Most people spend way too much time sitting at a desk. Even those who are physically active. Just think about this – the average gym member spends about 3 hours a week in the gym and 40 hours sitting at a desk.That’s a huge difference that didn’t exist a few decades ago.
Now, I won’t go into detail about why a sedentary lifestyle is harmful, but I’d like to point out one very important fact. A sedentary lifestyle makes your shoulders weaker. In particular, the rotator cuff muscles, which stabilize the shoulder and protect it from injuries, are not developed in most people. Our hands don’t move like they used to.
If you want to increase upper body strength, you need strong shoulders, and training rotator cuff muscles is crucial for that.Here’s a couple of exercises that target the rotator cuff muscles:
- Resistance band external rotation
- Resistance band internal rotation
- Dead hangs from a pull-up bar
Neglecting your rotator cuffs actually makes it more difficult to grow your shoulders, also known as deltoids.Deltoids consist of three heads: front, side, and rear deltoids. They make complex movements of your hand possible and also have the most impact on how big your shoulders will look. The bigger the deltoids, the more you’re going to look like Henry Cavil in Superman.
Of course, it’s not just about looks – strong shoulders will give you overall strength because shoulders are involved in many different movements such as bench press, incline press, and shoulder presses.
To get bigger deltoids, you should rely on heavy shoulder presses with a bunch of accessory dumbbell and machine work to hit all three heads equally
These are your core movements:
- Overhead barbell press - seated or standing
- Dumbbell press
- Arnold Press
Then add in these for accessory work:
- Dumbbell Lateral Raises
- Machine Lateral Raises
- Dumbbell Upright Row
- Handstand pushups against a wall
- Front Raises
- Bent-Over Dumbbell Raises
- Rear Delt Machine
When you combine those compound movements with isolated ones, you’re going to get monster shoulders very quickly. And as I said before, big and strong shoulders will have an amazing effect on your physique and overall strength. Before I sign off, I’ve got a small tip to share with you as well.
To make your shoulders (or any muscle) grow faster, you should make sure to load up your body with Essential Amino Acids (you knew something about Oh!mino would end up in our blog!).The EAAs found in Oh!mino (patented) is 11x more effective than whey protein when it comes to muscle synthesis.This means you can drastically increase the effectiveness of every workout you do.
Oh!mino is a reliable source of top-quality essential amino acids specifically made to increase performance and support muscle growth. With Oh!mino, you’ll train smarter as well as harder. There’s really no excuses for why you shouldn’t go all-out on your next shoulder day!
Stay fit my friend,
Michael
Founder & CEO