Mind Pump: Raw Fitness Truth - 1687: Eight Exercise Combos for Maximum Gains

Episode Date: November 18, 2021

In this episode Sal, Adam & Justin cover some of the best exercise combinations for each part of the body. Eight Exercise Combinations for the average-consistent fitness consumer. (2:40) #1 – Legs: Barbell Squat to Romanian Deadlift. (5:43) #2 – Back: Barbell Row to Pull Up’s. (9:59) #3 – Chest: Press to a Fly. (15:58) #4 – Shoulders: Standing Overhead Press to Rear Delt Flys. (21:32) #5 – Biceps: Barbell Curl to Hammer Curls. (29:34) #6 – Triceps: Parallel Bar Dips to Overhead Tricep Extension. (34:12) #7 – Core: Perfect Sit-Up to Cable Chops. (39:25) #8 – Calves: Jump Rope to Seated Calf Raises. (43:17) Related Links/Products Mentioned November Promotion: MAPS Anywhere and the Fit Mom Bundle – Both 50% off! **Promo code “NOVEMBER50” at checkout** Visit PRx Performance for an exclusive offer for Mind Pump listeners! **Code “mindpump5” at checkout** How To Start Squatting – Learn To Squat Like A PRO (FREE GUIDE) The ONLY Way You Should Be Doing Stiff Legged Deadlifts! - Mind Pump TV The ONLY Way You Should Barbell Row – Mind Pump TV How To Do A Perfect Pull-Up (AVOID MISTAKES!) - Mind Pump TV 3 Bent Over Row Exercises You NEED To Try! - Mind Pump TV How To Actually Target Your Lats With The Lat Pulldown! - Mind Pump TV How To Incline Dumbbell Press - The Right Way! (GROW YOUR CHEST) Dumbbell Flyes vs. Cable Flyes- Which Builds Your Chest Better? How to Perform the Overhead Press (the CORRECT way) How To Do A PROPER Dumbbell Rear Delt Fly Don't Make these Bicep Curl Mistakes if You Want to Build Big Biceps How To Do Hammer Curls for HUGE Biceps (BICEP GROWTH!) Traditional Bicep Curls vs Hammer Curls (What's The DIFFERENCE?) | FREE Arm Growth Guide Get BIG Biceps By Doing Chin-Ups! (SECRET WEAPON) Top 3 Bicep Exercises You're NOT Doing! (TRY THESE) | MIND PUMP 3 Best Secrets - How To Make Your Triceps Grow (AVOID THESE MISTAKES!!) Want Bigger Biceps & Triceps? Try these 4 Exercises to Wake Up Your Arms Shrink Your Waist With The PERFECT Sit-UP (SIX PACK ABS!) Build An Amazing Midsection with the Side Wood Chop 3 BEST Secrets - How To Grow Your Calves! (AVOID MISTAKES!) Mind Pump #1677: The Best Explosive Exercises For Muscle Growth & Fat Loss How To Properly Do The Ice Skater Exercise How To Build Your Calves With The Donkey Calf Raise - FREE Guide For Strong Calves Mind Pump TV - YouTube Mind Pump Podcast – YouTube Mind Pump Free Resources

If you want to pump your body and expand your mind, there's only one place to go. MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, MIND, with your hosts. Salda Stefano, Adam Schaefer, and Justin Andrews. You just found the world's number one fitness health and entertainment podcast. This is Mind Pump. Alright, in today's episode, what we tried to do was give you some of the best combinations, two exercise combinations for every single body part.

In fact, if you listen to this whole episode, take notes, you should be able to put together a great routine based off of what we talked about. We explain why we put specific combinations of exercise for each body part. So you can hear us explain why, decide for yourself what you're looking for, what we're best for you, and put together a great workout. So we hope you enjoy this episode. Now it's brought to you by our sponsor, PRX. Now PRX makes the best home gym equipment you'll find anywhere. I'm talking commercial grade home gym equipment, sturdy, last forever, very safe. Also, here's the best part.

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50, there was no space for that discount. By the way, every single program that we sell has a 30-day money back guarantee. So you can sign up, try it out for a month, you don't like it, return it, no questions asked, we'll give you a refund. I think it's important, and we do this a lot, right? Because we trained so many everyday people. We always try to pertin perspective, like the average person, what they're going to do, what they're not going to do, and that really tailors

how we communicate our information. Because it makes no sense to communicate this crazy information if we know that the average person is saying going to do it, or it's not going to be feasible for them. So I think for the average, not fitness fanatic, but for the average consistent person who works out who's interested in building their body, sculpting their body, their health and fitness, it's probably very realistic to talk about like the two best exercises combos

you could do for each area of your body. Because I think the average person, or at least the average person I'm talking about now, person who's relatively consistent, it's probably where they're gonna do it. They're probably gonna go to the gym, train their body, and they'll do two exercises per body part. So which two do they pick?

Why pick those two? Why are they so valuable? And I have a bunch off the top of my head that I've written down that I know are always great to exercise combos, but I think this would be great. Well, I always like to reduce it down to relatable things, right? And I think we've learned that as coaches,

is whatever we can do from all the vast amounts of education and different types of techniques out there, like what had the most value to us personally and also to our clients that's more relatable is something that they can replicate fairly easily. So I think that, you know, this will be good. At least like something you can apply right now at the gym after you listen to this.

