Develop Powerful Shoulders Without Pain

Develop Powerful Shoulders Without Pain

Want crazy shoulders like Arnold? Don't get injured!

One of the best exercises for shoulder strength and size development is the Barbell Press Behind The Neck. But grabbing a loaded bar and trying to press it behind your neck without sufficiently warming your shoulders up is asking for trouble. So here's an awesome shoulder saver exercise.

Band Pull-Aparts Behind The Neck

This exercise takes all the muscles involved in the barbell press behind the neck and provides them with tension that helps activate them so they'll all contribute properly to the pressing movement.

As always, before any heavy lifing, make sure muscles that might oppose achieving the full range of motion are well stretched out first.

Stretch: Pecs, Lats, External Rotation

Warm-up:

Side-lying dumbbell external rotations

Serratus push-ups

Band pull-aparts behind the neck (as shown above) 1-3 sets

Rest sufficiently between sets to prevent accumulation of fatigue. Do only as many reps as you feel you need to fully activate the muscle. But make sure to stop your set before you feel fatigue or burning in the targeted muscles.

Pushing your warm-up and activation sets into fatigue will hinder performance of your heavy pressing movement to come.

Use this warm up and then do this balanced upper body workout to build awesome muscle size and strength.

1) Barbell Press Behind The Neck 3 x 8

2a) Mixed Grip Pull-ups 3 x 8-12

2b) TRX, Blast Strap, or chain suspended push-ups

3a) Barbell Shrugs 3x15

3b) Posterior Flyes 3x12

Let me know how it went in the comments section below.