7 Things That Helped My Shoulders Grow — Transcript

Full transcript

1. 0:00What's the difference between these
2. 0:01three physiques? It's the shoulders,
3. 0:03right? This person has underdeveloped
4. 0:06delts. This person has well-developed
5. 0:08delts. And this person has 3D delts. And
6. 0:11in this video, I'm going to show you
7. 0:12seven shoulder training tips for 3D
8. 0:15delts. So, we'll start with a few tips
9. 0:17that are a bit more common, and then as
10. 0:18we go, they'll get more and more
11. 0:20obscure. So, I'd say most of you have
12. 0:22tried the first tip before, but I bet
13. 0:24less than 1% of you know about the
14. 0:26seventh tip. Of course, these things
15. 0:28that I'm going to show you aren't as
16. 0:29important as simply training hard and
17. 0:31being consistent. But, they are
18. 0:33techniques that I use in my own
19. 0:35training, and most of them have at least
20. 0:36some scientific support, which I'll
21. 0:38highlight as we go. All right, the first
22. 0:40tip is to take your traps out. This
23. 0:42one's pretty obvious, but if your traps
24. 0:44are taking over on your shoulder
25. 0:45movements, your delts could be getting
26. 0:47robbed of precious tension. Now, you'll
27. 0:50hear some coaches say that since most
28. 0:52guys want bigger traps anyway, getting
29. 0:53some crossover work isn't actually a bad
30. 0:55thing. And the argument goes, as long as
31. 0:58you go to failure, your delts will grow
32. 1:00even if your traps help out. There's
33. 1:02some truth to that, but I do think that
34. 1:04for some trainees, their delts go nearly
35. 1:06silent if the traps take over. And in my
36. 1:08coaching experience, a lot of female
37. 1:09trainees want to avoid growing their
38. 1:11traps, so this will help with that. Over
39. 1:13the years, I found one cue to be most
40. 1:15effective in helping people engage their
41. 1:17side delts over their traps.
42. 1:20Here it is. Picture that you have this
43. 1:22long shovel, and you're scooping sand
44. 1:24out to the side. This will force you to
45. 1:26keep your shoulders down and sweep the
46. 1:29weight out using your side delts, rather
47. 1:31than shrugging it up using your traps.
48. 1:34To be sure though, I went to the gym and
49. 1:35I asked random people to try out two
50. 1:37different cues. For the first cue, I
51. 1:39just told them to just get the weight
52. 1:40up. Use whatever muscles you need to use
53. 1:43to move the weight.
54. 1:43>> I just want you to focus on getting the
55. 1:45weight up. So, use whatever muscles you
56. 1:46need to just move the weight. Perfect.
57. 1:49I'm already thinking too much. Good. It
58. 1:52looks nice. For the second cue, I told
59. 1:54them to think about keeping their
60. 1:55shoulders down and sweeping the weight
61. 1:58out like you've got this long shovel,
62. 2:00and you're scooping sand out to the
63. 2:01side. Jesus, wow.
64. 2:04It makes it way harder, right? Did you
65. 2:05notice any difference in like how it
66. 2:07felt?
67. 2:07>> Harder. It was harder the second Yeah,
68. 2:09yeah, it's interesting, eh? I felt it a
69. 2:11lot more on the second one. Like I could
70. 2:13feel tension more on the way up when I'm
71. 2:15like Yeah. down at the bottom. Good, cuz
72. 2:17you can like this motion will take your
73. 2:20traps out from the beginning, and then
74. 2:22yes, as you start to get through the
75. 2:23range of motion, they have to come in
76. 2:24because your scapula have to rotate, but
77. 2:27if you can initiate this way, I feel
78. 2:29like you can turn the side delts on
79. 2:31faster. Now, this obviously not a
80. 2:32scientific survey, but every single
81. 2:34person I showed this to said they felt
82. 2:36more side delt activation when they
83. 2:38focused on scooping the weight out,
84. 2:40rather than just lifting the weight up.
