Episode 267: The Top 25 Chest Exercises Ranked S to F Tier

0:00:11.7 Mike Vacanti: Hello, Jordan.

0:00:12.3 Jordan Syatt: What’s up, Michael?

0:00:13.2 Mike Vacanti: You feel like you just walked into a classroom where you’re in trouble with the teacher?

0:00:17.6 Jordan Syatt: Yep.

0:00:18.0 Mike Vacanti: You’re potentially about to get sent to detention.

0:00:20.2 Jordan Syatt: Reprimanded.

0:00:20.9 Mike Vacanti: You don’t know what’s gonna happen.

0:00:22.5 Jordan Syatt: No, detention was fine. I didn’t mind detention.

0:00:24.7 Mike Vacanti: You’re gonna put on your biggest smile and charm your way out.

0:00:27.9 Jordan Syatt: Yep.

0:00:28.3 Mike Vacanti: Maybe slip a joke in there. I’m getting a little background noise.

0:00:34.6 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, someone’s vacuuming literally right outside the door in this exact moment.

0:00:38.8 Mike Vacanti: No problem. That sounds like a temporary thing. Unless the outside of that door is extremely dirty, in which case might be a while.

0:00:48.8 Jordan Syatt: No, it’ll be hopefully no more than two minutes.

0:00:51.4 Mike Vacanti: I’m glad after seven years we know the process of the setup for the podcast, though. We’re locked in now.

0:00:57.4 Jordan Syatt: We’re oiled up. We’re ready to go.

0:01:00.3 Mike Vacanti: We’re oiled up. Let’s go. Are we oiled up on short form social media posting on the @personaltrainerpodcast pages that’s your responsibility?

0:01:09.1 Jordan Syatt: No, no, I haven’t been oiled up on that. I’ve been posting more than I was for a while.

0:01:13.4 Mike Vacanti: Oil prices are too high and we just can’t afford it, so there’s no oil to fuel the Syatt engine?

0:01:20.0 Jordan Syatt: No, we can afford it. We can afford it. You know what it is? We got a leaky gas tank.

0:01:26.3 Mike Vacanti: So we’re buying oil and it’s just dripping out and we’re not using it to make content for our dear listeners and viewers to help them grow their businesses and become better coaches. We’re just leaking oil all over the highway.

0:01:40.1 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, all over the garage, all over the highway. It’s everywhere.

0:01:43.4 Mike Vacanti: Where’s the leak?

0:01:44.4 Jordan Syatt: Kids.

0:01:45.3 Mike Vacanti: I see.

0:01:46.2 Jordan Syatt: The oil’s the energy, right? So it’s one kid leak, another kid leak, another kid on the way, God willing, leak. My mom’s staying with us, leak.

0:01:49.5 Mike Vacanti: Okay.

0:01:59.5 Jordan Syatt: Passover, leak.

0:02:00.5 Mike Vacanti: That’s understandable. Oh, it is. Happy Passover, day one, right?

0:02:03.9 Jordan Syatt: Yes, sir. Yeah, but I just gotta plug the leaks and just be more consistent with it.

0:02:09.8 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, plug the leaks is a good idea, but I don’t want you plugging kid one, two, three. I don’t want you…

0:02:15.7 Jordan Syatt: Oh, no, I’m not gonna plug the kids. I just gotta get a bigger engine so when I fill it up, it’s still leaking, but there’s more oil in there.

0:02:29.6 Mike Vacanti: Okay, so we’ll buy some more oil and we’ll get a bigger… Where’s the bigger engine coming from? What about this? What are responsibilities like 13, 14, 15, and 16 that are ahead of the PT pod, Instagram, YouTube shorts posting? We don’t need to put this above your children. That’s irrational, obviously. But what could get bumped a little bit?

0:02:53.7 Jordan Syatt: It’s good motivational interviewing. Probably a game of chess.

0:02:58.8 Mike Vacanti: Not even a whole game, really. Maybe just part of a game of chess, right?

0:03:03.5 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, just one game. Just one game.

0:03:06.6 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, half a game even. We got the clips. David serves us up the clips on a silver platter. I see you write that copy. Trust your gut. I see that copy and…

0:03:07.1 Jordan Syatt: Yeah.