I think that'd be rad. I can't wait to see you lead this because I'm curious to see how much we all agree. Like how much your combo, all of us go, oh yeah, that's a great combo. Or I've got one for you that I really, really enjoy because we've mentioned some of these in the past on the episodes, and I always get somebody DMing me,

like they go and they apply it at the gym right afterwards, and they're like, oh my God, that felt so amazing. We've got the most massive pump from that. Yeah, now I'm gonna predict that off, you and I are probably more similar at them, because you and I have more of a bodybuilding approach, I know Justin will have to throw a fucking wrench and everything. Yeah, he will be more of a performance guy,

but there's tons of value in that, right? Oh, yeah. And what's important to understand is, because I mean, how many times we've said this, right? Not all exercise are created equal. Some are far more effective, give you more bang for your buck than others. Well, when you start to add exercises together, the formula actually gets more complex. There are exercise combinations that are far more valuable than

other exercise combinations, even if the independent pieces measure the same. In other words, you could do two very effective leg exercises that on their own rank very highly, but as a combination are inferior to another two exercise combination because of how they hit the body and the parts of the body if they work, for example. And you'll feel the difference, too, right? Like, based off of what your focus is. And so I think that it'll be interesting at least. I want to put in some perspective of like,

if I'm focused on something else, like power, trying to generate more force versus just getting a pump. Yeah, absolutely. So, all right, let's start with legs, right? So we'll start with the biggest body parts, I guess, and move kind of the smaller ones. If I had to pick two exercises,

and I do wanna be clear, ideally you wanna do other exercises that are more individualized to you or whatever, but we're picking just two here. And in my experience, the best two combined exercises you could do for legs, if you go to the gym and work your legs out, you only do two exercises. I think a barbell squat, we've talked about the squat many times, works the whole body, very functional,

this huge muscle building, metabolism boosting, kind of payback from doing them in comparison to other exercises. And I think if you combine that with a Romanian deadlift, Romanian deadlift is a phenomenal, what's called posterior chain exercise, right? So it works. The glutes and hamstrings, it works on hip hinging.

I think when you combine those two together, the sum is equal more than the part. You get this tremendous benefit from doing both exercises together for the lower body. Yeah, I totally, I love Squatis King. And obviously deadlift has its place in terms of the lower body. Yeah, I totally agree. I love Squatis King. And obviously Deadlift has its place in terms of the posterior chain. If I was to look at it in terms of hip-hinging movement

that gives you that power and is able to really stimulate an insane amount of force to generate for this too. A lot of times I like to incorporate a heavy kettlebell swing for a few reps just to really get that type of power and speed and snap. And then I'm really waking up the CNS and then moving that into a squat, I feel even more activation from my muscles. So you're going to go swing to squats. That's your combination. By the way, these aren't supersets. This is like you do your sets with your, yeah, same with mine. You would do your

squats first, three sets or whatever. And then later do, you know, in the way, these aren't supersets. This is like you do your sets with your, yeah, same with mine. You would do your squats first, three sets or whatever, and then later do, you know, in the workout, do the Romanian deadlift. So I think that's a great combination. In fact, I think on a recent episode, we talked about starting a workout with kettlebell swings. I think it was a qual or someone asked a question. So I like that one. Yeah, well, you and I are going to be on the URI on the same page. The only, I think, one slight modification that I would say to the squat is because the Romanian deadlifts are post-eared chain heavy, I would end squats still get post-eared chain involved.

I may actually do like a hack squat or a front squat with that. Oh, yeah. But I mean, you can't go wrong with squats. That's one of my favorite combos, for sure, to include in almost every leg workout that I do. And it's for the point you said. I mean, you're just, you're attacking the entire leg and you're not missing out

and both of them are good, heavy or exercise that you could heavy load and really get after. Yeah. In fact, I did this with my consistent clients. This was a very common combination for legs where they come in and you know, these are people that would hire me for three days a week or more so that the more consistent people. This was a very common combination we did and everybody just got phenomenal results And if I have limited time to work out and can only pick two exercises These tend to be the ones now are we going to Specify to on the order that you would do them like I think that's important Okay, so I don't think Romanian deadlifts before squats is a good idea

Now the only reason why I would do that is if I have somebody with like at for example I was just helping an old client of mine out who's trying to develop her hamstrings And she's trying to bring those up and so I Quaddominate right she's very quad dominant She's trying to be she's trying to work on her posterior chain because she's trying to work on developing her hamstrings more I might flip that so that's the only case where I would flip it is, I'd say, okay, let's do the Romanian Delas first, because I want more energy, more output for that exercise. Plus, now I'm kind of pre-exhausting the hamstrings

before you go do something like a back squat, which still gets some hamstrings. That's a really great point. I will say this, that if that's the case, the second exercise, you probably want to go lighter and focus more on technique and form, right? But 100% in fact, all of these exercises, we put them in the order that is ideal for most people,

but there's always exceptions to the rule where flipping them might be good. And I'll try and make that like when it comes up, like that's just popped in my head because I literally just had this conversation. I said, hey, when you do your Romanian deadlifts and squats, I know normally I would have, we have them program squats first,

we almost always will traditionally program that way, but there is always exceptions to the role when somebody has a very specific goal, which is she's quad dominant, she's trying to develop her hamstrings. In this case, that's a simple thing that you can do that'll just help her in that direction. Totally. All right, so now we're going to back. Okay. One of my favorite, just two exercise combos for back are rows, typically a barbell

row to pull-ups. And if someone's not strong enough to do pull-ups, I'd have them do a pull-down or assisted pull-ups. Now, why both these exercises? Okay, so rows really do well at strengthening the entire back, but really focusing on what's called scapular attraction, pulling the shoulder blades back, which for most people is a very, it's a function of the back that needs to be focused on with exercise because so many of us have forward shoulder. So I'm gonna start with the rows

because forward shoulders are so common, I want them to focus on those mid back muscles to really give them kind of better posture. And then pull ups, pull ups are pull downs, but especially pull ups, great lat exercise. Directly works the lat. And then from a body sculpting and muscle development standpoint,

you're hitting the whole back when you do those two exercises in combination. Rose to pull ups, it's like mid back development. You still get some lat development. Now you're doing pull ups, mostly lat. Just this wonderful kind of well developed back you'll get from that combination. So, I agree with that.