85. 2:42The second tip is to train your
86. 2:43shoulders more often. According to this
87. 2:45poll of my audience, most of you train
88. 2:47your shoulders twice per week. 24% of
89. 2:50you hit them just once a week, but
90. 2:52here's the crazy part. Only 11% of you
91. 2:54hit them three times per week, and just
92. 2:564% more than that. That's a low
93. 2:59frequency, and I think that's a mistake
94. 3:01if you're trying to maximize their
95. 3:02growth. Here's why. The amount of truly
96. 3:04effective volume that you can do for a
97. 3:06single muscle in a single workout is
98. 3:08lower than most people think. It
99. 3:10probably starts to cap out at around
100. 3:12six, maybe eight sets in a workout. In
101. 3:15other words, after you've done six to
102. 3:16eight sets for your shoulders in a
103. 3:18single workout, doing more than that
104. 3:20probably isn't doing much, if anything.
105. 3:22A recent meta-analysis from this year
106. 3:24suggests that the cap could be as high
107. 3:25as 11 sets per muscle per workout, but
108. 3:28once you get above six or so, the
109. 3:30returns are greatly diminishing anyway.
110. 3:32Because of this, the best way to get in
111. 3:34more effective shoulder work isn't to
112. 3:36throw more sets on top of the workouts
113. 3:38you already do. It's to hit them more
114. 3:40often. Rather than cramming the volume
115. 3:41into just one or two days, spread it out
116. 3:44across three or four days. Earlier in my
117. 3:46bodybuilding career, I used to do three
118. 3:48sets of dumbbell lateral raises after
119. 3:50every single workout. Five days a week.
120. 3:52I think that made a difference.
121. 3:54But, what about recovery? Well, this is
122. 3:56anecdotal, but from my coaching
123. 3:58experience, your shoulders do recover
124. 4:00pretty quickly. They almost never get
125. 4:02sore. Like, do you remember the last
126. 4:04time your shoulders actually got sore?
127. 4:06And in my coaching experience, they can
128. 4:08tolerate quite a beating. My shoulder
129. 4:09strength bounces back really fast, even
130. 4:11after super hard workouts. So, even if
131. 4:13you hit them hard with three to six sets
132. 4:15on one day, you should feel ready to hit
133. 4:17them again within 24 to 48 hours,
134. 4:20especially if you're focusing on
135. 4:21isolation exercises like lateral raises
136. 4:23and rear delt flies. And if you want to
137. 4:25pause and screenshot, this is how I'd
138. 4:26set up a higher frequency shoulder plan,
139. 4:28which borrows from my new Men Max
140. 4:30program. Okay, tip three is to get a
141. 4:32brutally strong shoulder press. For me,
142. 4:34that's this machine shoulder press, but
143. 4:36it can be any vertical press that you
144. 4:37can overload. Machine, dumbbell, or
145. 4:39barbell. Load it up with a weight that
146. 4:41you can do for five or six reps, and add
147. 4:43a little weight each week. Stick with
148. 4:45that for a year. A full year. And if
149. 4:47after a year, you haven't gained some
150. 4:49serious shoulder mass, come back to this
151. 4:50video, take your like back, and swap it
152. 4:53for a dislike. You've earned it. The
153. 4:54reason why this works is simple. As you
154. 4:56progressively lift more and more weight
155. 4:58on the shoulder press, you're increasing
156. 5:00the mechanical tension that your delts
157. 5:02experience. Mechanical tension is the
158. 5:04main driver of hypertrophy. It isn't
159. 5:06that strength directly causes more size,
160. 5:08but they are linked. If your delts are
161. 5:11getting stronger on the same exercise
162. 5:12with the same reps and the same form,
163. 5:15you have, in all likelihood, added new
164. 5:17contractile tissue to be able to produce
165. 5:19that extra force. Now, you'll often hear
166. 5:21that you don't need a vertical press
167. 5:23because they only hit your front delts,
168. 5:24and your front delts already get all the
169. 5:26work that they need on horizontal
170. 5:27presses. And yes, your front delts do
171. 5:29get a lot of work on horizontal presses,
172. 5:32but your side delts are a lot more
173. 5:34active on vertical presses than people
174. 5:36realize. In fact, I tested this out for
175. 5:38myself with EMG, and actually saw more
176. 5:41side delt activation than front delt
177. 5:43activation on this machine shoulder
178. 5:45press. And as we'll see when we get to
179. 5:46tip six, since you can only add weight
180. 5:48to lateral raises for so long, having a
181. 5:50strength-focused shoulder press makes
182. 5:52sure that you keep progress moving.
