Tips to Build Giant Shoulders
Tips to Build Giant Shoulders
Exercises from 6 Delt Monsters
What’s the most important body part in terms of visual impact on the overall physique? It would be hard to argue against the shoulders. The very first thing that sets any man apart from the average non-training citizen is a set of wide, round delts. This can be ascertained from a distance, and is impossible to hide whether you’re shirtless or in a parka. Who better to seek advice from than six men who have all built some of the most impressive shoulders in recent history? Let’s hear what these deltoid masters have to say about building boulder shoulders.
Roelly Winklaar
Train With Maximum Effort and Intensity
When Roelly first broke on to the pro scene a decade ago, his shoulders and triceps were compared to those of Kevin Levrone, who arguably had the best combination of those two muscle groups ever.
Years before he ever picked up a weight, Winklaar’s shoulders got a head start in development as a youth in Holland via the demanding sport of gymnastics. Take a gander at top amateur gymnasts, and you’ll see that their deltoids are often round and full from work on the rings, parallel bars, floor and pommel horse.
Though he did refrain from working his arms at times because they were growing too fast and overpowering his physique, Roelly never once laid off his delts. “Shoulders are one of those areas that you can almost never have too much development,” he explains. “The thicker, rounder, and wider you can make them, the better your overall shape is, so I never stop hitting my deltoids with maximum effort and intensity.”
All the old-school bodybuilders from the 1940s on until around the late ‘70s used to do all their dumbbell and barbell presses standing up. For several years, Roelly did all his presses seated, without back support.
Most bodybuilders only lower their arms to parallel, the point where their upper arms are level with the floor. Roelly goes down a couple of inches more, until the dumbbell actually touches his shoulder. “Think about it,” he says. “The guys with the best legs like Branch, Kai and the great Tom Platz didn’t just squat to parallel. They buried the weight! When you bench press, don’t you touch the bar to your chest for a good stretch? So why would you miss out on that full range of motion on presses?”
One last tip from Roelly: “I like to hold the dumbbells off center, with my pinkies up against the inside edge of the plates, and angle my hands slightly downward so my thumbs are lower. I feel more activation in the side head of the delts when I use this grip.”
Roelly does lateral raises in two styles: standing and with heavier weights, and standing up against an incline bench set to a high angle with lighter dumbbells. Bracing his torso up against the bench keeps it immobile, ensuring stricter form and better isolation of the medial deltoids. “If you decide to try this, do the freestanding laterals for maybe three sets, and then the braced laterals for another three,” he notes.
Roelly’s Shoulder Workout – 2008-2013 (trained by Grandma)
Seated Dumbbell Press (no back support) 4 x 8-10
Dumbbell Front Raises 3 x 8-10
Bent Dumbbell Rear Laterals 3 x 10-12
High Rope Pulls for Rear Delts 3 x 10-12
Lateral raise 3 x 10-12
Shoulder Bombs* 3 x 10-12
*Beginning with your arms straight out to your sides and your palms facing up to the sky, bring the dumbbells up in a half-moon shape and rotate your hands down. At the top position, the dumbbells are almost touching, your pinkies are up in the air, and your thumbs are aimed at the ground.
Roelly’s Current Shoulder Workout (training on his own)
Hammer Strength Press Warm-up, 2 x 20, 3 x 10-12
Seated Dumbbell Press Warm-ups, 1 x20, 1 x 15, 4 x 12
Lateral Raises 3 x 12
Shoulder Bombs/Overhead Lateral Raises 3 x 12
Dumbbell Shrugs 4 x 10
Bent Lateral Raises 3 x 12
Steve Kuclo
Early Shoulder Training
“My shoulder training was a lot more intense earlier in my career. I trained them hard and they grew fast. I used to train with national-level super heavyweight Justin Harris, and the weights I was using at 18-19 years old were considerable. I could do clean and presses with 225-275, seated military presses with 315 and laterals with 70-80-pound dumbbells. One thing I got stronger on over the years was the military press. I can handle 405 on that now. But the biggest change has just backing off and not working them quite as heavy or as hard, because they could easily overpower my torso if I let them.”
Not Always Good to Have Shoulders That Grow Easily
“The real struggle for me has been keeping them out of my chest and back exercises, because they have a strong tendency to take over. For that reason, even when I’m not training them directly, they are always getting worked. I’ve backed off on them, but I’ve never stopped training them completely for more than a week at a time. That being said, many times my ‘training’ for them on many occasions has just been a few sets of lateral raises done after my chest or back workout to maintain them.”