0:03:20.0 Mike Vacanti: I think the daily posts are coming. Take the Sabbath off, of course, but six days a week, Instagram @personaltrainerpodcast, YouTube. You know what really motivates Jordan? If you’re listening right now, if you could hop on Instagram, if you have that application on your cellular phone, and you could just give us a follow @personaltrainerpodcast. Give us a follow and just say, “Hey, Jordan, where’s the daily posts? We want them. They’ve been so good lately. We’ve got two in the last 17 days. We really enjoyed them both, but we just want a little more, like six times a week.”

0:03:50.1 Jordan Syatt: That would be helpful if everyone could do it.

0:03:53.8 Mike Vacanti: Cool, cool.

0:03:55.3 Jordan Syatt: Just get everyone rallying behind it. “Where’s your daily post, bro?”

0:03:58.8 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, we’re gonna rally. We’re gonna rally and then some of it, even if we don’t rally, at the end of the day, responsibility. Yeah, one game of chess might improve your rating, right? Let’s say we remove the worst game of the day, replace it with posting. Everything’s gonna be better.

0:04:15.2 Jordan Syatt: You’re right. Yeah, I’m sorry, dude. I haven’t been on it.

0:04:19.0 Mike Vacanti: Apology accepted. No problem. I feel like we got a real strategy here. Should I continue to do the text reminders or what do you think about those?

0:04:28.8 Jordan Syatt: No. No.

0:04:30.0 Mike Vacanti: Don’t even text you, “Hey, daily post.” You still want me to do that? You don’t want me to do that anymore?

0:04:33.8 Jordan Syatt: No, because then if you text and I don’t do it, it’s anger higher. So we’ll just nix it.

0:04:39.3 Mike Vacanti: My anger is higher? Yeah, that’s probably accurate. That’s probably accurate.

[laughter]

0:04:49.0 Mike Vacanti: Yep. Yep. Okay. But let’s set the Mike anger aside, which, you know, a 5 to a 12, what are we really talking about in terms of anger on a 100 score? Is it helpful, or is it not even helpful for you to get the text reminder?

0:05:07.6 Jordan Syatt: I mean, realistically, it is helpful.

0:05:09.3 Mike Vacanti: The helpfulness might outweigh the perceived slight bump in anger that may or may not even exist.

0:05:16.1 Jordan Syatt: Or use that anger to fucking post.

0:05:20.4 Mike Vacanti: Oh, anger for. I thought it was my anger.

0:05:22.5 Jordan Syatt: It was. So me using your anger and my fear of your anger, your fear of your wrath.

0:05:27.6 Mike Vacanti: Wow. I didn’t even… That’s next level psychology. I’ve used my own anger as motivation before. I don’t know that I’ve used someone else’s anger, at least not consciously.

0:05:36.3 Jordan Syatt: I use your anger all the time.

0:05:38.1 Mike Vacanti: Well, hey, then I’m gonna send two texts a day, all right? Daily post. And just know, just because I’m fully off of Instagram, like, fully, fully, and off of X, going on 10 days now, I go on YouTube on my desktop and I go to Personal Trainer Podcast and I click on shorts and I see, oh, it’s that same one at the top that’s been sitting there for a while.

[laughter]

0:06:01.2 Mike Vacanti: Would really like to see a new one here.

[laughter]

0:06:05.4 Jordan Syatt: All right, got it.

0:06:06.4 Mike Vacanti: I’m glad we have the audience support. We got a plan in place. Chess is getting bumped. You got time. Do you feel good about this? Is there anything else we should do to make this plan even a higher probability of being a success?

0:06:20.0 Jordan Syatt: No, I feel good.

0:06:21.4 Mike Vacanti: Good. Good. Then I feel good.

0:06:25.3 Jordan Syatt: Feel like this is like a mob boss, man. You feel good? You feel good? I feel good. Okay.

0:06:29.3 Mike Vacanti: That’s exactly.

0:06:30.2 Jordan Syatt: Don’t fuck it up.

0:06:31.0 Mike Vacanti: That’s exactly what this is. Today, actually, do we have anything before… Oh, you know what? We do. We got a little something before we get into… Jordan doesn’t even know what we’re reviewing today, but it’s gonna be good. I had a bad cold. I’ve been sick twice now in, like, a three and a half month window. And it happened after I took antibiotics for the first time in years. I didn’t get sick for four years, and then I took an antibiotic for that. I had, like, a pimple thing up here, and a dermatologist didn’t want it to… Like, it was swollen, and she didn’t want it. Apparently, it’s dangerous. It can get into your eye or your brain if it was some kind of infection. And so…

0:07:19.3 Jordan Syatt: Wait, did you go to a dermatologist?

