Chest exercises are popular and fun to do, and some chest development is essential for developing a good physique. Learn what exercises to do and how to do them.
For fitness, appearance, strength, and health, you should train the muscles of your chest and back. As a home trainee, you probably want to use the best and most productive exercises available. Fortunately, you can do most of these at home.
The largest muscles of the chest are the pectoralis majors (the pecs). You can divide the most popular pec exercises into presses and flies. Presses use the front part of the shoulder (anterior deltoid) and back of the upper arm (triceps) as assistance exercises, and flies isolate the pecs more. If you want to streamline your program, choose presses because they use more muscles, and thus allow you to train your whole body with fewer movements, and because they are more functional movements, being similar to everyday activities such as opening heavy doors or moving furniture around.
You can do either presses or flies in the flat (supine), incline, or decline positions. The muscle fibers actually run in a slightly different direction in the upper versus the mid-chest region. Incline movements target, but do not isolate, the upper pecs. This movement is more functional for many athletic movements, such as basketball shooting or most volleyball moves. There is a difference of opinion as to whether there really are lower pecs that can be targeted by decline moves. If so, most men would generally not want to overwork that area. If anything, women might want to develop that part of the chest. Depending on how extensive a program you want, favor flat movements, as they recruit more of the muscle, then add incline movements if you want to do more, as they will help improve both functional strength and aesthetics. Do declines only for an occasional change of pace.
If you have a home gym, it will probably have a chest press station. It may be in either a flat (lying down) or seated (vertical bench) position. If the movement on the seated press is straight out, it is like a flat press. If it angles upward on something of a diagonal, it is equivalent to an incline press. Decline press machines are rare, but not unheard of. Use it if that’s all you have. Your machine may have a pec deck in addition to, or in place of, a chest press. That movement will be equivalent to a fly (or butterfly) movement. If you’re seated straight up, it’s like a flat bench fly. If your seat angles back, it’s like an incline fly.
If you don’t have a home gym, use either barbells or dumbbells for your presses and dumbbells for your flies. If you want to do a barbell bench press, you should have either a bench with supports for the bar, or a partner who is strong enough to both hand you the bar and help you control it. If you are doing barbell bench presses that are at all heavy for you, you need to have a spotter assist you for safety sake. Ideally, you will have a bench that adjusts to both an incline and (less important) a decline position. You can do presses and flies on the floor, but it will limit your range of motion, as well as your comfort, especially with presses. Flies are easier to do on the floor, and you may want to make that your chest exercise if you don’t have a bench.
Here’s how to do a barbell bench press: Lie on your bench with your feet flat on the ground. (You can put your feet up on the bench if it makes your back feel better, but you will be less stable.) Keep your head, shoulders, feet, and buttocks down throughout the movement. Position yourself on the bench so the bar on its supports is over your eyes. Grasp the bar with your hands slightly more than shoulder width apart. When your upper arm is parallel to the floor, your forearms should be vertical. This is the best all-purpose grip, but you can vary the width somewhat for different goals. Take the bar off the supports, and extend your arms up with the bar over your mid-chest. Lower the bar slowly until it touches your chest, then push it up strongly until your arms are straight, and repeat. Do not arch your back, and don’t bounce the bar off your chest. If you don’t have a bench, you won’t be able to go down this far. If you have shoulder problems, stop when your elbows are even with your chest instead of bringing the bar to your chest. The movement is basically the same with dumbbells. Bring the dumbbells down until the inside part of the dumbbell touches the outside of your shoulders. Hold the dumbbells with your palms facing forward, as you do with a barbell. Stop when your elbows are even with your chest if you have shoulder discomfort or if you are trying a heavier weight. You need a spotter for heavy dumbbell bench presses or flies.
Incline presses are similar except that the barbell or dumbbell is lowered to the upper chest (do not lower it to your neck). Make sure you press the weight straight up toward the ceiling, not forward.
You will be able to use more weight with presses than with flies, and with flat bench movements than with inclines.
Another exercise you should incorporate into your chest workout is the old-fashioned pushup. At the up position, your arms should be straight but not locked out, your body should be straight, and only hands and toes on the floor. If you can’t do these, do modified pushups from your knees instead of your toes. Still keep your body straight. You can go down until your chest is a few inches from the floor, but do not go so far that you feel discomfort in your shoulders. You can change hand position to vary the exercise. Give a little push at the top of the movement so that your back rounds a little. This will work the serratus anterior, the muscle on the side of your rib cage, which is important to posture and muscle balance.