9 Massive Muscle Building Exercises You Can Use to Boost Your Muscle Gains

By: Gregg Gillies
Submitted: 2007-01-17 16:18:38
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Proper exercise selection plays a big role in the kind of progress you can make with your muscle building goals. If you want to develop ripped, bulding, rock-hard muscles, you need to use the right weight training exercises. If not, you won't get the real muscle buildings gains that you want.

Quads

Squat

Did you really think I was going to say something else? Wimpy leg extensions, maybe? Yeah, go for the burn and tear up your knees while you're add it. But you won't build huge quads from leg extensions. I know squats are brutally hard work. And that's why they are so freaking effective. If you want to bulid slabs of muscle all over your body, you need to squat.

Hamstrings

The Stiff Legged Deadlift (knees slightly bent)

Sorry, no leg curls here. Once again, it's the hard exercise using a lot of weight that is most effective for building massive hamstrings that aren't overshadowed by overdeveloped quad muscles.

Calves

Standing Calf Raises

Basic is better. You can use a heck of a lot of weight on this exercise. Go for it. An alternative is to do them on a leg press machine.

Chest

Dips

Surprised that it's not the bench press? Sure, the bench press is the most popular chest exercise. That doesn't make it the best. First off, it's not a hard exercise. You lie flat on your back. Yeah, that's real tough. Try an all out set of dips versus the bench press and you tell me which has you working harder. I guarantee you, it'll be the dips.

The flat bench press can wreak havoc on your shoulders and rotator cuff. It puts them in a very awkward position.

The dips works your chest, triceps and shoulders more thoroughly and effectively than the flat bench press does. Many people have called it the upper body squat. If you want to build massive muscles through the chest and shoulder area, make dips a focal point of your weight training program.

Midback

Deadifts

Yes, another exercise that far too few trainees perform. Yet, it should be the cornerstone of your back training program. The deadlift works your back like no other exercise can. Yes, like the squat and stiff-legged deadlift, it's brutally hard. BUt it works. Learn to like hard work.

Lats

Chins

Chins, not lat pulldowns. If you can't do enough chins now, work hard on lat pulldowns until you can. Once you are strong enough, go to chins for your lat development.

Shoulders

Dumbbell Upright Rows

Why not some form of overhead press? Because overhead presses focus more on the front delt. To hit the bulk of the muscle, you need to hit the side head, which involved moving your upper arm out to the side. So you'd think lateral raises. However, this is a light exercise. You can't really overload the delts with side lateral raises. So what's left? Dumbbell Upright Rows done the right way. You gotta do these with dumbbells, not a barbell. This allows you the freedom of movement to do them in the most productive manner.

As you pull the dumbbells up, your upper arms should move slightly out to your sides as you lean slightly forward. Your upper arms move into the same finishing position as if it were a lateral raise but your forearms finish as if you were doing a row. You can use more weight this way and it really overloads the delts and traps.

Triceps

Dips

Yep, the same exercise as for chest. To emphasize the triceps more, make sure your body is straigh up and down as you lower and raise yourself each rep. If you want a separate exercise, go with the close grip bench press. I prefer doing this on a decline as opposed to a flat bench. There is less emphasis on the shoulders.

Biceps

Standing Dumbbell Curls

The dumbbell curl is much more effective than the barbell curl or ez curl bar curl for a couple of reasons. First, the ability to supinate your hand adds to the effectiveness. The barbell curl also has a tendency to place more emphasis on the forearms than the biceps as you curl the weight up. The ez curl bar is not effective for the biceps as it puts your hands in a position that de-emphasizes bicep contraction. Go with the dumbbells and supinate your hand as you curl so that your pinky is above your thumb at the top of the rep.

No matter what kind of weight training routine you use, make sure to include most of these mass builders as often as possible. This way, you'll be sure to get the most muscle building bang for your buck from every routine you use.

Gregg Gillies is the founder of http://www.buildleanmuscle.com Interested in gaining 21 pounds of muscle in only 9 weeks? Grab his free report at http://www.fastmasstips.com Want to boost your metabolism, burn more fat with less effort and lose all the weight you want...fast? Grab his free report at http://www.fatlosssecretsrevealed.com

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