I think from my perspective too, like in terms of like going in that order of like, I'm gonna try and get like some fast twitch muscle involvement to really ramp my CNS, you know, you could turn that row into a Pendlet row. And that could be something that you could apply, you know, going before the pull up, also too. I mean, I know that deadlifts aren't necessarily

considered back exercises, but I'm sorry, it's deal years. Let's say a trap bar deadlift just because for me and working with athletes, this is something that I feel like risk reward and less time teaching. This is one of those sort of hacks that was really helpful for me. And so to load a trap bar deadlift,

substantially then have them move over to to lap, pull downs, man. Or sorry, pull ups, I think that that's a deadly combo. So we're all again close, almost on the same page. I mean, this is for sure, this is actually my favorite combo of all exercises for anybody apart, is the deadlift to the lap pull down. The only reason why I'm more lap pull down is because the deadlift is so taxing.

And after doing three to five sets of heavy debts, going to do pull ups is tough, is tough to do. Although I will say, if you've never experienced that, it's actually kind of crazy how much you fly up on the first set. Like, if you've done, if no one's ever done this before, and we've talked about this on the show where you go do like one or two reps of a heavy debt lift and then go do a pull up, and you'll feel like you're 50 pounds lighter.

So there is that. But if I do three to five sets and I'm doing more like five to eight reps on deadlifts, I'm a little more gas than fatigued. I love to go over to the lap pull down and do that right after. And what I love, and I know that, you know, with the rows, like both of you guys are saying, you know, pinlay rows and then a traditional rows, you're getting more scapular retraction. And I know you're not getting as much of that, obviously, with the deadlift. Yeah, but you're working in mid much of that, obviously with a deadlift. But you're working in mid-back like that.

Oh, yeah. You're able to load it significantly heavier and you get even more rectus pinae moods too, because that's how much you're trying to load the low back. So you talk about feeling the entire back pump. I've never had a back pump, like heavy deadlifts right over to afterwards finishing my deadlift, so it's going over to lap pull down.

In the one thing I guess of being the functional guy here too that I always kind of consider as well as like where I can add elements of rotation and you know with rows like having just like a single arm row but with added rotation like getting that you know scapula to to go through all those ranges of motion I think is important. And so you know if that's an opportunity where you want to include that, it's a good place to do it. Yeah, now why would you do pull-ups first? You would do pull-ups first if you had a back

that was developed at lacked lats. You got the mid back strength, you got the upper back strength, but you lacked the lat, you know, width or whatever, in which case pull-ups first would be perfectly fine. I would not have somebody with really bad forward shoulder to pull-ups first, though. I would have them do rows first, or deadlifts first. But yeah, the combo that you said, deadlifts pull-ups,

I did that for years. That was one of my favorite combinations. It's a nasty one. It is, and it really works the entire back. I got really well developed muscles from it. I don't think you're missing much by doing that. I want to elaborate a little bit more on Justin's. Like I said, there's always exceptions to the rule.

And I love, because you actually just, you named the exercise that we put in maps performance, right? So we did that where you're kind of split stance and you're doing the kettlebell with a rotation in there. And so here's where this, this depends on the client. If I have a client where we are more functional focus, right? So I'm working on their movement. They don't, they do a lot of things in the schedule plan or maybe they

sit at a desk all day long. They're not trying to be a bodybuilder or get the most bang for the buck as far as building tons of muscle. They're, I'm looking for overall performance and movement. This is where I think that trumps it. Like that, that's a no brainer to go that direction to add some sort of an anti-rotational component to the back exercise, which if we do what Sal and I are saying, they're very basic, like, sagittal plane movements where you're not incorporating that. So again, there's always this exception,

the rule on what the client's goal is, if I'm just thinking, best pump, build most muscle, most amazing feeling, like I'm going deadlift, flat pull down, but if I'm like, I've got this client, which by the way is probably more the majority, advanced age, you know, had low back pain maybe in the past, like just wants to feel good. Yeah, like that is gonna be a better overall exercise,

regardless of maybe the other combo might give you a fraction a bit more muscle or pump. Yeah, no, to be more specific with the row pull up combo, I still like to do supinated grip rows to overhand pull ups. So I do the yates style row, great stretch pull ups, and I just get this great, just this great feeling on my back. All right, let's go to chess now.

And this is a common one, it's a common combination, but I think it's good to explain why this is a good combination. A press and then a fly. Okay, so let's get a little bit more specific. I think a low incline chest press is more functional and will produce better aesthetics than a flat bench press. And I know I'm being a little sacrilegious here

in glass from, as I should say. But whenever you do any kind of pressing motion and sports or whatever, it more closely mimics an overhead press or an incline press than at what a bench press. Very rarely are you kind of pushing in this direction. From an aesthetic standpoint, when you see a well-developed chest,

actually, when you see a chest that's not well-developed, what you tend to see is a lower chest development with lacking upper chest development. That slow incline gives you a fuller, broader looking, more aesthetic chest. There's more function, I think, to that type of pressing. Then when we go to flies, I like a flat fly because the stretch you get on a flat fly

really spans the entire rib cage. Now, why the fly to the press? You know, with a lot of exercises for certain body parts, you tend to get these common combination of muscle groups, right? For pressing for the chest, it's always chest shoulders triceps, right? Any press, barbell, dumbbell, incline, flat, decline, it's chest shoulders triceps. And muscles start to kind of learn to work together. A fly is actually chest shoulders and biceps. When your arms are open and you go down on a fly,

it's your biceps that are connecting with the chest. It produces a different feel, the tension's different on the chest. And then the stretch, the stretch at the bottom of a fly is not something you can achieve with the press. Press is you're typically limited by the bar or even by your shoulders. But when you bring the weight out and you come down,

you get this really good stretch on the chest. The press and fly combo, it's a classic one. Bodybuilders have been doing it since probably the 50s, and it's one of my favorites. It's magical, and I mean, I could get cute in, and you know, suggest that you do some kind of like med ball chest passes, like something to kind of get that power movement out.