183. 5:54Okay, tip number four is to bring your
184. 5:56waist down. And it's funny because out
185. 5:58of every tip on this list, this is the
186. 6:00one I think most people will skip, but
187. 6:02it's also the one that will have the
188. 6:03biggest impact on how 3D your shoulders
189. 6:05look, by far. Here I am at 20% body fat,
190. 6:08and here I am at 9% body fat after using
191. 6:11my smart nutrition app MacroFactor for
192. 6:13my cut. My shoulders are definitely
193. 6:15broader and rounder at 9% because my
194. 6:17waist is smaller, and there's less body
195. 6:19fat around my deltoid muscle. The cuts
196. 6:21are deeper, there's more separation
197. 6:23between the heads, and that creates the
198. 6:24illusion of a more 3D look. Honestly,
199. 6:27you could ignore every other tip in this
200. 6:29video and just get leaner while training
201. 6:31your shoulders hard, and they'll look so
202. 6:32much more 3D. So, if you need a little
203. 6:34help with your nutrition, you can try
204. 6:35out MacroFactor for 2 weeks for free at
205. 6:37the first link in the description box
206. 6:38below, and I'll have a little more info
207. 6:39about that at the end. The fifth tip is
208. 6:41to lift through a variety of muscle
209. 6:43lengths. Real quick, to get everyone on
210. 6:45the same page. A muscle is shortened
211. 6:48during the contracted half of the range
212. 6:49of motion, and a muscle is lengthened
213. 6:51during the stretched aspect of the range
214. 6:53of motion. That's because the muscle
215. 6:55gets longer as you stretch it, and
216. 6:57shorter as you contract it. So, the
217. 6:59deltoid is shortened from here to here,
218. 7:01and lengthened from here to here. But,
219. 7:03here's the thing. For the front delts,
220. 7:05when most people do shoulder presses,
221. 7:07they go from here to here, and back to
222. 7:09here. That's a pretty short range of
223. 7:12motion. For the side delts, most people
224. 7:14do lateral raises from here to here, and
225. 7:16back to here. There's some length here
226. 7:18at the bottom, but peak tension doesn't
227. 7:20hit until the delts are pretty short.
228. 7:22And for the rear delts, it might be
229. 7:23worst of all. Instead of going from here
230. 7:26to here, and back to here, most people
231. 7:29just go from here to here, and back to
232. 7:31here. That's a lot of short length
233. 7:33emphasis. But, longer length training
234. 7:36really seems to have benefits. These
235. 7:38three studies showed between 130 and
236. 7:40190% more growth when training at a
237. 7:43longer muscle length for the quads,
238. 7:45biceps, and calves, respectively. For
239. 7:48the delts, there's only one eight-week
240. 7:50study that kind of looked at different
241. 7:51muscle lengths, and it compared the
242. 7:53dumbbell lateral raise to the cable
243. 7:55lateral raise. Dumbbell laterals provide
244. 7:57more tension when the delt is short,
245. 7:58cable laterals provide more tension when
246. 8:00the delt is long. And based on prior
247. 8:02research, the authors hypothesized that
248. 8:04cables would result in more growth since
249. 8:06they offered more lengthened tension.
250. 8:09But, there was actually no difference.
251. 8:11Both cables and dumbbells grew the
252. 8:13shoulders about the same. That's why I
253. 8:15think, as the research stands, you
254. 8:17should include both short length and
255. 8:19long length exercises. But, since most
256. 8:21people overemphasize short length delt
257. 8:23training, here's the fix to balance
258. 8:25things out. On your shoulder presses, go
259. 8:27deeper. Don't stop once your arms hit
260. 8:29parallel. Sink your arms as low as they
261. 8:31can comfortably go. On lateral raises,
262. 8:33use a cable and stretch it across your
263. 8:35body, rather than stopping at your side.
