The Deltoid And Tricep “Massacre”

Saturday, July 16th. Empire Fitness Club, Hoboken. NJ. Got me a new victim, er, I mean training partner, for today! I’m going to be working more closely with my long time friend and trainer Richie Smyth in the upcoming weeks, but when I’m not training with Richie, I’m always happy and grateful to have a training partner. The vast majority of the workouts I’ve done over the years have been solo – no partner, no trainer. Sometimes it’s imperative to train solo in order to keep up a certain tempo (when training with short rest intervals, etc). However, given a choice between one or the other, I’d almost always choose training with someone else first. The motivational push and the accountability you get from having someone standing over your shoulder, barking out, “COME ON! THREE MORE REPS!”… there’s just nothing like it.

DELTOIDS

A1 Seated Dumbbell Press

1 set X 80 lbs X 10 reps

A2 Seated “W Press” (press up and out with neutral/palms facing grip)

1 set X 50 lbs X 6-8 reps

B1 Seated Dumbbell Press

1 set X 80 lbs X 7 reps

B2 Arnold Presses (rotate hands; supinate to pronate while pressing up)

1 set X 50 lbs X 6- 8 reps

C1 Seated Dumbbell Press

1 set X 80 lbs X 6 reps

C2 Alternating Dumbbell Presses (left-right-left)

1 set X 50 lbs X 6-8 reps each arm

D1 Prone Incline bench 2 dumbbell front raise

3 sets X 25 lbs X 12 reps (strict)

D2 Prone incline bench dumbbell cross body lateral raise

3 sets X 15 lbs X 12, 11, 10 reps (slow and strict)

D3 Standing dumbbell side lateral raise

3 sets X 25 lbs X as many reps as possible (loose form)

E1 Prone incline bench reverse flyes (rear delt raise)

3 sets X 20 lbs X 15, 12, 12 X 3021 (strict)

TRICEPS

A1 Seated Dumbbell tricep extension (behind head)

3 sets X 90, 85, 80 lbs X 10 reps, 10 reps, 10 reps

A2 2 Dumbbell Tricep Kickback

3 sets X 45 lbs X 12 reps, 10 reps, 10 reps

B1 Reverse grip pushdown

3 sets X 70 lbs X 12 reps X 3012 (squeeze hard! in contracted pos of each rep)

1 set 80, 90, 100 lbs X 6, 6, 6 reps (ascending set, change grip with each weight change: reverse grip, wide overhand grip, narrow overhand grip)

Workout Commentary

Today I trained with Kostas Marangopoulos (I probably butchered his last name again… If I did, sorry Kostas… buddy… comment me with correct spelling!) Kostas was a member of my gym for many years, so I’ve known him a long time and trained with him once before – he trains hard!!! He recently moved back to Greece, but then he moved back to Hoboken again, so I told him, “come train with me any time! So here were are for shoulders and triceps. We did some unique exercises, and I got a few pictures this
time, finally.

By the way, be sure to check out Kostas’ website: href="http://www.bodybuildingapplied.com">www.bodybuildingapplied.com

We started with dumbbell presses, performed in a variety of supersets. This is the same routine I’ve been doing the past several weeks. It’s been working well, so I repeated it once again, moving up in weight once again – got up to the 80 lb dumbbells today.

Next it was the “Killer Deltoid Tri-set.” It started with thumbs up dumbbell front raises for the front deltoid, while laying prone (on stomach) on an incline bench. Why this way instead of standing? Well, I do them both ways; the standing
version allows you to use much more weight, but that’s partially because you can swing your body into it. The prone incline version is 100% strict (provided you don’t swing the weights), thus the 25 lb dumbbells were plenty, especially with a pause at the top and a slow negative. This is also my preferred choice if and when I need to go easy on my low back.

Then, we supersetted into a favorite exercise, the cross body lateral raise. This too, we did on the incline bench (see photo), although I more often perform this one seated upright. It’s a simple movement: Begin in the “iron cross” position with your arms out at your sides as if you just finished a straight arm lateral raise. Then cross the dumbbells in front of your body so the inner (thumbs side) bells touch at arms length out in front of your chest. At no point do you lower your arms to your sides – this is a 100% high tension exercise and the deltoids stay fully contracted the entire time.

The cross body lateral raise is also an exercise where you need to use light weight (I used 15 pounders and even that was tough, especially in a superset after the front raises). Don’t laugh til you’ve tried it… it’s harder than it looks. It works especially well as the 2nd exercise in a superset.

Then (yes there was more), I finished the tri-set (three exercises in a row) by grabbing the 25 pound dumbbells and repping out for as many standing lateral raises as possible. Three times through that TRI SET and the delts were cooked!… Almost… we still had one more to go… rear deltoid raises, also prone on
the incline bench.

This shoulder workout was high in volume, but we kept moving, no talking or messing around between sets, so we zipped through it real quickly. It’s what I call “high density training” – a lot of work in a short period of time. ALL my workouts are usually an hour or less in length. Maybe this much volume is overtraining for some, but if it’s overtraining for ME, then someone forgot to tell my deltoids… they grew anyway!

Then it was onward to triceps. First we did a superset combination of overhead dumbbell tricep extensions with dumbbell kickbacks. I’ve been doing this one for a while, and will probably change the routine soon. Besides, my elbows were killing me on the extensions with a 90 lb
dumbbell. I’ve gone as high as 120lbs in the past (straight sets, not in supersets), but the limit seems to be what my elbows can take. Better to tighten up form, go stricter and or change
exercises than keep going heavier if the joints hurt.

Last exercise of the day was tricep pushdowns with a reverse grip (palms up). real strict… squeeze at the bottom. Finish out with an “intensity set” using the ascending set with grip change principle: 6 reps with reverse grip, increase weight then 6 reps with wide overhand grip, increase weight, then 6 reps with narrow grip. I went from weakest grip to strongest grip so that I could continue increasing the weights with each “set”, for a total of 18 reps in a row.

Was it a good workout? Heck yeah! The shoulder workout was a 10! Only reason triceps might not have been a 10 was that we beat our shoulders so hard, there wasn’t much left for tri’s! I usually call my workouts with Richie “torture sessions” or “beatings”… When we were finished, Kostas called this one a “Massacre!” I’d say that was an apt description.

By the way, as I always say, This blog is not workout instruction or advice. Unless you’re a professional… “Don’t try this at home!”(on the other hand, if you ARE a professional then the next time you’re in Jersey, look me up! I’m always looking for… “Fresh blood!” … heh heh!)

Until next time, Train hard and if you don’t have a trainer, at least get yourself a training partner…it will take your workouts to a new level!