Favorite Techniques on Shoulder Day
“On all my lateral movements, I like to lead with the elbows and make sure they always stay higher than my hands. This is so the shoulders do the work, not the traps. With any lateral raise, it’s all about finding the perfect groove where the delts are doing the work and getting that isolation you’re after. I see some guys doing laterals with really heavy weights, and they’re doing little jumps to get every rep going. I can’t even guess what other body parts are getting in on those; probably the calves? Another technique I like to use on laterals to eliminate momentum is to pause at the bottom of every rep.”
Where Most Guys Go Wrong
“Lifting too heavy is almost always the problem, no matter what body part you’re talking about. It’s a bigger problem when you’re doing isolation movements like lateral raises because all these other accessory muscles step in and take the stress away from the deltoids. On overhead presses, going too heavy means you tend to lean back and start hitting more chest. One other thing that happens when the weights are too heavy to handle properly is that you cut the range of motion short. We talk all the time about half squats, but I see plenty of half presses too.”
Steve Kuclo’s Shoulder Routine
Hammer Strength Shoulder Press 4 x 8-12
Superset with
Lateral Raise Machine 4 x 8-12
Bent Dumbbell Rear Laterals 3-4 x 10
Superset with
Barbell Upright Rows 3-4 x 10
High Cable Rope Pulls for Rear Delts 4 x 8-12
Superset with
Standing Dumbbell Laterals 4 x 8-12
Dumbbell or Machine Shrugs 4 x 8-12
Jay Cutler
Laterals First
Standard procedure for most bodybuilders is to start shoulder workouts with presses, but Jay Cutler decided long ago that it made more sense to employ the pre-exhaust principle, which is to train a muscle using an isolation movement first before proceeding to a compound exercise that recruits other muscle groups to assist. This serves a dual purpose for Jay. Not only does it warm up the vulnerable shoulder girdle, but it also limits the amount of weight on the overhead pressing movement that will follow. When you are as strong as Cutler, often the weights you are capable of handling can be dangerous. Jay has pressed 150-pound dumbbells in the past and is certainly capable of doing so if he chose to; but the risk of injury to the rotator cuff or various other connective tissues should he “slip out of the groove” with that much resistance hoisted overhead simply isn’t worth it. Fatiguing the medial deltoids first with laterals also ensures that they will work harder during presses, since the more powerful anterior (front) delts and triceps tend to take over normally.
Dumbbells for Pressing
You will occasionally find Jay on a machine for presses, but most often he likes to do seated dumbbell presses. And he’s a strong mofo on those, too. He’s been captured on video many times pushing up 140s and even 150s in good form, doing the reps all on his own, for sets of 8-10. “It’s tough getting away from dumbbell presses because they just feel right, and they’ve always been super effective for me,” Jay confides. Since Jay believes in a very complete range of motion, he lowers the ‘bells until his upper arms actually break the parallel line before pressing up to full extension. He also doesn’t lock out the elbows, which keeps greater tension on the delts throughout the set.
Cable Side Laterals
Jay popularized a variation of this movement done with his arm behind his back. This is another trick to making the exercise stricter and forcing his medial deltoids to take on more of the work. His goal here is to burn the muscle out. “I’ve already done my two power movements for the shoulders at that point, so this is for detail,” he adds. Jay gets a full stretch for the side delt at the bottom of the rep, and then raises up in an explosive burst, pausing at the contraction.
Rear Delt Machine
Rarely do you ever hear a bodybuilder express a desire to build huge rear delts, but Jay professes that extreme development in the posterior heads is a little-known secret to stupefying width. “Whenever you’re seen from the side in the quarter-turns or the side chest or triceps poses, that extra development in the rear delts adds a whole other level of impressiveness to the shoulders that most bodybuilders are too blind to realize,” he says. Mr. O often does two dedicated exercises for this underrated muscle group, selecting from the rear delt machine, dumbbell rear laterals facedown on an incline bench, or the two-arm cable version that looks like the reverse motion of a cable crossover.
