the top (like pouring a cup out). I think I got that from Larry Scott somewhere.
**Edit:
Found this (for what it’s worth)…
Larry Scott vid (about 1:10 minutes in)
“The shoulder only knows where your elbow is, it doesn’t know where your wrist is…”
Like it’s been said before, if it works for you, it works for you. In the vid, LS talks about not using your traps… Well, it obviously works for Jay Cutler (and others), so it’s not “wrong” per se, but maybe ineffective for some people.
[quote]MODOK wrote:
jehovasfitness wrote:
My favorite is the people that bend their arm at 90* literally, and do the movement.
And why would that really make that much of a difference, yahweh? As long as the plane of motion of the humerus is still in the same plane, its still training the same muscle, right? Only difference is, you are changing the distance of the weight from the fulcrum, which will allow you to use more weight.
I think doing a lighter weight with straight arms, a heavier weight with bent arms, or the heaviest weight with arms at 90 degrees, if its in the same plane of motion and the same rep range, its virtually the same.[/quote]
Agreed. My arms are very bent during this movement. I am also using more weight than I see anyone else using…and I would like to think my shoulders prove that to be WORKING so I am not sure how people see this as wrong.
If the guy doing it has shoulders as big as your head, then guess what, HE IS FUCKING DOING IT RIGHT.
[quote]Professor X wrote:
If the guy doing it has shoulders as big as your head, then guess what, HE IS FUCKING DOING IT RIGHT.[/quote]
Bollocks, it’s the drugs, oh yeah and the X-men genetics.
[quote]mtotry wrote:
I have always been partial to the way ronnie does them…its looks like he is cheating…but the more I watched and paused it…at the top of the movement where he holds it for a second is all side delts…
check it out…
- YouTube [/quote]
no doubt ronnie and jay each have monster shoulders. after watch both videos it appears that because of ronnie’s hand position he is activating the anterior head and the medial head, wherein based on the mechanics jay is isolating the medial head more so.
regarding the bent are thing, you cannot do laterals w/ heavy weight w/out bending the arm, more over keeping the elbow straight is dumb anyway, unless your thing is encouraging unnecessary injury.
lastly, why anyone would choose to not do lateral raises as part of a shoulder routine is beyond me.
[quote]Professor X wrote:
MODOK wrote:
jehovasfitness wrote:
My favorite is the people that bend their arm at 90* literally, and do the movement.
And why would that really make that much of a difference, yahweh? As long as the plane of motion of the humerus is still in the same plane, its still training the same muscle, right? Only difference is, you are changing the distance of the weight from the fulcrum, which will allow you to use more weight.
I think doing a lighter weight with straight arms, a heavier weight with bent arms, or the heaviest weight with arms at 90 degrees, if its in the same plane of motion and the same rep range, its virtually the same.
Agreed. My arms are very bent during this movement. I am also using more weight than I see anyone else using…and I would like to think my shoulders prove that to be WORKING so I am not sure how people see this as wrong.
If the guy doing it has shoulders as big as your head, then guess what, HE IS FUCKING DOING IT RIGHT.[/quote]
Really you do them with a 90* bend in the arm?
btw- the people I see doing them with a true 90* bend are no where near developed. If I saw someone like X or Modok doing this exercise, more power to them, but I never see it. Sure, some have a good bend to the arm, but not a 90* bend
[quote]jehovasfitness wrote:
Professor X wrote:
MODOK wrote:
jehovasfitness wrote:
My favorite is the people that bend their arm at 90* literally, and do the movement.
And why would that really make that much of a difference, yahweh? As long as the plane of motion of the humerus is still in the same plane, its still training the same muscle, right? Only difference is, you are changing the distance of the weight from the fulcrum, which will allow you to use more weight.
I think doing a lighter weight with straight arms, a heavier weight with bent arms, or the heaviest weight with arms at 90 degrees, if its in the same plane of motion and the same rep range, its virtually the same.
Agreed. My arms are very bent during this movement. I am also using more weight than I see anyone else using…and I would like to think my shoulders prove that to be WORKING so I am not sure how people see this as wrong.
If the guy doing it has shoulders as big as your head, then guess what, HE IS FUCKING DOING IT RIGHT.
Really you do them with a 90* bend in the arm?
[/quote]
I don’t even THINK about how much bend is in my arms so I would literally have to do them again just to examine how much my arm is bent. You guys are focusing on the wrong shit. The bend of your arms is IRRELEVANT. Few people are ever going to be able to do much more than 40lbs if they think their arms are supposed to be perfectly straight at their sides.
I bend my arms as much as is needed given the weight I am using to take stress off my lower and even upper arm and place it on the lateral head where it belongs.
You guys seem to be ignoring that what works your lateral delts is the movement of the HUMURUS, not how much your arm is bent. Bending the arm does not change the force directed at the lateral head of the delts.
Slightly off topic. Who is doing their laterals after pressing, and who is doing them first, (maybe as a pre-exhaust before pressing)? Who’s done both and which gave you better overall results?
[quote]Professor X wrote:
You guys seem to be ignoring that what works your lateral delts is the movement of the HUMURUS, not how much your arm is bent. Bending the arm does not change the force directed at the lateral head of the delts.[/quote]
Keeping your arm straight does make the exercise harder for the delt–that’s just leverage, but the problem I have seen is that it is hard to keep the focus on the medial delt with heavy weight and a locked elbow. The traps often just end up taking over. I don’t think elbow bend matters if it doesn’t hurt, if you are keeping tension in the medial delts, and if you are progressing. Point being that plenty of people could benefit from dropping the weight to teach the delt to activate properly THEN return to adding weight. If that wasn’t the case then everyone would be walking around with capped shoulders because everybody does lateral raises.
I like doing bent arm laterals for heavier weights and lower reps and straighter arm, but still slightly bent, for moderate reps. I think you can have your cake and eat it too.
Bent arm just allows you to use more weight. It’s just a matter of activating the actual delts and not shrugging or swinging them up.