0:07:20.9 Mike Vacanti: I did, yeah, because it was really swollen. This was back in early December.

0:07:25.3 Jordan Syatt: Was it staph?

0:07:26.4 Mike Vacanti: No, it was a pimple. It was nothing.

0:07:29.0 Jordan Syatt: Oh okay.

0:07:29.6 Mike Vacanti: I waited for 45 minutes in the waiting room. I didn’t see a dermatologist. I saw a PA. She looked at it for exactly 8.5 seconds, and she did basically nothing except said, go take an antibiotic, which wiped out all the good bacteria in my gut. And I’ve been sick twice in three and a half months, so thanks a lot. And I forgot to take the antibiotic for, like, the first day and a half, and it basically had gone away completely on its own, but I kept taking it because I don’t know, that’s what you’re supposed to do, take the whole course of antibiotic. Anyway, really dumb.

0:08:02.5 Jordan Syatt: Did you try popping it?

0:08:03.8 Mike Vacanti: Antibiotics are amazing. They can be life-saving. Very gently early on, which I think made it worse. Anyway, my four-year streak is very over.

0:08:13.1 Jordan Syatt: Are you better now?

0:08:14.4 Mike Vacanti: Oh, I’m great now. It was a good reset. A bad cold or like getting the flu or any kind of illness is always a nice, like, all right, down three pounds of body fat, feeling a little leaner. Let’s go. It’s a real reset. It’s a reset on caffeine. It’s a reset on strength training.

0:08:35.8 Jordan Syatt: I just remembered Gary doing that all the time. Like, if anytime he got sick or something, he’d be like, oh, this is nice. I lost a few pounds.

0:08:42.6 Mike Vacanti: You gotta look at the positives, right? And now, I have something for Jordan. We are playing a game, and David’s gonna have to do a little editing with time because I’m gonna look these up in real time. I am gonna show you a picture of a bodybuilder, and you are gonna guess who the bodybuilder is.

0:09:07.6 Jordan Syatt: I’m gonna lose.

0:09:09.0 Mike Vacanti: As competitive as Jordan is deep in his soul, you’re not playing against anyone. So there’s no… You can’t lose. It’s just you’re gonna guess the bodybuilder. You might get some right, you might get some wrong.

0:09:20.7 Jordan Syatt: I’m gonna get more wrong than I get right, which means loss.

0:09:23.6 Mike Vacanti: All right, we’re starting right here. Jordan, who is… Oh, there’s a name there. Okay, now the name is covered up. Who is this individual?

0:09:39.5 Jordan Syatt: Schwarzenegger. You gave me an easy one to start with.

0:09:42.2 Mike Vacanti: Ding, ding, ding.

0:09:43.6 Jordan Syatt: I didn’t even see his face. His face was blown out. I just knew that body.

0:09:45.9 Mike Vacanti: Wow. That is an intricate knowledge of the sport of bodybuilding right there.

0:09:51.2 Jordan Syatt: That’s just the classic physique right there.

0:09:53.1 Mike Vacanti: Who is this individual?

0:09:54.6 Jordan Syatt: Ronnie Coleman, baby.

0:09:56.2 Mike Vacanti: Let’s go. Very good, very good. Mr. Olympia many, many times. Like nine, maybe. Ronnie Coleman won a lot of Mr. Olympias. Okay, who, Jordan, is this individual?

0:10:13.1 Jordan Syatt: Chris Bumstead.

0:10:14.5 Mike Vacanti: Wow. Dude, you’re three for three.

0:10:18.2 Jordan Syatt: Let’s go.

0:10:19.0 Mike Vacanti: Who, Jordan, is this individual?

0:10:22.5 Jordan Syatt: Franco Columbu.

0:10:23.8 Mike Vacanti: Wow. Is the name on the thing there? Oh, it is.

0:10:27.8 Jordan Syatt: I didn’t see his name.

0:10:28.6 Mike Vacanti: It’s at the very bottom, and it’s in small letters. Okay. Wow. How’d you get that right?

0:10:33.4 Jordan Syatt: Because he’s, like, the most famous short bodybuilder. So, like, I liked him a lot because he was short. And I remember Arnold talking to him, like, telling him how to make his posing better because he’s short. And he’s like, you gotta bring your arm out. You gotta bring your arm out and show more, not less. Be more. That’s the only reason I know that guy.

0:10:52.1 Mike Vacanti: Jordan, who is this individual?

0:10:56.9 Jordan Syatt: I have no idea who that is.