Jay’s Shoulder Workout, Circa 1992 – Age 18
Seated Behind-Neck Barbell Press 4 x 10
Dumbbell Lateral Raises 4 x 10
Barbell Front Raises 4 x 10
Shrugs Behind Back 4 x 10
Jay’s Shoulder Workout as Mr. Olympia
Seated Dumbbell or Machine Press 4 x 6-10
Dumbbell Lateral Raises 4 x 10
Front Barbell or Dumbbell Raises 4 x 10
Bent Dumbbell Rear Laterals 4 x 10
High Pulley Rows or Cable Rear Laterals 4 x 10
Seated Machine Laterals (FST-7 “Sevens”) 7 x 10
Shrugs (dumbbell, barbell or machine) 5 x 12
Evan Centopani
Common Mistakes in the Gym
“I see people using too much momentum, especially on lateral raises. They’re trying to make a power movement out of an exercise that was never meant for that. You should try to challenge yourself, but when I see someone flinging up 80s or even 100s for laterals, I think to myself, what an idiot. Control the weight and try to get a contraction at the top, or you’re just wasting your time. I remember seeing photos of Francis Benfatto doing laterals years ago, and his form was perfect. He started with the dumbbells in front of him and touching for a better range of motion. Most guys start with the dumbbells at their sides. That cuts the range of motion and lets them go heavier, but the medial heads of the delts don’t get as much stimulation that way.”
How Evan’s Shoulder Training Has Changed
“One exercise I used to do all the time but stopped doing is presses behind the neck. I was using 315 on them and to this day I still believe it works the overall shoulder better than regular military presses to the front. But the bigger I got, the more dangerous they started to feel. I could feel a lot of pressure on the rotator cuffs and I knew it was only a matter of time before I got hurt.”
Most Productive Exercises
“Easy— the barbell military press, upright barbell rows, dumbbell lateral raises and dumbbell rear laterals. Those four exercises are really all you need if you work hard and use decent form.”
For Rounder Shoulders, Don’t Neglect Rear Delts
“Like most guys, my rear delts were pretty weak compared to my front and side heads when I was younger. But when I was in my early 20s, my training partner pointed it out to me and I started doing rear laterals at every workout. You see a lot of guys who have great shoulders from the front, but when they turn to the side they don’t look impressive anymore. Having equal development in all three heads gives your shoulders a rounder, more complete look.”
To Avoid Injuries, Listen to Your Body
“I can’t say I have any secret warm-up tips, though I do gradually work up to heavier weights with as many warm-up sets as I feel I need on any particular day. I think the real key is that I’ve tried to listen to my body and avoid movements that don’t feel right. Like I said before, I loved behind-neck presses and they delivered excellent results for me. But after a while I could see that they were going to lead to an injury sooner or later. I know guys who say that upright rows kill their rotators—yet they keep doing them! You have to be smarter than that or else you’ll be out on the injured list.”
Evan’s Shoulder Workout – May 29, 2010
Seated Barbell Military Press 135 x 10, 225 x 10 (warm-ups)
315 x 12, 315 x 10, 315 x 8, drop to 225 x 9, drop to 135 x 10
Barbell Upright Rows 95 x 10, 145 x 10 (warm-ups)
195 x 14, 195 x 14, 195 x 11, drop to 145 x 10, drop to 95 x 110
Dumbbell Lateral Raises 50 x 14, 50 x 13, drop to 40 x 12, drop to 30 x 8
Dumbbell Rear Lateral Raises 70 x 12, 70 x 10
Markus Rühl
Shoulders Not Always Huge
“Believe it or not, in the first couple years that I was training, my shoulders were my worst body part. I’m not joking. I was very disappointed because my chest and my biceps were growing, but my shoulders were terrible. They are such an important muscle group for a bodybuilder that I feared I would never be a great champion if I couldn’t get them to improve.”
How Did Your Shoulder Training Evolve?
“When I started working out in 1991, I was listening to the trainers at my gym and doing what they told me was best. They showed me proper form, but they also told me I had to use light weights that were easy to handle with perfect form, so I would not injure myself. They also told me that I must never do more than eight to 10 sets for any body part or else I would overtrain. I suppose that’s fine for some people, but that kind of training will never build a freaky body, and I really wanted to be huge and freaky.
“After two years, I was not happy with my results, so I decided to make my own training style and see if that worked any better. I started to train with much heavier weights, not worry so much about perfect form, and challenge myself by giving 110 percent in every workout, since taking it easy was getting me nowhere. We had a Multipresse machine and I started pressing the whole stack on the shoulder press station. I used dumbbells for side and rear laterals. I began to do six to eight sets of every exercise, with the reps being as low as three and as high as 15 in the same workout. Higher volume, heavier weights, and a mix of higher and lower reps worked like magic. All at once, I started growing so fast I couldn’t believe it was happening, and I kicked myself for not trying my own style before that.”