But honestly, I would stick with just a tempo focus with the bench press and maybe even do an incline version of that. So I'm bringing the bar down, but then my focus is powerful of a press on the concentric part as possible to get that focus of of, I'm really trying to move the weight quickly and effectively and then I'm going to transition over to probably an alternating fly version of that.

Just because I like the stability, the control, the isometric component of that while getting that stretch at the same time, great combo functionally. The only thing I was going to change was like, this is where I love cables. Like a cable fly after this exercise is just, just cause it keeps constant tension. Right, with the dumbbell fly, obviously when you're at the top of the movement, you lose a little bit of that tension

or as much of the intention as you would if you were actually doing a cable fly and I love the alternating. I was gonna say though, Justin, I mean, obviously a med Ball press would be a little ridiculous to think that that's gonna replace a dumbbell or chest press. But you could do like an alternating dumbbell press to get some anti-rotational component in there.

And you can still go pretty heavy with that. And I love to do that. I'm with you, South, too. And I don't know if I'm biased because I saw the greatest change in my own chest aesthetically when I really started to focus on incline. I also think too, there's that, I think we've talked about this, that the incline bench, whether you're doing barbell or dumbbell,

just puts your scapula in a more advantageous position. It's less technical, it is. It is. Flat and flat, there's more likely going to be a little bit of a breakdown or the shoulders rolling forward or issues with the shoulder kind of clicking or something. So I love doing a heavy either dumbbell or barbell press and then going into the fly, my only adjustment to the fly, which by the way, I do both, but my favorite would be to do the cable fly right now.

Yeah, and the feel is different with dumbbells than with cables, right? With dumbbells, your focus should be, by the way, with flies, the goal should not be to go as heavy as possible, whether using cables or dumbbells, the goal is form and technique. You go heavy, you're gonna turn it into some kind of a weird press. But with the dumbbells and free weights,

the emphasis is on the stretch. This is where most of the resistance is, right? There's not very much resistance up here, but when you're at the bottom, it's about the stretch. That's the value of the free weight fly. Now, the value of a cable fly is I would argue more in the squeeze position, mainly because you don't get the squeeze in the chest with really any free weight exercise, right? You don't really get that full squeeze.

And so if you only ever do free weights, you may actually be very strong in the stretch and then mid-range position, but then all of a sudden, you lack this kind of short range of motion, this squeeze position with cables because the resistance is the same all the way through. You know, what I like to do with cables is I go lighter than I would with flies, and then I'm like, my goal is to squeeze as hard as I possibly can with every single rep and focus on that contraction in the middle. And it is a different feel. Well, that's you just alluded to why I would make the case why I like the cables even more is because I think you can get a little bit of both where the dumbbells are a little

more limited, right? Dumbbells, like you said, it's just you get the most out of this exercise when you're in the fully stretched position. I still can get that with the cables. And I also get the squeeze. And so that's the only reason why I prefer it a little bit more, but I think both of them, and I think the order is one of the best things that you could do for your chest for sure. Yes. Now, let's get to shoulders. And I think there's going to be a lot of people might be surprised that there's this particular exercise missing from this combo.

And I'll explain why here in a second. But let's start with the first exercise. I think it's hard to argue a better overall shoulder strengthening and building exercise in a standing, or even seated, but I'll say standing overhead press, right? An overhead press all the way down to where it's down to the upper chest. Of course, remember,

everything's gotta have good stability, control, mobility. And then a full extension, like you are working that shoulder joint through a wonderful expression You're working the entire shoulder. It's gonna develop good strength. It's gonna develop good muscle building You get a decent amount of mobility with a good full standing overhead press. Okay, so what's the second exercise? A lot of people with throwing a standing lateral or what they used to call back in the day a side lateral right? we're going to a standing lateral or what they used to call back in the day, a side lateral, right?

Lateral raises, very common. Gotta hit those side delts. No, I think it's a great exercise, not saying you shouldn't do them, but if you're only gonna do another exercise and we're doing two exercise combos, I'll argue all day long that a rear fly is a superior exercise to compliment and overhead press.

I think with a good overhead press, you get a lot of anterior delt activation, that's the front. You get a decent amount of side delt activation, especially at the top, very little rear delt activation. And if you just did overhead presses and laterals, standing laterals, which a lot of people do, this is the most common combination, I would say,

is overhead press and laterals. You develop this kind of sloping forward shoulder look. You don't get the round aesthetic looking delts and you lose a little bit of functionality because those rear delts are also very important. And the rear delts are not really active in either one of those exercises. So overhead press, rear fly, developer,

wonderful round, well developed shoulder and it's more functional than if we did overhead press to the standing normal side lateral. Yeah, two things, I guess, that I would add to that in terms of a functional perspective. So if I were to add any kind of fast Twitch movement there, I mean, this is a great place for a push press. And but in terms of functionality, again, adding rotation, I actually prefer like a single arm,

you know, a rotating press either with the kettlebell or with a dumbbell, either way. But that way I could really kind of focus on my posture and making sure, you know, my shoulder is packed and I have, you know, everything sort of in good alignment. And I go through that full range of motion, that spiraling type of a press. I think is massively beneficial to express all the different components of the shoulder. Then moving that over again, and I agree with the rear delt kind of focus.

The natural tendency would be to do a side lateral race. That's what we call it, but yeah, this side lateral. I'm trying to get in the bodybuilder, Lingo. But yeah, so I think chess supported it. I like doing those over the bench. If I was just kind of focused with that, it really just kind of hone in on getting the right technique of that with the dumbbells.