264. 8:37So, sweep it across your body like this,
265. 8:40and the range of motion here, rather
266. 8:41than stopping at your side. In fact,
267. 8:43they actually did stop at their side in
268. 8:45that eight-week study, which I think
269. 8:47might be part of the reason why they
270. 8:48didn't find a difference with dumbbells.
271. 8:50One of the potential advantages of using
272. 8:51cables is that you can increase the
273. 8:53adduction range of motion, and sweep the
274. 8:55cable across your body while keeping
275. 8:57tension. You can't do that with standing
276. 8:59dumbbells. Or, you could try cross-body
277. 9:01cable Y raises. I love these, and they
278. 9:04offer about as big of a range of motion
279. 9:06as you're going to get for your side
280. 9:07delts, from fully lengthened to fully
281. 9:10shortened. If you don't have cables, lie
282. 9:11back on a 20° incline bench, and do
283. 9:13cross-body Y raises with a dumbbell. For
284. 9:16rear delts, just make sure you're
285. 9:17crossing your arms over across your
286. 9:19body, and sweeping the weight back until
287. 9:21you feel a nice rear delt squeeze,
288. 9:23whether you do that with cables,
289. 9:24dumbbells, or a machine. Okay, tip
290. 9:26number six is to pick the right
291. 9:28progression scheme for the right
292. 9:29exercise. We all know that progressive
293. 9:31overload is the key to keeping a muscle
294. 9:33growing. You need to add a little more
295. 9:35stress to the muscle each week over
296. 9:37time. If you keep using the same weight
297. 9:39for the same reps week in and week out,
298. 9:41the muscle has no reason to keep
299. 9:43growing. But, there is a slight problem
300. 9:45with progressing on shoulder exercises.
301. 9:48Isolation movements like lateral raises
302. 9:50are really hard to overload. If you
303. 9:51start with 15s and just add 5 lb each
304. 9:54week, by week eight, you'd be up to
305. 9:5650-lb laterals. That's simply not
306. 9:58realistic, even if you get some serious
307. 10:00cheating going. So, you need to make
308. 10:02sure that your progression scheme
309. 10:03actually matches the exercise that
310. 10:05you're doing. For your heavy shoulder
311. 10:07press, use a simple linear progression.
312. 10:09Add 5 or 10 lbs each week at a fixed rep
313. 10:11count of five or six reps. Every 4 to 8
314. 10:14weeks or so, do a deload week where you
315. 10:16drop the weight back a bit and don't go
316. 10:17quite as hard. For isolation exercises
317. 10:19like lateral raises and rear delt flies,
318. 10:21that linear progression won't work
319. 10:23because you'll quickly max out how much
320. 10:25weight you can add. So, instead, use
321. 10:27something called a double progression.
322. 10:29In this case, you pick a rep range
323. 10:31rather than a rep target. Let's say 10
324. 10:33to 12 reps. Start in week one with a
325. 10:35weight that you know you can do for 10
326. 10:37reps and hit failure or get close to it.
