If you want a full shoulder workout from athlean x that is designed to help you grow bigger shoulders, then this is a video you will want to watch. Here, Jeff Cavaliere is going to take you through a real time complete workout for shoulders that will train your front delts, middle delts and rear delts in under 40 minutes.
It starts like any workout should, with an efficient warmup. Note, I did not say a long warmup. When done properly, warming up for a shoulder workout should take you just 5 to 10 minutes max. Here I use a shoulder warmup matrix that can be done with a single weight plate. Perform about 30 seconds of halos to internally and externally rotate the shoulders. Follow this up with Plate 8’s for abduction and adduction of the shoulder and finish it with some locked in overhead presses using the scoop press.
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At this point you’re ready to begin your shoulder workout.
The first shoulder exercise is usually some pressing variation. For me, I prefer the single arm OHP with a dumbbell. I always like to get on my feet whenever possible. The freedom of movement of the dumbbells is more forgiving on my shoulders but feel free to perform a barbell overhead press if you’d like.
The second benefit is that I am able to keep the joints more stacked with the wrist, over the elbow over the shoulder. This brings more stability, and with an already compromised shoulder joint having a torn labrum and rotator cuff, this feels much better and alleviates any shoulder pain that I may get on a typical barbell press. Being on the feet also allows me to push press the final few reps to provide some forced tension for greater muscle building stimulus.
The next exercise up is a cable side lateral. The cable lateral not only gives me a good stretch on the middle and rear delts at the beginning of the exercise but I’m able to match the resistance curve a little more easily throughout the rep than I can with a dumbbell version of the movement. I am trying to move more weight here and load up this exercise to be performed as a heavy shoulder exercise. 3 sets of 610 reps on each arm is the goal with some partial range of motion reps performed after reaching failure.
It’s important to point out that partial range of motion reps are great for driving more tension into an already fatigued muscle to further increase the intensity of the set. That said, they should be performed after all full range reps are exhausted.
I follow up the cheat cable laterals with a strict lateral raise. It’s at this point that I want to really focus my tension into the middle delts specifically. To further drive this home this is the time in the workout when I often train shirtless in the mirror. This helps to ensure that the muscles I want to be performing the movement are initiating and driving the exercise. I can decrease involvement of muscles I don’t want to dominate and increase the recruitment of those I do want to perform it by using the visual feedback the mirror provides.
I then shift the focus to the middle and now rear delts with the final two exercises. The high pull is the antiupright row and for good reason. It’s simply better. It does everything I need it to do and more so than the upright rows. The rear delt gets better engagment and the shoulder joint stays in a safer, healthier position. 23 sets of this exercise is perfect.
I then add hip huggers to my shoulder workout as another dumbbell shoulder exercise. Here the key is to drive the arms backwards into extension to really hit the rear delts. Pause at the top of the contraction until you can almost feel a cramp in your delts.
Finally, I wrap up my shoulder workout with a corrective exercise for the rotator cuff. I use banded external rotations to do this. Focus on high quality reps rather than a specific rep count.
In summary, the full shoulder workout looks like this:
Shoulder Matrix Warmup with Plate
Single Arm Overhead Press 3 x 610 reps
Cable Lateral Raises 3 x 610 reps (follow with partial reps)
Strict DB Lateral Raises 2 x 1012 reps (follow with partial reps)
DB High Pulls 23 x 610 reps
DB Hip Huggers 2 x 1012 reps
Banded External Rotation for Rotator Cuff 23 x 15 reps
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Jeff Cavaliere MSPT, CSCS served as both the head physical therapist and assistant strength coach for the New York Mets. Jeff earned his Masters of Physical Therapy and Bachelor’s of Physioneurobiology from the College of Health Sciences University of Connecticut Storrs. He is a certified Strength and Conditioning Specialist by the National Strength and Conditioning Association (NSCA).