An inner pectoral workout typically refers to exercises that target the inner or medial portion of the pectoral muscles, which are located in the chest. These exercises aim to develop and strengthen the inner part of the chest for a more balanced and defined chest appearance. Examples of inner pectoral workouts may include exercises like chest flies, close-grip bench presses, or certain variations of push-ups that emphasize the inner chest muscles. It’s essential to incorporate a variety of chest exercises to work different areas of the pectoral muscles for overall chest development.
Though chest exercises such as bench presses and pushups may yield some solid gains, one area may remain lacking in progress. To maximize results from such workouts, targeting inner pectoral muscles (sternocostal head) will provide additional results.
These muscles can best be trained through single-joint exercises such as flies.
Dumbbell Pullovers
Dumbbell pullovers, as a single-joint movement, are typically regarded as accessory exercises and should be completed toward the end of your training session to aid recovery and reduce muscle soreness. But serious strength athletes and gymgoers recognize that isolation exercises such as these do not serve no purpose and, when performed correctly, may actually provide significant muscle gains while increasing upper body strength potential.
The dumbbell pullover exercise targets chest muscles from an unconventional angle, making it an effective way to hit inner pectoral muscles and engage the core. Furthermore, its eccentric phase requires you to brace against back arching during movement – further challenging core strength!
Submerge yourself on a flat bench, holding one dumbbell vertically above your chest with elbows unlocked or slightly bent. Slowly lower both weights to either side of your chest until reaching an acceptable point of shoulder flexion (around your armpits). As you bring them back up above your head, squeeze your chest and shoulders hard so they return back into their starting positions.
Exercise that should not be done quickly or too quickly. For optimal results, focus on performing this movement at a slow, controlled tempo to develop mind-muscle connection and minimize risks of injury. You may need to reduce weight initially if this movement is new to you; gradually build it up until reaching heavier loads gradually to prevent injuries and frustrations.
Positioning the dumbbells by your sides helps emphasize chest and inner pectoral muscles over triceps and deltoids, as well as rear delt and infraspinatus muscles in your upper back. Bracing abdominal muscles and maintaining five points of contact between bench, hands and floor is also important to prevent momentum taking control during lowering phase; furthermore it would be prudent to limit how far shoulder flexion extends during bottom position to reduce risks associated with shoulder injuries.
Cable Crossovers
Cable crossovers can add some variety to any chest workout by targeting both the upper and lower pectoralis major, as well as working the deltoids. Cable crossovers are beneficial for all fitness levels but especially effective when starting out developing chest strength.
To perform the cable crossover, stand before a cable machine with one foot slightly in front of the other (a lunge-stance). Hold D handles attached to lower pulleys in each hand with arms extended out at 45-degree angles from your torso and hands gripping D handles attached to lower pulleys in each hand (keeping elbows slightly bent), slowly bring cables together until touching at top of chest then squeeze chest muscles for maximum contraction before slowly returning handles to starting position.
Successful cable crossovers involve fully extending your arms on return, to avoid using only your biceps as primary muscle recruits and fatigueing your shoulders too much during your workout.
An integral component of this exercise is the selection of an appropriate light to moderate weight, as this allows for proper form and reps without excessive use of excessively heavy loads that could potentially compromise results and cause injury. Be wary of using too much weight; excess will likely lead to errors that compromise results and increase injury risks.
People often make the mistake of restricting their range of motion during this exercise by not crossing their hands at the end or fully extending them on the return, thus leading to suboptimal muscular activation and thus lessened effectiveness of this workout. This may be caused by either allowing one’s ego or lack of focus dictating how much weight to use; both errors can easily be avoided by performing cable crossover in an orderly, controlled fashion while paying close attention to feeling chest expand and contract at the top of movement.
Bench Press
To get that Superman chest, it’s essential to include exercises that target inner pectoral muscles along with upper and outer chest workouts. Doing this ensures balanced growth with prominent definition. We have put together our top inner chest workouts here as an aid.
To complete these workouts, you will require some key equipment: a bench, dumbbells and pulley. However, even without this equipment at your disposal you can still build a great chest routine using bodyweight exercises such as pushups and dumbbell flies.
Before beginning any chest-targeted exercise, it is always advisable to stretch and warm up your muscles in order to prevent injury. We suggest performing several dynamic stretches such as pushing, pulling and extending arms in both wide and narrow grips to prepare your muscles properly for movement during your workout. Once these warm up steps have been accomplished, then begin your regimen!
Bench presses are an integral component of any chest-targeting workout, but it’s essential that they’re performed in such a way as to target inner pectoral muscles more directly. To do this, lower dumbbells to your shoulders with elbows slightly out of a 90-degree angle before pressing up while contracting inner pecs as you press back up – this will prevent your triceps from taking over and jeopardizing form and results.
Along with employing this technique, it is also advisable to vary your rep range during bench press workouts. While higher reps may seem beneficial in terms of general chest development, they could actually hinder recruitment of inner pectoral muscles that require lower rep ranges for full engagement.
Use of wider grips is another effective strategy for improving bench press. Although most people stick with shoulder width grips when bench pressing, using wider ones allows you to focus more on inner chest work while still getting an effective workout for your triceps.
Another effective variation on the bench press is doing it at an incline, providing your pecs with additional challenges and helping emphasize inner and sternocostal heads of your chest that might otherwise be hard to target on a flat bench.
Pushups
Pushups are one of the best exercises for building overall strength, yet many don’t realize it also helps strengthen their inner pectoral muscle. Pushups work because their movement engages many other muscles as well, particularly your core, as well as targetting pectalalis major. Other muscles that benefit include wrist flexors and serratus anterior.
Pushups can effectively work your inner pectoral because of their versatility: you can tailor them to meet the specific needs of each muscle fiber group by performing them with knees bent for easier workouts or on an incline for added challenges and muscle fiber targeting.
Pushup grip width can also help target different parts of the chest. A wide pushup, for instance, targets the clavicular head of your pec muscle which connects with your collarbone; narrow pushups focus more on targeting scapular muscles; while diamond pushups target all aspects of chest development.
The standard pushup can also be combined with weighted vest or barbell to effectively target multiple muscles at once. By increasing resistance, your muscles recruit additional muscle fibers and cause micro-tears, leading to faster muscle growth rates and stronger muscles.
Negative pushups offer an extra challenge to your chest workout by emphasizing eccentric contraction, or lowering portion, of the movement. This increases load placed on muscle fibers for concentric contraction, or pushing back up, later. To perform one in plank position with arms extended straight out in front and lower until chest is at least one inch above floor – switch hands such that right is in front 6 inches while left is behind 12 inches; repeat for reps until chest reaches 1″ off floor and repeat this sequence of movement until chest lift off floor at least 1″, then start in plank position with arms extended straight out straight out in front – and perform at least 1 of this exercise if desired!