327. 10:40The next week, do that same weight, but
328. 10:42this time for 11 reps. Then the next
329. 10:44week, 12 reps. Once you hit the top end
330. 10:46of that rep range, add some weight and
331. 10:48go back to 10 reps again. The next week,
332. 10:51at the new weight, add one rep again and
333. 10:53so on and so on. And if you're doing
334. 10:55three sets, you don't need to add a rep
335. 10:57to all three sets. Just one rep to one
336. 10:59set is enough to keep progression
337. 11:01moving, especially as you get more
338. 11:02advanced. But eventually, you won't even
339. 11:05be able to add one rep to one set
340. 11:07without your form breaking down. At that
341. 11:09point, here's the fix. Rotate in a new
342. 11:11exercise and start your progression
343. 11:12over. If you were doing dumbbells,
344. 11:14switch to cables and run a new double
345. 11:16progression there. Once you max out what
346. 11:18you can do on cables, switch to a
347. 11:19machine and run a new double progression
348. 11:21there. You'd be surprised just how much
349. 11:23of a difference actually having a
350. 11:24planned progression scheme that you
351. 11:26actually track and stick to makes over
352. 11:28time. Okay, we've gone through keeping
353. 11:30your traps out, increasing frequency,
354. 11:32getting a brutally strong shoulder
355. 11:34press, bringing your waist down,
356. 11:36including some longer muscle lengths,
357. 11:37and picking the right progression. At
358. 11:39the very bottom of the iceberg, we have
359. 11:41the seventh tip, which is to target all
360. 11:43heads of the delts. This anatomy
361. 11:46research took 60 cadavers, dissected
362. 11:48them, and found that instead of the
363. 11:49commonly known anterior, lateral, and
364. 11:51posterior heads, there are actually
365. 11:53seven intramuscular segments to the
366. 11:56deltoid, each with its own separate
367. 11:58tendon.
368. 11:59What we think of as the posterior head
369. 12:00actually branches into three separate
370. 12:02tendons. The middle head has just one
371. 12:04tendon, and the front head also branches
372. 12:07into three separate tendons. So, each of
373. 12:09these seven segments has a slightly
374. 12:11different function. So, instead of your
375. 12:13usual front, side, and rear raises, add
376. 12:15in some movements for the planes in
377. 12:17between.
378. 12:18To bias the fibers of the A2 and A3
379. 12:19segments, I do incline dumbbell Y
380. 12:21raises. By lifting up and out in a Y,
381. 12:24you'll place the path of resistance
382. 12:26directly in line with those in between
383. 12:28fibers. For the P1 and P2 segments, try
384. 12:30a movement like the 45° cable rear delt
385. 12:33pull. Stretch your arm across your body
386. 12:35at around a 45° angle and sweep the
387. 12:37weight down and back, almost like you're
388. 12:39pulling out an arrow to use for a bow
389. 12:40and arrow. As a ball and socket joint,
390. 12:43your shoulder has a massive amount of
391. 12:44freedom of movement in all three
392. 12:46dimensions. So, if you're trying to
393. 12:47build some 3D delts, make sure you're
394. 12:49training them in all three dimensions.
395. 12:52Okay, huge announcement before we go.
396. 12:54The MacroFactor Workouts app is
397. 12:55launching in January 2026. Most people
398. 12:59just pick a weight at random and go for
399. 13:01however many reps are in their program.
400. 13:03This can work for a while, but
401. 13:05eventually, you just spin your wheels
402. 13:07doing the same weight and the same reps
403. 13:08week after week and month after month
404. 13:11with no actual progress. Actually
405. 13:12tracking your workouts makes a massive
406. 13:15difference, and I promise you,
407. 13:16MacroFactor Workouts is going to be the
408. 13:18very best app for doing that. There'll
409. 13:20be a massive discount to the workout app
410. 13:22for current users of MacroFactor, like a
411. 13:24huge discount. So, if you haven't
412. 13:26already, get started with MacroFactor
413. 13:27today. You can get a two-week free trial
414. 13:29using code Jeff to see if you like it
415. 13:31first, and then if you do, you'll
416. 13:32already be a member for when the workout
417. 13:34app launches. And yes, the two apps sync
418. 13:35together. It also isn't just for
419. 13:37tracking. Just like the nutrition app,
420. 13:39it'll use science-based algorithms to
421. 13:41update your program over time, just like
422. 13:43a coach would. It'll have more analytics
423. 13:45and detailed feedback than any other app
424. 13:48on the market, and if you're a current
425. 13:49user of my programs, yes, there will be
426. 13:51a way to load those within the app. So,
427. 13:53click the first link in the description
428. 13:54box down below to get started with
429. 13:55MacroFactor, or you can scan this QR
430. 13:57code over here next to my head. Don't
431. 13:59forget to leave me a thumbs up if you
432. 14:00enjoyed the video, subscribe if you
433. 14:02haven't already, and I'll see you guys
434. 14:03all here in the next one.