The Shoulder Exercises an Elite Trainer Programs for a Champion Bodybuilder

[Related: How Shanique Grant Trains to Move to the Wellness Division]

Prioritizing Rear Delts

Rear delt development is pivotal to success as a Bikini athlete since they create an hourglass illusion. Rmabod believes rear delts require delicate training.

Chapados warmed her delts, and scapular muscles with face pulls. Due to loading limitations, face pulls are insufficient as a primary rear delt exercise. 

[Related: 5 Underrated and Overrated Hypertrophy Exercises]

FST-7 Flex Shoulder Press Sets 

FST-7 Flex sets involve flexing the target muscles after each set. Chapados placed her hands on her hips and squeezed her delts to prolong time under tension (TUT). 

In a 2020 study, posing enhanced muscle hypertrophy, strength, and endurance. (1) 

If you don’t [practice] posing, your body freaks out; it starts shaking when stage. [Posing] creates a more defined and chiseled look.

—Hany Rambod

Don’t sit too low during machine presses to ensure the elbows bend past 90 degrees, providing a complete delt stretch.

 “You must work past the burn; it’s all mental,” Rambod coached. While failure training isn’t vital to muscle growth, progressive overload is, and pushing through the burn determines progress. 

While Rambod insists women have a higher pain tolerance, studies show they have a lower pain tolerance in general. (2)(3)(4) This could be something to consider when programming a training regime.

Lateral Raise Range of Motion

Lying cable curls disallow momentum. Unlike dumbbells, they provide a stretch with greater tension at the start. Rambod discourages lifting the arms higher than the top of the head during lateral raises to prevent trapezius overactivation.

Stretch your arms as far as you can, not up, but outward so it’s an arc.

—Hany Rambod

Chapadoes ended the set with lengthened partials for a potential growth boost, as evidenced by research. (5)

Time Under Tension

Rambod had Chapados perform front raises while rotating a weight plate from side to side like a steering wheel, adding TUT. This increases metabolic stress and fiber activation, which are growth variables. Chapados performed traditional sets with heavier weights and slow negatives, a superior hypertrophy combination. (6)(7)(8)

To the Olympia

Chapados skipped the 2025 Arnold Classic, relinquishing her Bikini International reign to defend her Olympia crown later this year.

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References 

1. Schoenfeld BJ, Grgic J, Contreras B, Delcastillo K, Alto A, Haun C, De Souza EO, Vigotsky AD. To Flex or Rest: Does Adding No-Load Isometric Actions to the Inter-Set Rest Period in Resistance Training Enhance Muscular Adaptations? A Randomized-Controlled Trial. Front Physiol. 2020 Jan 15;10:1571. doi: 10.3389/fphys.2019.01571. PMID: 32009980; PMCID: PMC6974452.
2. Soetanto AL, Chung JW, Wong TK. Are there gender differences in pain perception? J Neurosci Nurs. 2006 Jun;38(3):172-6. doi: 10.1097/01376517-200606000-00006. PMID: 16817669.
3. Jackson T, Iezzi T, Chen H, Ebnet S, Eglitis K. Gender, interpersonal transactions, and the perception of pain: an experimental analysis. J Pain. 2005 Apr;6(4):228-36. doi: 10.1016/j.jpain.2004.12.004. PMID: 15820910.
4. Racine M, Tousignant-Laflamme Y, Kloda LA, Dion D, Dupuis G, Choinière M. A systematic literature review of 10 years of research on sex/gender and experimental pain perception – part 1: are there really differences between women and men? Pain. 2012 Mar;153(3):602-618. doi: 10.1016/j.pain.2011.11.025. Epub 2011 Dec 20. PMID: 22192712.
5. Pedrosa GF, Lima FV, Schoenfeld BJ, Lacerda LT, Simões MG, Pereira MR, Diniz RCR, Chagas MH. Partial range of motion training elicits favorable improvements in muscular adaptations when carried out at long muscle lengths. Eur J Sport Sci. 2022 Aug;22(8):1250-1260. doi: 10.1080/17461391.2021.1927199. Epub 2021 May 23. PMID: 33977835.
6. de Freitas MC, Gerosa-Neto J, Zanchi NE, Lira FS, Rossi FE. Role of metabolic stress for enhancing muscle adaptations: Practical applications. World J Methodol. 2017 Jun 26;7(2):46-54. doi: 10.5662/wjm.v7.i2.46. PMID: 28706859; PMCID: PMC5489423.
7. Schoenfeld BJ, Grgic J, Van Every DW, Plotkin DL. Loading Recommendations for Muscle Strength, Hypertrophy, and Local Endurance: A Re-Examination of the Repetition Continuum. Sports (Basel). 2021 Feb 22;9(2):32. doi: 10.3390/sports9020032. PMID: 33671664; PMCID: PMC7927075.
8. Hody S, Croisier JL, Bury T, Rogister B, Leprince P. Eccentric Muscle Contractions: Risks and Benefits. Front Physiol. 2019 May 3;10:536. doi: 10.3389/fphys.2019.00536. PMID: 31130877; PMCID: PMC6510035.

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