Broad Shoulders
Broad shoulders give your body width and proportion. Shoulder workouts for mass give you broad shoulders which make your waist appear smaller, and most find rounded shoulders pleasing to the eye. Massive shoulders require work, focus, and determination and a variety of exercises from a variety of different angles. The below shoulder workouts for mass will do just that. Like anything it won’t happen over night but with persistence and determination you will see a positive change. This is my favorite muscle group to workout.
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Shoulder Workouts for mass
Shoulder Workout Mass Builder #1 – Overhead presses with a barbell, a pair of heavy dumbbells, shoulder press machines, or cables. Overhead presses build all three heads (separate muscles) of the deltoid. Start your shoulder training with dumbbells as they allow all of your shoulder muscles and shoulder stabilizers to be used, and heavy dumbbells will be your best overall shoulder builder. One of my favorite exercises with dumbbells is the Arnold press.
Shoulder Workout Mass Builder #2 – Dumbbell raises train your anterior deltoids on the front of your shoulder. When performing front raises, lean slightly forward into the movement allowing your front deltoid to fully contract. Keep your arm straight and don’t cross your arm at an angle across your chest, allow it to follow its natural path. Pause and hold the dumbbell briefly at the highest point before you lower and repeat.
Shoulder Workout Mass Builder #3 – Lateral, or side raises train your lateral deltoids and add size and width to your shoulders. Start your lateral raises with a dumbbell in each hand about six inches away from your thighs. Start each repetition from this 6 inch point and raise the dumbbells out from your sides until your arms are slightly higher than parallel and hold briefly at the highest point. Don’t swing the weights or use momentum to raise the dumbbells. Start with lighter weights and higher reps and gradually reduce the number of reps and sets as you increase the weight – big, wide shoulders are built with heavy weights and low reps.
Shoulder Workout Mass Builder #4 – The bent barbell (or dumbbell) row trains the rear deltoids and overall shoulder joint. Hold a barbell or your dumbbells slightly wider than shoulder width with your palms facing down. Pull the weight up to your chest at a point midway between your chest and chin. Once at your chest, pause and squeeze your shoulder blades together. When you lower the weight, get a full stretch at the bottom. To add variety, rotate your hand grip on the dumbbells or rotate the dumbbells as you pull them up to your chest.
Additional shoulder-building exercises include:
- Kettlebell Swings. Kettlebell swings are an excellent warm up movement prior to heavy shoulder training. Swings develop core strength as they stretch and strengthen all three heads of your deltoid muscles.
- Push Ups. Push ups train the rotator cuff muscles that are important for shoulder strength and stability. Performing push ups on an unsteady bosu platform or with hands on a medicine ball doubles their effectiveness.
- Shoulder Touches. Do these after your push ups. From a pushup position with your back straight and hands directly below your shoulders, maintain this “plank” position as you lift your right hand and touch your left shoulder. Place your hand back down and touch your left hand to your right shoulder. Repeat alternately left, right, left until you can’t do any more.
Strong, massive and rounded shoulders require developing all three “heads” of the deltoid muscles. You must attack each head of your deltoids (anterior, medial, posterior) as a separate muscle and hit them with heavy resistance and fewer sets and reps.