Before I show you various ways to achieve that glorious 'V', you must also be aware that the 'V' shape is also an illusion. If you have a wide thick back with a powerful chest, coupled with boulder-like deltoids, your 'V' will show up commandingly because those attributes will make your waist look small and thus accentuating the 'V' illusion.
To have a stupendous upper body, you MUST train your lower body. V-shapes will just be an ugly upper body shape if your legs are like bamboo poles. The excellent full body shape is called the X-frame. Just like those super heroes you see in comic books. If you don't train legs, you are missing out on training the largest muscle mass. When training legs, many other upper body muscles especially the back and abs will be involved. This gives you the most muscle mass trained in one go. And because you are training so many muscles at one go, you secrete tons of growth hormones when you sleep, further enhancing overall muscle development for that perfect X-frame.
Another muscle group many people fail to pay attention to is the back. The back must be trained for thickness as well as width. Many back exercises also develop the rear deltoids and the trapezius which are very important to getting that 'V'. When your back is thick, you will look powerful and with the width, it will make your waist look narrower, thus making the 'V' more pronounced. Do bar-bell row, deadlifts for a thick and powerful back. Chin-ups and push-ups (weighted and doing them in a slow controlled motion) will provide you the width or more commonly called 'wings'.
Another very obvious V-shape illusion creator are your triceps. But most people pay more attention to the biceps than triceps. Why triceps then? Because your triceps, as the name 'tri' suggests, has three 'heads' and each 'head' must be dealt with when you exercise them. They are also 1/3 bigger than your biceps. By training the triceps hard, your upper arms will grow bigger faster, giving more berth to your upper body and again creating a narrow waistline illusion.
The best illusion-shapers are your deltoids. Your delts have 3 'heads'. However, most of the time, I see people only working out the front delts. When you develop your delts well, they will be round and boulder-like, and they make your shoulder wide and strong. Now, close your eyes and have a mental image of yourself with a wide thick back, big strong triceps... now, do you see that 'V'? Add lateral raise, bent-over lat-raisers and upright rows to your routine.
How to have a beautiful 'V' if your abs are flabby? Forget the side crunches and side bends. It will only make your waistline thicker. Go on a lose fat program by combining weight lifting, cardio exercises and eating correctly. Your abs will show in no time.
Ahh... to finally stamp your authority in the gym and at the beach, a wide and powerful gladiator's chest will put you ahead of the pack! Train your chest heavy with dumbbells, barbells and cables machines. Use incline benches rather than flat or declining ones. You want to build the upper chest and not targeting the lower chest in case it gets you the droop or saggy chest which we call 'bitch tits'. Although the pec is one huge muscle, it can be targeted at different places to recruit different fibres to shape it.
The shoulder is actually made up to three deltoids or muscles: the front, middle and the back. Fortunately, each of the three heads are involved in many of the compound weight lifting or bodybuilding exercises:
* Benchpress works the front deltoid aside from the pectoral (chest) muscles * Closegrip benchpress also works the front deltoids, aside from the chest and triceps * Overhead shoulder press targeted primarily to build and strengthen the triceps and middle deltoids * Bentover rows primarily performed to build the back muscles (lassitimus dorsi) and works out the rear deltoids
If you have a program that has the following exercises, there may be no need to do additional exercises for the shoulder, as this can lead to overtraining of that bodypart, and even injury to the shoulder joint. In fact, the shoulder joint also takes a lot of stress and beating when exercises like the deadlift are performed (especially with heavy poundages).
When doing the compound exercises, all the muscles of the shoulders are actually getting stimulated, albeit in varying degrees. For example, when doing the benchpress, the rear and middle deltoids also act as stabilizers. So it's easy to understand how the deltoid can get overtrained.
However, there may be a need to build more shoulder mass and strength even if the compound exercises mentioned can give a good workout. That's when we can go into specialization.
During the phase of specialization, a target muscle or group of muscles are targeted for a period ranging from 2 months to 6 months (depending on rate of progress or goals). During specialization, the progression of the poundages of other exercises affecting the part to be targeted are lightened, or the volume reduced. In the case of shoulders, lightening up or reducing the volume of work on the benchpress and bentover rows may be necessary.
The reason for this is not to tax too much a persons recuperative abilities, and to avoid overtraining of the body part from the performance of other exercises.
Shoulder specialization exercises that can be considered are:
* Front dumbbell raises - works more of the front deltoid * Lateral raises works more of the middle deltoid * Bent lateral raises works more of the rear deltoid
You can also include barbell presses in your specialization program, especially if mass and power are part of your goals.
If your workout is mostly composed of bodyweight exercises, the shoulder may need additional stimulus from lifting weights. Please take note, however, that bodyweight exercises like pushups also work the shoulder.
Since the shoulder muscles and the joint can be easily overtrained and stressed during exercise (especially during heavy weight training), care must be taken not to pull any muscle in the area or the joints.
While the shoulder joint is actually very sturdy (just watch how much weight strongmen can lift overhead), you can actually strain it easily by making light flicking (like shadow boxing) or jerking movements if it is not warmed up properly. Nonetheless, the shoulder joints will also give in if is it is subjected to too much stress (from heavy weights, for example).
So we cannot underestimate the need to warm up properly when working out your shoulders. Violent, jerky or flicking movements when warming up the shoulders are discouraged. Better to go slow first when warming up your shoulders.
If you feel any pain in the shoulder joint, better to stop those heavy workouts before things get worse. For sure, nobody wants to undergo an operation to repair that part.
Joshua Watson has sinced written about articles on various topics from Blogging, Investments and Body Building. You can find more information at "> Adcentives West Catalog,. Joshua Watson's top article generates over 1220000 views. to your Favourites.