Free Weights, or a Mix With Machines and Cables?
“It’s a mix. I prefer using machines for shoulder presses, because I can concentrate purely on pushing up the weight and not have to worry about balancing and keeping the right form as you must with dumbbells. And when you are using a lot of weight with dumbbells, it can be just as exhausting to keep them balanced. I feel this takes away from energy you could be using to work the muscle better. It’s worked perfectly for me, so I would never say you have to press with free weights to grow. For my rear and side delts, I like dumbbells best. I never use cables for my shoulder training.”
Extra Warm-up Before Using Heavy Weights
“Warming up is very important. I have been injured a couple of times in my pro career and you lose money. When you can’t train right, you can’t do appearances and guest posing, you can’t compete and you can’t earn a living. I do at least two or three warm-up sets before I use a heavy weight.”
Markus Rühl’s Shoulder Workout
Seated Smith Machine Press 6-8 x 8-10
One-arm Dumbbell Lateral Raises 6 x 8-10
EZ-bar Upright Rows 6 x 8-10
Dumbbell Bent Laterals on Bench 6-8 x 8-10
Dumbbell Shrugs 5-8 x 6-10
Dennis Wolf
Don’t Train Shoulders With Chest
Genetic blessings aside, Wolf has been quite intelligent in the way he has gone about training those mighty delts of his. For one thing, he has always worked them on their own day, rather than pairing them up with chest, as many other bodybuilders do.
“I tried that just once in my life,” he informs us. “After only two sets of presses, I knew it was a mistake. The chest workout had ruined the possibility of working the shoulders properly. Even me, who has no trouble making my shoulders grow, recognized how stupid a practice this is.”
Make a mental note of that one, guys. Dennis will often work a smaller muscle group like triceps after shoulders, but shoulders always come first in the session.
Another wise move Wolf made long ago was to always make sure that shoulder and chest days were separated by a substantial margin in the training week. “I train chest every Monday, and don’t get to shoulders until Friday, so there is a lot of time for them to recover, and no overlap.” He thinks it’s crazy to train these body parts on consecutive days. “Because the front delts and the triceps are both working so much when you train chest and also the shoulders with presses, you have to be very careful to keep these two muscle groups away from each other in your training schedule.”
Free Weights Safer for Pressing
“I think free weights are more effective to build mass, and more recently I have also found that they are actually safer to press with. They are more effective because they force you to work harder to balance and coordinate the movement. In a way, that limits the amount of weight you can lift but that’s actually a good thing. For about a year or two, I was doing almost all my shoulder pressing with a Smith machine. I didn’t have to balance it, so I could just load up a lot of weight and push! I could get reps with four 45s on each side. But here’s the problem. With a barbell, your body will adjust to its natural position that’s best and safest for your structure. With a machine, you are always in the same position and maybe it’s not right for you. Another problem with machines, at least for me, is I don’t warm up as much because I don’t feel like I need to, so I get to the very heavy weights fast. Long story short, I started to get shoulder pain for the first time in my life. I went back to using only free weights for my pressing, and soon the pain went away. So for anyone who thinks machines are always safer than free weights, I found out that’s not true at all.”
Lighten Up and Do Your Laterals Right
“A lot of guys go much too heavy on their lateral raises. They swing and heave the weights up, and their shoulders are hardly getting anything out of it. The best thing they could do is put those dumbbells back, grab a pair that’s only half as heavy, and start trying to get really good contractions for the side delts. You are much better off using 25s and working the side delts than you are swinging up 50s and working your arms, traps and lower back.”
Dennis Wolf’s Shoulder Workout
Seated Military Press 4 x 10-12
Seated Dumbbell Laterals 4 x 10-12
Seated Bent Laterals 4x 10-12
Barbell Shrugs 4 x 10-12
Ron Harris got his start in the bodybuilding industry during the eight years he worked in Los Angeles as Associate Producer for ESPN’s “American Muscle Magazine” show in the 1990s. Since 1992 he has published nearly 5,000 articles in bodybuilding and fitness magazines, making him the most prolific bodybuilding writer ever. Ron has been training since the age of 14 and competing as a bodybuilder since 1989, and maintains the popular website www.ronharrismuscle.com, most notable for its blog “The Daily Pump.” He lives with his wife and two children in the Boston area.
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