I know Adam's probably gonna go with the camera. I'll let you go. Well, I'm actually gonna kind of combine what both of you said. So I love, I know doubt, no, I can't imagine someone trying to argue the overhead press or at least some form of the overhead press, right? So, and I love the idea of the push press.

I'm gonna add a little bit to that. A push press with an emphasis on the stability at the top to where I would make you hold for like three seconds and then come back down. Hey, you wanna talk about hitting the entire shoulder and that after you get that explosiveness, you get the fast twitch that you or alluded to, at the top after I get it fully pressed,

I'm actually gonna hold and stabilize for about three seconds and then reset, come back down and press again One of the most amazing shoulder pumps and then this is this is talk about one of my favorite combos It is going to the the pull-throughs or the rear flies on the cable I've done a video on the mine pump TV channel. It's been my favorite rear del exercise and I just love The how it takes the muscle through its full range of motion and I feel like I get this constant tension and a massive pump in the rear delts, which I feel is a

more difficult exercise for people to get pumped. I think a lot of people when they do rear delt flies, it's the opposite of how we do chest stuff where you are wanting to stay in this retracted position. Like when you do rear flies, you wanna be in this kind of protracted position. When you do the fly, which I think is just counter-intuitive for a lot of people. And I think that when you do the pull-throughs,

like it forces that, right? So when I'm hinged over, it forces my shoulder forward. So it just makes it more advantageous for somebody to keep their shoulders in that position. And I just love the pump. So I love the push press or overhead press with the focus on the stability on the top and then right into a rear fly on the free motion. Now you could make an argument that you could replace and I'm going to say could I don't think this was great for everybody. But I think for somebody that's got a good

connection to the rear delt, you could replace a rear fly with like a face pole where you're, you know, pulling almost like a W. You are getting good rear dealt there. You're also combining the biceps. You're also getting other parts of the of the shoulder. So it's a different, you know, combination of muscles rather than shoulder and tricep and shoulder and bicep. Now, if you don't have a great connection to your rear delts, I don't know if you should necessarily do that. It's still think it's functional. You're just not going work the reedelts as well But I can I can make my reedelts really work on a face pole and it's more of a compound lift than a rear fly

So that's the watch the elevating shoulders. Yeah, that was a little more complicated So I but I do I like the fact that you both you guys both put emphasis on the rear delt Supposed to go in the lateral which would be this kind of the traditional way there But it goes and I think aside from that the laterals are supposed to go in the lateral, which would be this kind of the traditional way that everybody goes. And I think aside from the the laterals are getting some work in the overhead press, I also just think that the rear delt is one of the most overlooked parts of the shoulder

and you may point about, talk about getting this full shoulder look. It makes a huge difference. You can really tell somebody who has developed their rear delt, you can see it when they got their shirt on, they're just standing there. I mean, it's, it sticks out on the back and it just makes the whole shoulder and arm look so much better. You know what Adam is funny, when I, as a trainer, occasionally, it wasn't super calm enough, but occasionally, you would get a client

that would want to develop a specific part of their upper body, right? Usually it was, you know, I want to lose weight and, you know, overall, but every once in a while, we get a client and say, my shoulders. I really want my shoulders to stand out. I have women telling me that, I had a man telling me that. What's funny? I was really good at this. And all I would focus on was rear-delt development.

I didn't develop the anterior del or the side del, it was the rear del. Once the rear del developed, they were like, oh my God, I've been doing, you know, laterals and presses forever and all of a sudden my shoulders look so round. It's like because the rear delt plays a huge role in how your shoulder looks visually.

A lot of people don't realize that. I mean, I think it plays a huge role in how the entire arm looks because I did this exact same thing. It was a weak point for me. It was an area that I worked on and made my shoulder look totally different. It also made my arms look totally different.

I'll never forget laying off all the arm work that I was doing at that time of my life, focusing on the rear delts, and then getting compliments about my arms looking better. It just pulls the entire arm together. If you get a nice rear delt on someone, you get that spade or kind of real bubbly round look on the shoulders, it makes the arms look more difficult. It makes you in good posture too. That too. That's what I like about it. It's so many great things.

It helps you to kind of present yourself in a lot better light, which I think people like discount that a lot. Like if you're in good posture, you look a lot better. Just walking around. It's such a good point. I remember that was an exercise that I used to do with clients when I do assessment with them. Is I would like, you know, we'd be standing in front

of a mirror and I'd be assessing them. And then I would like, you know, we'd be standing in front of a mirror and I'd be assessing them and then I would put them in perfect posture and it'd be like just look, you look like you just lost 10 pounds just by standing upright. Totally. All right, let's talk about the show muscle. You know, the one that you instinctively flex if someone says show me your muscle. The bicep. Now, with the bicep, it's interesting.

Some muscles combinations make more of a difference than other muscles. Biceps doesn't make a huge difference, but there's still a difference with the Bicep, it's interesting. Some muscles combinations make more of a difference than other muscles. Biceps doesn't make a huge difference, but there's still a difference with the exercises you wanna pick. Now, I'm gonna start with the overall muscle building barbell curl. It's just a general bicep building exercise. It's really good for overall strength and function.

I think it's hard to beat if you wanna compare it, you know, exercise to exercise in terms of developing, you know, nice biceps. All right, what do you combine with that? So this is, I think we might all have a difference here and it'll probably all just as valid. I like hammer curls. Now here's why I like hammer curls.

When you're doing barbell curls, whether it's an easy curl bar or a straight barbell, your hands are pretty much supinated, meaning the palms are up. And that's definitely a function of the bicep. But oftentimes when you're grabbing things in real life, you pick up your kids, you grab something, pick it up, your hands are not supinated. They tend to be sometimes also in kind of this neutral position.

