after 2 years of working out and neglecting my shoulders, i still look skinny depsite having rather large pecs and bicpeps

and i recketnly have decided to work my shoulders having done litterally nothing, and have realised having large shoulders is very impressive

question: what is a good workout for building impressive shoulders? i am willing to put in the hard yards

Horizontal and veritcal lateral dumbell raises for me do nothing at all, they arn't sore the day after, and i havn't been using a massive weight i swing up, ive been using a moderate wieght which i can get up with a little difficulty

and i have been doing many presses, shoulder presses, Arnie pressses (twisting ones) and military presses in front of my head

and they dont seem to make me sore the day after either

ive also done barbell raises, and they dont do much either

i am completely out of exersices here, do i just need persistance? or do shoulders just not become sore the day after a workout like EVERY other muscle in my body?

cheers fellas

Lower the weight you're using, go high reps (12-20) with presses, take your time with the negative portion of the lift, and when you're finished wait maybe 30 seconds, and try to squeeze out a few more reps. I prefer dumbells because they don't require a spotter. Don't bother with the raises.

The shoulder pushup, a bodyweight exercise, can also be quite effective.

Hope that helps.

front and lateral raises should only be used as a warm up.


Do this: http://www.exrx.net/WeightExercises/DeltoidLateral/BBUprightRow.html

Reverse butterfly's are good too.

For chest I've never done anything other than barbell presses and for shoulders I've never done anything other than military presses (put them at the beginning of the work outs where I do them). Guys are quick to say, you shouldn't do it that way because you're muscles grow quicker if you 'attack them from every angle' and so on...but for me this has worked extremely well...I like to keep things simple and if it ain't broke I'm not gonna fix it...and an advantage of this approach is, that it allows you to focus perfcetly on just one exercise and every time you do that exercise all you're gonna concentrate on is to be able to do ONE rep more (and if you can do 2 or 3 reps more... add weight). Anyways using but one such 'bulking' exercise/heavy exercise per muscle group has really helped me focus to kill that exercise and focus on..getting better at that special exercise...and yes my muscles are proportional even though I didnt 'attack them from every possible angle'.......

Espi said:

Military presses actually develop all three muscle heads of the shoulder...I cannot do miltary presses exclusively, however, because gentically my front shoulder muscles get really big, while my sides and espcially my rear delt heads slag behind.

Click to expand...

Military presses hit mostly the anterior head of the deltoid.

To the Original Poster

I see you're learning and are trying to change your workout routine. Alot of people make the mistake of only focusing on their anterior (front) and medial (side ) delts. Make sure you hit the posterior (back) delts as well. I personally like having a day designated to shoulders, usually monday where I do 3 sets of compound movements (military presses) followed by 3 sets of isolation movements for my medial delts (L-Laterals) as well as 3 sets of isolation movements for my posterior delts (bent over barbell row to face, with arms out, or bent over rear db laterals). I then hit the medials and posteriors again on wednesday or friday (or maybe both sometimes) with the same 3 sets of isos. I don't isolate the anteriors, cuz I feel they get hit enough with military presses, as well as benching and rows, but you could always throw in a couple set of front raises if you wanted to.

Also form is absolutely crucial when hitting medials and posteriors so make sure you get it right and save yourself from somewhere down the line saying to yourself "damn why didn't I always do them like this?", when you start to feel nice pumps and better gains after lowering the weight and improving form.

Cable rows with a bar (and a shoulder-width grip) will hit the posterior delts really well, just keep your elbows parallel with the ground. That's probably the best for the post delts; dumbells isolate too much, especially for a small muscle like that. Pulldowns/pullups should also utilize the post delts a little, especially if you angle back a little (and again, keep your elbows up).