0:10:58.2 Mike Vacanti: Here is another picture of this individual that you are potentially more familiar with.

0:11:09.0 Jordan Syatt: Oh, no way. Is that Lee Haney?

0:11:10.8 Mike Vacanti: Lee Priest.

0:11:11.8 Jordan Syatt: Lee Priest. Lee Priest.

0:11:13.0 Mike Vacanti: Lee Priest. Good. That’s a half point for the first name. Well done. I was starting to get progressively harder.

0:11:22.8 Jordan Syatt: That’s crazy. I didn’t know… I only knew that picture of Lee Priest. I didn’t know the other one.

[laughter]

0:11:29.9 Mike Vacanti: Who, Jordan, is this individual?

0:11:38.9 Jordan Syatt: It’s really grainy. Is that the guy who played the Hulk? Oh, no. Oh, no, no. Okay. I didn’t even realize he was black. I thought he was white based on the lighting. That is… Holy shit. I met him in person. What is his name? He’s literally my favorite bodybuilder because he’s so fun and nice. Wow. The fact that I’m forgetting this guy’s name is going to absolutely infuriate me. He has the best routines. He’s super flexible, he dances, he’s wicked funny. Tell me his name. I forget his name.

0:12:10.1 Mike Vacanti: That is Kai Greene.

0:12:11.4 Jordan Syatt: Kai Greene. Kai Greene. Yeah.

0:12:13.6 Mike Vacanti: All right, Jordan, who is this man?

0:12:15.7 Jordan Syatt: Phil Heath, baby.

0:12:17.1 Mike Vacanti: Wow. Very good, very good.

0:12:22.0 Jordan Syatt: All right, last one. Next week, can I do MMA?

0:12:24.6 Mike Vacanti: That’s literally on my list. Yeah.

0:12:26.1 Jordan Syatt: Oh, okay. Sick.

0:12:27.1 Mike Vacanti: You see that I’m doing these…

0:12:28.4 Jordan Syatt: You’re doing the most popular. I know. You’re doing the most… I know. You’re not doing sleepers.

0:12:32.9 Mike Vacanti: I’m not doing sleepers. And I’m also… We’re doing… This is Home Run Derby. I want you to succeed. I’m on the mound. I’m giving you…

0:12:42.1 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. I’m not gonna try and trick you.

0:12:43.8 Mike Vacanti: Jordan, who is this individual?

0:12:48.7 Jordan Syatt: Ooh.

0:12:50.8 Mike Vacanti: That’s his prime compared to present day.

0:12:53.3 Jordan Syatt: I mean, present day is fucking savage. And prime is also savage. I have no idea who that is.

0:12:59.6 Mike Vacanti: That is Dorian Yates.

0:13:01.0 Jordan Syatt: That’s Dorian Yates. Oof. That’s embarrassing. That’s okay, because I love the Yates row. I did not know that was Dorian Yates.

0:13:08.3 Mike Vacanti: You do? Yeah. He’s the man.

0:13:10.7 Jordan Syatt: Doesn’t he have the greatest back of all time in bodybuilding?

0:13:14.5 Mike Vacanti: He definitely had a monster back. I don’t know if I would have… I don’t know if I would get this one right if someone showed me, but I just remember the name, and this guy’s pretty legendary. Last one. Who is this man?

0:13:33.1 Jordan Syatt: I know this guy’s super legendary. I’ve seen this picture all throughout my childhood. Oh, man. I don’t know his name, but I know I’ve seen this guy. No clue what his name is.

0:13:42.4 Mike Vacanti: His name is Steve Reeves, and I believe he was in the pre-anabolics era.

0:13:50.7 Jordan Syatt: Really?

0:13:51.6 Mike Vacanti: So when people hypothesize natural limits, if you want to think, all right, if you have the best genetics and you dedicate your life to it, what can you look like? You have to look at pre-steroids because we don’t know for sure now. Don’t quote me on that, but I believe he is one of the handful of people mentioned in those types of conversations.

0:14:10.4 Jordan Syatt: Can you pull up his picture again?

0:14:12.4 Mike Vacanti: He was Schwarzenegger’s…

0:14:15.3 Jordan Syatt: Rival?

0:14:16.4 Mike Vacanti: No, no. Like, when Arnold was a kid, he really liked Steve Reeves.

0:14:19.6 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because Arnold was on… Yeah.

0:14:22.8 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, Arnold. A good suntan is about the same as steroids. A good suntan.

