UKC

What are the best exercises to build shoulder muscles. At the moment I am as weak as an erm.... weak thing. Trying to climb anything that remotely overhangs it just won't happen.

My brother has a bench, bar and dungbells which I can use so what are the best exercises to build up upper body strength but shoulders in particular?

Cheers, Andy

In reply to AndyH1710: Don't use dungbells, they're shit.

pull ups but with your hands as wide apart as possible. press ups. try doing "frenchy" pull ups. hands wide apart go up and hold for 5 seconds, hold halfway back down for another 5 seconds, and hold again with arms only just bent for 5 senconds. repeat. also do some pull ups with palms of your hands facing you

In reply to tommiddleton:

Lol, dumbells, sorry.

Andy

In reply to AndyH1710:

Use the bar, high reps on lifting pints good for shoulders,back,knees and wrists

In reply to AndyH1710:

and here i thought it was a kind of plastic ones with "special" filling :0)

In reply to fatty: But how about those of us so ridiculously weak we can only do about 1 or 2 pull ups. Surely this low number of reps isn't really going to help. Are there no other techniques that can be done to build up the relevant shoulder muscles more effectively to a point where you can do a reasonable number of pull ups and so maybe gain some benefit.

In reply to AndyH1710:

Have you read the article on the site about shoulder health? Shows a couple of stretches to prevent injury, not sure if it's what you want but worth a look:
http://www.ukclimbing.com/articles/page.php?id=119

In reply to cider nut: If you're willing to shell out for a set of chest expanders they do wonders for your Latissimus Dorsae (Spelling?) and can be used for most muscle groups in the upper body and arms.

In reply to Liam M: If you do an excercise where you can only do one or two reps, you will build muscle fast ! Just keep working on it and you will find you can do more reps as you get stronger. Make sure you give yourself enough rest between training sessions though - a day at least, more if you are particularly tired.
Also read the article on shoulder strength on this site, mentioned earlier.

In reply to Andy Manthorpe: Unlikely to build much muscle as it will induce little hypertrophy, more likely to increase maximum muscle fibre recruitment at that number of reps.

In reply to AndyH1710: Go to a gym and use a pull up/dip machine with a knee pad which allows you to take some of the weight off. Or - use a chair to rest your legs on when doing pull ups. Dumb bell sitting shoulder presses, side and front raises and reverse flies - keep weights light for these.

In reply to PeteA: It is not your "shoulders" but all the "pull" muscles like lats.

Plenty of training info on line.

In reply to AndyH1710:

i do a mix of close and wide arm press ups, easy to do!!

wide arm, put hands far out to the sides,
close arm, make a triangle with your thumbs and forefingers.

in the morning you can do maximum reps, and at night i do 5 sets of ten reps!

In reply to AndyH1710:

Wanna get really strong?

Read this first.

http://www.ukclimbing.com/articles/page.php?id=119

M

In reply to AndyH1710:

I tend to use a finger training board by metolius for my training and dead hang for about 10 secs on each hold before resting 20 secs. In the rest cycle I'll do situps and step machine (cheapo one from argos or wherever the missus got it). the dead hangs are good for contact strength and will also help strength generally, especially if you straighten your legs out into an L as the added leverage helps u're abs. I also do push ups to work opposing muscles to the pull ups.

Even if you can't do many situps/pulups/pressups or hang for very long even on big holds just keep at it and do what you can. eventually you'll start recruiting more muscle fibres and then can start doing more, thus increasing the muscle mass. Just remember that it won't happen over night and that it can also go again quick (he says whilst thinking "I really should have done some training before work this am" lol). But be careful and don't over do it or you'll end up a wreck!

In reply to AndyH1710:
I'd recommend you look at building more than your shoulders. If you look in the mirror whilst you do a chin up you will see a hell of a lot more than your shoulders working.

Interesting article at http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/kristin5.htm also a wealth of info on ways to build strength. Also www.menshealth.co.uk/videos for some ideas on weight training, also make sure you make note of their good technique!
http://www.indoorclimbing.com/exercise.html is another good article, but the best way of building your strength (and is repeated in just about every thread on this forum) it to climb, when you have finished finish off with some chinups, lock offs, pressups etc to failure also get some situps in there to help build your core stability. If your muscles can't do it anymore then your body will realise and you will build more muscle quicker

In reply to Mick Ryan:

Nope, i'd just like to get strong without serious shoulder pain first. Once i've achieved that, we'll work on really strong


Now that's a good article. I shall be putting that into practise asap.

In reply to Mick Ryan:

Copycat :-p

In reply to cider nut:

Sorry cider nut. Well at least its reinforced.

M

In reply to Mick Ryan:

Only joking.

I only read it myself day before yesterday, never really looked at the articles section before.

In reply to nz Cragrat: True - but doing too many pull ups without building up the whole range of stabilizing muscles is asking for trouble. As per the article on rotator cuffs. Also try doing mantleshelves and laybacks without using triceps, rear delts etc. So many ppl neglect doing reverse flies with sub 5kg weights - just squeezing the shoulder blades together in full control - amazing how a tiny weight can feel so limiting. I'm no expert but climb with 2 hospital physio's and they have passed on a lot of useful info.

In reply to AndyH1710:

drink guinness....?


Professor D Carden of Sheffield Uni