I remember when I first started going to the gym. It was during high school and I was usually go in the early morning as to avoid the rush and a packed house. The one thing I did quickly notice is that many of the guys working out there spent a lot of time on only two types of exercises: biceps and chest. Many of the people you could tell were a little out of proportion, and could have looked much better if they decided to do some core exercises for men, but who am I to judge. There are some great chest exercises for men out there, but just because they are a glamour body part does not mean they should be your only focus.
That said, over the years I have done a lot of different chest exercises and have a specific group of them that I believe are the best chest exercises for men. Since most of them are bulking exercises I do not recommend them as much for women.
Why you should work out the chest
This is a no brainer in my opinion. As I mentioned above, the chest is a glamour muscle, along with biceps and shoulders. They are the muscles that people typically first notice on you – no one says “wow you have such nice hamstrings.”
That said, obviously there are better reasons than just looking good. Having a strong chest will make many other exercises much easier. It will make working out all of your upper body much less of a stress on your body than if you had a weaker chest.
How many chest exercises should you do?
It’s best to work more than one body part at a time at the gym – this will offer more of a variety of exercise for you and also let you target and build multiple body parts much quicker. That said, you should not go too crazy with a specific body part.
Depending on my routine, I typically do 3 chest exercises at the gym when I am working chest for a specific day. Your milage may vary, but I wouldn’t do much more than that.
Great chest exercises for men
The pec dec
This is probably the easiest out of the exercises listed here because it is done on an exercise machine and does not require any free weights. The pec dec is the machine that holds your arms out to the side, forming an L-shape, and requires you to squeeze them together in front of your body.
This is a great chest exercise for men and will quickly strengthen both the inside and outside of your pectoral muscle.
Laying, over-head dips
This is likely my favourite of them all, but it can get a bit awkward. What you will need is a dumbbell that will be lifted with both your hands (choose a good weight), and an exercise bench to lay on.
Lay on the exercise bench so that you are perpendicular to it with your upper back laying across it and your head hanging off the other side. Lift the free weight with both hands on one end of the weight straight in the air over your body and head. Then slowly lower the weight, keeping your arms fairly straight, back down behind your head. Lift it back up to the starting position, and repeat.
This is a great exercise for the upper chest and is very exhausting to start with a lighter weight than you think you’ll need.
Decline bench press
This is a very common chest exercise for men and is exactly like a bench press except you are laying on a declined exercise bench. This will target your lower pectoral muscles and firm up your chest.
I usually use dumbbells for this exercises but if you had a spotter, it is a great idea to use a barbell or a smith machine.
Pushups, pushups, pushups
I cannot stress enough how important pushups are to your chest. They are by far the easiest and most convenient exercise you can do to increase the strength of your chest. Unfortunately, they are so simple and elementary, that many people don’t do them as they feel they don’t provide any results.
The great thing about pushups is that you can target all areas of your chest by simply changing the width of your hands or by adding an incline or decline to your body.
If you want to get really creative try adding 10 pushups after eat set you do of any chest exercise at the gym – that will tire you out quite quickly.
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