And when you do a hammer curl in this neutral position, you are working the bicep. You're also working the brachialis, which is a muscle underneath the bicep, which a lot of us don't focus on. And by the way, you develop your brachialis, you get this really nice side look to your bicep, because it kind of shows here through the side. But you also develop another elbow flexor. A lot of us don't realize it exists, which is the brachio-radialis muscle,

the top of the forearm here. Well, my hands are neutral, or especially when they're pronated, the brachio-radialis muscle, this muscle right here along the elbow, which by the way, a lot of people have pain in their elbow up here from working out and stuff, right? What do they call it?

Golf or Zelbo or tennis elbow? This muscle tends to be underdeveloped and a lot of people, especially people at Lefwights. So hammer curls gives a nice full look to the bicep and combination with the barbell curl. It also develops this really important muscle that attaches the forearm that also helps flex the elbow. So.

Yeah, so I'll, this is kind of one of those that I, I'm gonna see what you guys think. Because this is literally like, this is my favorite combo. And I would swear to you, you didn't close. I feel like I'm out of my realm here with this bicep, you know, this specific muscle, but. So I like to do chin-ups, so supinated chin-ups to start,

and you get that full range of motion, it's nasty, right? So just focused on that, and then my favorite combo to follow that up is actually a dumbbell alternating curl, but like on an incline bench, and then letting them hang in this position here. So like one comes up while the other one is in the stretched position. And then I alternate that and it just, yeah, it's a good feeling

destroys my, my bike. I love that. I think it down with both of those. I mean, I think you get, I like what both of you, I'd have a slight modification, probably to cells, the barbell curls. I would actually do a spider curl with the rotation, right? So I'm getting kind of the hammer, I would actually start in like a hammer curl position hanging over the spider curl and actually fully rotate and lead

with my pinkies and then rotate back down. So I can incorporate some of what you're trying to target. Plus I love the spider curl to kind of focus on the squeeze and the peak, right? So you're at the top of the exercise and then of course the barbell just a standard barbell curl has to be in there. Those two together would be probably one more. Now, I want to add something to adjust instead about chin ups because I'm sure there's going to be people, especially on YouTube, like chin ups, it's a back exercise. Okay.

Palms up, supinated grip chin ups with an emphasis on the biceps. So if I'm pulling for my back, my chest is up, and I'm squeezing my back. If I'm pulling for my biceps, I'm not pulling my chest up, and I'm squeezing the biceps at the top. You could change the focus. This is a compound lift for your biceps.

Okay, there is nothing that I promise you. First of all, you gotta be strong enough to do it this way. If you are, you will not find a bicep exercise. Now what, ham, think about compound lifts for other body parts compared to isolation lifts. You just found a compound lift for your biceps. It's a huge muscle builder. It's hard to do for a lot of people, even people who could do pull-ups. When you show them how to do it for the biceps, it can be really hard. But holy cow, that one builds the biceps. It's really, really tough. It's all about the cues on this one, right? So if I'm cueing somebody for biceps, it's pull the bar into the chest. If I'm queuing some for back,

it's pull the back. Pull the chest to the bar. Pull the chest into the bar, right? So that's where the cues are different so that people are not making it a back exercise. You could very easily change that slight cue right there. It makes a tremendous difference. Yeah, and I'm telling you, it's a nasty exercise. I had a gymnast that worked from your ones that taught me all about it, and I went up and I did like five reps. I was like, holy cow. Can't do very many. Yeah, so whole new thing.

All right, so let's get to triceps. Triceps, I have a combo here. I have a pretty strong case for that. I really like to combine the two. Now the first exercise is your traditional parallel bar dips. It's hard to find, in my opinion, a better tricep, compound tricep exercise, that's more functional.

Some of my argue, a close-cut French press, I could see that argument, but dips, it's your body, it's hard, it's very rare that we actually push our bodies up in that direction. Great tricep exercise, you can use a lot of weight, obviously use your body weight. Some people can actually strap weight to their bodies. And then the second exercise is an overhead tricep extension,

dumbbell cable, doesn't matter. Why the overhead extension? Because it's the only position where you actually stretch the long head of the tricep. So if I tell you to stretch your tricep right now, those of you that know how to do it, probably stretch it like this, right? You bring your elbow up to your head and bring it across. What you're feeling is the long to stretch your tricep right now, those of you that know how to do it, will probably stretch it like this, right? You bring your elbow up to your head

and bring it across. What you're feeling is the long head of the tricep because it attaches near the scapula. That stretch position means you're gonna hit the tricep totally different in different area. It's gonna hit the long head, which is also part of the tricep that gets less activation on dips.

So you go dips, overhead tricep extension, you get this nice kind of full effect on the triceps. It's one I've done since I was a kid, one of my favorite combinations. Yeah, so somewhat, I mean, I love dips personally too. I like to intensify dips in terms of stability. So if you have access to it, I know this is not like the most accessible way to do this,

but I love ring dips. I mean, it's the most intense. There's ways to scale it in terms of like progression and regression. But if you can, if you have the ability to do it, there's nothing more demanding than a ring dip in terms of like being able to get those triceps to, you know, produce the strength in order to get you into full extension and then following that up with skull crushers with the easy bar. Very close to the old red stuff.

Yeah, it's close. So you get that same kind of stretch position to follow that up. Yeah, the only thing I mean, I'm not going to debate this that these aren't the king. It's hard to debate that dips are not king for tricep exercise. Although personally, you would find me probably doing the close grip in client bench press more. Just, it's comfortable, it's easy. I feel like I can load it substantially. I can load it even more.

