Overview
Effective shoulder training involves targeting the three heads of the delts to some capacity.
These are of course the anterior, lateral and medial heads, in descending order of size.
The anterior head is involved in shoulder flexion (and internal rotation).
The lateral head is involved in shoulder abduction.
The medial head is involved in shoulder extension (and external rotation).
Because of this delt training should generally be thought of as three distinct motor patterns, though if pressed (ha) there are some clear winners to decently hit all three heads in one exercise.
Shoulder, chest and triceps training is intrinsically linked together; although we’re grouping them into distinct categories for ease of discussion, in reality a pressing motion is going to involve all three muscle groups. Therefore overtraining of shoulders has to be considered when designing a program.
Prescription
Minimalist
An absolute minimalist approach means 1 movement ‘slot’.
In this case if we can only 1 motor pattern, there’s a clear winner:
- Behind the neck vertical press
Moderate
If we have more resources to expend on the muscle group, it is of course the preferred approach.
In this case the movement slots would look like this:
- Vertical press
- Lateral raise
- Rear delt raise
Maximalist
This is the approach if we are throwing everything at the kitchen sink. Use sparingly either if you are in a plateau or looking for a specialisation phase.
Here the movement slots might look like this:
- Vertical press
- Lateral raise
- Y raise
- Rear delt raise (shortened biased)
- Rear delt raise (lengthened biased)
Standout exercises
BTN press movement
There is a winner that stands heads and shoulders above the rest here:
Seated Smith Machine BTN Press
- Of course any variation with either a smith machine or barbell, standing or seated, is still great. If done on a barbell, the ‘rack press’ where you glide the barbell up against the rack is also great, and arguably better than a free standing barbell.
Lateral and rear delt raise combos
As alluded to, I consider shoulders to be a relatively unique muscle group that benefits from supersets, giant sets, and other combination sequences. Thus this will be structured a bit differently.
Below are 12 archetypal variations that broadly cover all aspects of medial and rear delt training. This is of course a slightly arbitrary number, but each one is a distinct combination in which you could sub in further variations as an advanced lifter.
The sequences here are either several exercises done as straight sets, super sets, or giant sets.
| Exercise | Sets | Description |
| Standing DB Lateral Raise | Straight sets of mechanical drop sets | Strict reps Standard reps Swing reps |
| Lateral Raise Machine | Straight sets of mechanical drop sets | Strict reps Standard reps Swing reps |
| Supported DB Rear Delt Raise | Straight sets of mechanical drop sets | Supinated reps Neutral reps Partial reps |
| Reverse Pec Deck | Straight sets of mechanical drop sets | Supinated reps Neutral reps Partial reps |
| Supported DB IYT raise | Straight sets of mechanical drop sets | I raises Y raises T raises |
| Cable Cuff Lying Lateral Raise Cable Rear Delt Fly | Straight sets | The lateral raises need a cuff The rear delt flies are done just on the empty cable |
| Cable Lateral Raise Cable Y-Raise Cable Bentover Rear Delt Raise | Straight sets | With lateral raises, bring hands to the front With Y-raises, bring hands to the back |
| Bentover DB Rear Delt Raise, Seated DB Lateral Raise, Seated DB Front Raise | Giant set | Continuous reps |
| DB Powell Raise 1-arm DB Upright Row 1-arm DB Standing Raise | Straight sets | 1-arm work |
| Band Pullapart + Dislocate, DB 6 Ways | Super set with band, then straight sets | |
| Band Spider Crawl + Face Pull DB Round the World | Super set with band, then straight sets | |
| Cable face pull Cable chest pull Cable lateral raise Cable front raise Cable press | Giant sets | Done from seated to lying |
Vertical press movement
The above combo sets have a significant focus on the lateral and medial heads of the delt. This is typically a weak point for most folks, guys and girls. Sometimes however you do need a front delt dominant phase.
There are three distinct stand out choices here.
Seated DB Shoulder Press
- This is the most straightforward option, easily accessible and joint friendly. The only real downside is at a certain point the weights get so cumbersome to lift up it’s not worth the risk and effort. This is probably around the 35-40kg mark, so until that point its effectiveness is near unmatched.
Handstand Push-up variations
- The HSPU shouldn’t be considered a singular exercise but a family of variations. You have the wall and free-standing variations, the headstand push-up to the ground or the true HSPU with paralette bars, and even progressions with HSPU to Planche.
- It’s important to note this is a fairly advanced exercise. It’s going to be better to work on the Seated DB Shoulder Press or other machine variations than sloppy half-reps against the wall. A typical standard for guys might be around 30-40kg Seated DB Shoulder Press for a clean set of 8 before progressing here. It may frankly be quite challenging for girls unless you have a high level gymnastics background or some such.
Standing 1-arm DB Press (with slight knee bend)
- This is pretty much the ideal if you’re looking for a unilateral movement with an overloaded eccentric. When might you want this?
- If you’re having trouble with a mind-muscle connection to your shoulders.
- If delts are a stubborn body part and you are trying to make it a key part of your physique.
- Developing high movement quality and (though it’s outside the scope of this guide) athleticism
Execution
Programming
The most obvious way of breaking down back movements is dividing it into horizontal and vertical planes of movement. This is a logical and effective way thinking about back training.
Each microcycle should contain 1 or more vertical pulling movements, and 1 or more horizontal pulling movements. Pullover variations can be considered a third category, or simple grouped under the horizontal umbrella.
Another consideration is the degree of your elbow. A pulling movement where your elbow is right on your side is more lat-dominant. A pulling movement where your elbow is at a roughly 45 degree angle is more mid back dominant.
Reps, tempo, sets, rest times
Triceps don’t need any unique points here, just focus on execution and effort and the rest will come.
Intensifiers and volume
Tricep presses should generally be kept as straight sets; cluster sets (for SM JM Press) or drop sets (for dips) can be used for a period of time.
Pushdowns should absolutely be blasted with all the intensifiers. Mechanical drop sets into partials and isometrics, cheat reps, cluster sets or drop sets should be liberally used.
For extensions we want to keep it simple with possibly just some iso holds at the end of sets, used occasionally. The bentover cable extension in particular can use more cheat; generally avoid this for lying variations.
Sequence
As always the standard rule with a muscle group with multiple exercises in a session is shortened biased first, mid-range biased second, lengthened biased third.
Here we also have to note a tricep press likely comes after a chest and/or shoulder press. Since the elbow joint is likely sufficiently warmed up, we can go straight into tricep pressing.
When it’s time for additional tricep work, we will still go pushdowns first extensions second.
In cases where you’re only doing an extension movement, still strongly consider hitting a pushdown with warm-up weights for a set or two.