Shoulder Routine in Reverse

There is no point doing the same old thing day after day and expecting different results… it’s boring, and according to Albert Einstein, it’s the very definition of insanity! This is true in all areas of life, but especially when it comes to weight training. The same routine doesn’t produce results for very long and we need to continually shock our muscles in order to reduce the chance of plateauing gains.

A great shoulder routine I have been implementing lately is the reverse routine listed below. Most people have an imbalance between the 3 deltoid (shoulder) heads, with the front head usually dominating and the rear head lagging in development. However despite this, there seems to be no shortage of young men in my gym doing set after unnecessary set of front delt exercises followed by endless presses… The front delt already gets a hammering on chest day and shoulder presses alone are enough to develop big front delts.

Let me drive this point home… this guy at my gym had particularly under developed front delts. Every Tuesday he would pull up outside the gym riding his unicorn. After doing 20 sets of front dumbbell raises he would hand out diamonds to the other gym patrons, and then levitate out of the gym. Moral of the story – virtually nobody has small front delts! If your front delts aren’t big enough, then chances are the rest of your shoulders aren’t either.

The only reason you would employ front raises is if your physiotherapist has instructed you to because of joint stability issues. Otherwise, give the below routine  a try! Here we start with rear delts, eventually working our way around to the front. Surprisingly I’ve found that your strength on the pressing movements isn’t diminished using this routine (possibly because the shoulder joint is better warmed up from starting in reverse).

As with all exercises, the muscle groups work in unison. The different shoulder exercises are designed to shift emphasis onto a particular head, though the rest of the shoulder girdle will still be activating to perform each exercise. If you don’t have access to a hammer strength press machine you can perform dumbbell shoulder press instead.

Give this routine a go and let us know what you think!

Reverse Shoulder Routine:

This is an example of one of the many workouts you’ll find in our Planet Max 8 Week Challenge. If you want to fast track your results with a fully customised training and nutrition plan, simply click below to get started