It also, again, the bias I have is it was one of those exercises that I've talked on the show before that when I started to incorporate it. It's game changer. It took my triceps to a whole other level. And I had already done kind of dips before, but I'm sure you could argue the case that if the reverse was true,

if I did incline press all the time, and then I finally did dips, I might have felt the same thing. So yeah, incline, incline, close grip bench press, or dips, easy one and two for me. And then the overhead extensions 100%. And so long as you have the shoulder mobility to be able to get your hands behind your head like that,

otherwise I would probably do a variation like Justin said, and that's the only reason why I would do one or the other is based off the client, which one is there more capable. If you really wanna focus on the stretch on that overhead tricep extension, use a rope and use a cable, because you could go down real.

Sometimes a dumbbell gets in the way, hits your back. But with the rope, you can go waiting to get that crazy stretch at the bottom. And the pump is insane. And if you've never done them that way, prepare yourself, because loading a stretched muscle tends to be more soreness.

I even used to like to do that single arm. So I'd grab the rope and actually take my other arm so I can hold my elbow in a fixed position and keep there so I'm not cheating it out, which that's another thing too. You'll see when people kind of do the over it, the flare, the elbows out or the rock, they won't go through full range of motion,

but taking it with one arm, using the other arm to hold in that fixed position while I just focus on the full extension is a great extra. Yeah, I want to comment on your close grip incline press and this is true for a flat close grip press. When I was younger, I thought close grip meant really close, like thumbs touching, but boy, is that awkward on the wrists? It actually causes impingement issues in the wrists,

it doesn't feel very good. Really a close grip is about shoulder width, maybe a little bit inside your elbows. So your elbows can just slide. And it's not that your elbows, and your elbows do come close to your body, but what's also important is that your hands come above your elbows.

So you're getting that. So that's my experience. So this is how I decide, right? Everybody always, I remember when I used to teach this exercise, oh, where do I grab here? Like, don't look at the bar on where to grab. Put your elbows. And that's where your hand, and that's where your hands go.

So line it up first by going, okay, I'm gonna tuck my elbows in right by my side and then wherever my hands are, that's where I'm grabbing the bar. So don't think of it as like, oh, grab between these lines or grab right here, it's like put your, because everybody's gonna be different. If you have a very wide, wide back and width, you're gonna be further out than somebody

who's a lot more narrow. So don't look at it as where you're grabbing the bar, get your elbows in the position first, and then kind of look at where you'd be grabbing the bar. That's where you grab the bar. And also it's important, remember the hands come up above the elbow, so I'm not doing a press where the bar's coming out of my belly button.

My elbow, my hands come up here, because that's the tricep action. Otherwise it's like front belt. I'm doing kind of a front delt raising with my presses. All right, so let's talk about the core. So the abs, the obliques, the internal external obliques, the muscles that we like to show off at the beach, well-developed core contributes to so much

in every other exercise, especially standing exercises. Very important, you train this properly. I like the perfect sit-up to start with. So perfect sit-up is very slow Your articulating you're trying to articulate every vertebrae as you go from laying flat to rolling your body up works the the abdominal muscles fully if you engage your TVA while you're doing it Like you're kind of drawing it at the same time you're working your TVA a bit of bleaks are stabilizing

It's a great extra overall exercise for the core. To make it easier for some people, you can reach forward with your hands. If you wanna make it more challenging, you keep your hands by your shoulders or behind your head, which just makes the lever heavier at the end and it makes it more challenging. Then to combine with that, I like cable chops.

Cable chops, great rotational exercise, great for the obliques. The obliques and rotation are very important for stabilization, for aesthetics, you want, nicely developed obliques, don't listen to those idiots that say don't work your obliques and make your waist grow. If you're lean and you have well developed obliques, even if your waist grows a quarter of an inch,

your waist is gonna look better. So those cable chops really work the obliques nicely through a really functional. Yeah, I'm glad you included that one. It's a great functional movement to in terms of like how it's structured. I love decline setups is is one to start with and just because using those gravitational forces and like honestly like like or sit-ups or the real focus has to be the intent of what you're doing. The technique of it is everything. If you're just adding weight or you're hanging from, I don't like adding hanging leg raises

or anything like that because I feel like people will have more of a tendency to do them wrong. I like about the decline, it really places you in a good position. And then you could slowly methodically go down through range of motion, come up and really feel each ad like get activated and go through that setup. And then later if you wanna to add way to that cool

or just intensify it by going even slower. And then to the functional sort of point, I would follow that up with a landmine rotation, trunk rotation. And I like that because I can add load to that. And it keeps everything kind of tight and controlled. And you get a lot of that rotational strength, you get the obliques, you get everything else that your core has as a function that we need to strengthen.

So I'm actually gonna choose a different one for core slash abs, and it's actually one that's sal, which I surprised you didn't go this direction because it was an exercise that you showed me the first time. I think I don't think I ever did it before. And that was actually on the stability ball and then putting your feet up like on the wall and doing like a crunch on the stability ball.

And since we're talking about core and not just directly hitting the abs, the stability component that you get with that and then also the full range of motion because you're opening up over the ball. So you get kind of like where you're trying to target with the perfect setup, because that is a great one where you're getting

the full range of motion, it's nice and control. I like that same concept, but done on the stability ball because now we have a stability component in that, that's really gonna hit it. And then going to some sort of a chop, whether it's a medicine ball toss or swinging a club or just doing a regular cable chop, I think to get some rotational component there, that combo is a must.

Yeah, I mean, you guys said, I don't think there's any worse or better than what I said. I think those are all great combinations. All right, calves. Now, this changed for me. So in the past, I would have said standing calf raises to seated calf raises because you're working the whole part of the calf, the gastroc, which is the big meaty part of the calf when you're standing. And then when you're seated with your knees bent, you're working the soleus, which is

this kind of flat muscle underneath the gastrocks that really gets worked when you're seated. Okay, that's what I normally would have said. And that's a fine combo. It's a great muscle building combo, great for aesthetics. But here's what I'm going to say now. I'm going to say instead of standing calf raises, I'll say jump rope. So jump rope to seated calf raises. Now why jump rope? I'll tell you guys a story that I just recently experienced. Now I trained my calves, I do standing calf raises, I do seated calf raises. Well, a couple of weeks ago, I wanted to do explosive pushes with the sled, where I'm driving,

but I'm actually trying to sprint. It's loaded, so I'm not really running fast, but the idea is to be explosive and push it across our turf. Great workout. I'm trying to build my work capacity a little bit, train my legs a little explosively. Anyway, a couple of days later, my killies was sore on my right side. Now, I know that my calves can handle the load, but they couldn't handle the explosiveness of the movement,

because they never trained them that way. And if you think about in real life how functional the calves are, the calves, in everyday life, you're probably not gonna, I mean, less things happen to you. You're not gonna use lots of explosive ability for the rest of your body.

And that's saying you shouldn't train it. I think there's lots of carryover. In fact, we did an episode on explosive movements in their value. But if there's anything that does require some level of explosiveness, it's your calves, right? Because you're walking, you're uphill, downhill. You might need to jump or take a step.

A little bit of an explosive component to calf. So it's probably a good idea that you train them that way a little bit. Now jump rope, a little more advanced, you got to start really, really slow. Don't go into fatigue, you will fry your body. So I would say practice jump rope for a little bit and then do seated calf raises.

Yeah, I'm surprised you with that, didn't I, Justin? I feel like you stole my jump rope. So I'll have to add then. Basically, I love ice skaters. I know this is one that a lot of people just they'll fall over the place. And I find a lot of value in terms of functional ability to control a lot of lateral forces.

So especially around the ankle, ankle is one of those things that just inevitably, anybody does something that's a little bit fast, a little bit explosive, like the ankle is so susceptible to injury and strain. And so I think building and reinforcing the stabilizing components around the ankles and also in the calves are gonna be expressed quite substantially,

like, you know, explosively moving left, right, or just like, just box jumps, I guess would be great for that as well, but I mean, yeah, jump ropes would have been the ideal movement there, but after that, I love just a heavy grinding, either sled drive or, you know, Hillsprints. And that's again, this is me just completely functionally not caring about like the overall hypertrophy of my calves more so the function of them. Yeah, but I'll argue a really good Hill Sprinter

who does really good, you know, box jumps or ice skaters. Probably gonna have well developed calves. Yeah, they're gonna get the frequency and they're gonna get the volume and all that but Yeah, in terms of load, it may be less. So I'm not qualified to answer this question That's been a body part of yours. You had to work. Yeah, you made some progress It's some veins Yeah, I just get I just I'm glad you had it. I'm glad you had it. It ancient some veins, dude. Yeah, I just get, I just add veins. That's what happens in one of those.

No, so I, I love the jump rope angle for sure and the sprinting component. I don't have much to disagree with that. The only thing that no one did touch that I would add or I might combo, so Citi calf raise gotta be in there. It's gonna have a bit knee. I feel like that component needs to be in there.

Then the other one will be a donkey calf raise with that. So I love because you're kind of going. That's a straight bodybuilder move, I love that. Yeah, donkey calf raise first, and then go to a CD calf raise after that. And I just, you wanna talk about completely hitting the entire calf, fullest range of motion on it.

I think that's an extra. And then maybe something that's neglected, which I think jump rope would actually get this, is the front, nobody, we don't ever focus on Tbilialis. It's a great point. It's a Tbilialis. What a great point. It's a neglected and when I did focus a lot on my calves,

when I was competing, I would actually, between sets would just do the toe raises, where I'm just kind of tapping, and then the golds gym over, when I'd be at Bernal over there. They actually had the, there's rarely ever do you see that tibialis machine, but every once in a while you'll see one in there where you slide your foot in and you can load it with a couple pounds on each side. It just even though you're not targeting the gas truck or the soleus, but it just gets a fuller look. And so if you're chasing looks, that was I think one of those like little secret weapons.

Bro, I'm so glad you said that. The number one cause of shin splints, which is very common. Very common. Everybody gets shin splints that I would train, and anytime they try to run or the hiking one, oh my shin's really hurt, it's weakness in the tibialis.

All I would do is strengthen their tibialis, shin splints would be totally gone. And of course, we'd have to work on some flexibility stuff. But what a great, that's totally true. Nobody ever trains there to be all right. And I'll tell you, you have well developed calves. And then you go and you try to run for a little bit, you'll get sore in your to be all right. You'll get sore in the shins because you never train them.

So look there you have it. We just gave you two just great combinations of exercises for every body part. If you wrote these all down, you can actually make yourself a great workout just based off of exercises for every body part. If you wrote these all down, you can actually make yourself a great workout, just based off of all of that. Now, look, if you want more free information from us, I suggest you go over to MindPumpFree.com. At MindPumpFree.com, we have all these guides

that are free that can help you work on your legs, or your arms, or your shoulders, or your midsection. We have guides to help you with your squat. We have guides for personal trainer. So again, it's mindpumpfree.com. You can also find all of us on social media. So Justin is at Mind Pump Justin. I'm at Mind Pump Salon. Adam is at Mind Pump Adam. Thank you for listening to Mind Pump. If your goal is to build and shape your body, dramatically improve your health and energy and maximize your overall performance, check out our discounted RGB Superbundle at MindPumpMedia.com.

The RGB Superbundle includes maps and a ballad, maps performance, and maps aesthetic. Nine months of phased, expert exercise programming designed by Sal Adam and Justin to systematically transform the way your body looks, feels, and performs. With detailed workout blueprints in over 200 videos, the RGB Superbundle is like having Sal and I'm in Justin as your own personal trainer's butt at a fraction of the price. The RGB Superbundle has a full 30-day money bag guarantee, and you can get it now plus other valuable free resources at MindPumpMedia.com. If you enjoy this show, please share the love by leaving us a five star rating and review

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