0:14:27.5 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. You know, it’s interesting because, dude, he has a ton of muscle, obviously, but you can see the difference just in… There is more a layer of fat more relative to when you get on steroids. Right.

0:14:40.2 Mike Vacanti: Part of that is, even if you compare CBum to Arnold, they both could have gotten to the same level of leanness, but they just didn’t at that… In the ’80s or ’70s, that wasn’t the ideal physique. This is more of a classic look, which had a little bit more body fat.

0:14:59.3 Jordan Syatt: Little more body fat. Exactly.

0:15:00.9 Mike Vacanti: And then you go even earlier than Arnold. I would imagine this guy’s leanness is less a function of the drugs he had… I think what is most telling about the fact that he’s not on steroids is his chest-to-shoulder ratio. If you look at a lot of the guys today who are professionals and who are using heavy amounts of steroids, they have these bowling ball shoulders, right?

0:15:26.8 Jordan Syatt: Yeah.

0:15:27.3 Mike Vacanti: Whereas it’s easier to build a big chest naturally. It’s harder to build big shoulders naturally. I’m excited for the MMA portion of this.

0:15:40.3 Jordan Syatt: I’m stoked. That was good. That was fun.

0:15:42.7 Mike Vacanti: Good. I’m glad you enjoyed it.

0:15:44.2 Jordan Syatt: I feel like I was like 50/50.

0:15:45.7 Mike Vacanti: I think you were more than… You got more than 50%. The only two you missed… I guess Kai Greene… You were more than 50%, for sure. Okay. This week on the Personal Trainer Podcast, we are… Did you have anything you wanted to discuss?

0:15:52.1 Jordan Syatt: No, dude, I’m ready to go.

0:16:02.7 Mike Vacanti: We are ranking the top 25 exercises for building the chest.

0:16:09.8 Jordan Syatt: Oh, we haven’t done chest yet?

0:16:11.2 Mike Vacanti: Nope.

0:16:11.5 Jordan Syatt: Oh, that’s crazy. Let’s go. That’s a fun one.

0:16:13.6 Mike Vacanti: Number one, flat barbell bench press.

0:16:17.0 Jordan Syatt: So my bias with this one is my powerlifting background, which taught me essentially to minimally use my chest when I barbell bench press, which was shoulders down and back, flex the lats, arch, and never mind you don’t even need to think about the biggest arch you can imagine. But a typical powerlifting bench press, especially for a smaller, leaner dude, uses far less chest compared to a typical bodybuilding bench press.

0:16:49.3 Mike Vacanti: Yep.

0:16:49.6 Jordan Syatt: So I’m gonna give this A-tier if it’s done properly. For me, personally, when I do it, it’s more of a B-tier for me. But I think overall, especially if you teach it properly and if you teach it specific for the goal of chest development and you do it properly, I think it’s an A-tier.

0:17:09.4 Mike Vacanti: I actually, even without your caveat of more powerlifting style, bigger arch, more elbow tucked to the body, more lat activation, more tricep activation, less pec activation even setting that aside or biasing it less, I think it’s still A-tier. I think that’s the right place for it. I think there are other moves that get a bigger stretch because you’re inherently limited by the bar hitting your chest. You can get a bigger stretch on dumbbells, for example. And there’s probably something, I don’t know if we actually want to dock it for this reason, but it’s technically not the easiest movement to learn. Even if you’re trying to bias the chest, let’s say you have a little bit more elbow flare, you have less of an arch, and you’re trying to feel your chest here, a lot of beginners are gonna feel more shoulder, front delt activation and/or potentially have some crankiness in their shoulders. Still, the ability to overload it and go heavy, yeah, it’s an A-tier. A-tier movement. Flat dumbbell bench press.

0:18:25.5 Jordan Syatt: I have to give this an S-tier. I think flat dumbbell bench press is S-tier. I’ll probably go over it, but I typically prefer a slight incline just in general. It just feels better. But you can get a huge range of motion. You can adjust your hand position so you can really feel your chest working in whatever way you want. It’s far more adjustable to the individual. The only drawback of the dumbbell is the setup. That’s just the one drawback of it, which is manageable. But I think it’s an S-tier exercise. Dumbbell bench press is just, it’s incredible.

0:19:07.2 Mike Vacanti: Completely agree. You can load it the same way you can barbell. There’s a slight benefit in being less likely to develop asymmetries because each pec is working independently. You have 75 pounds in each hand versus on a barbell, over time you could theoretically develop more of an asymmetry if one side is pushing more than the other. Yeah, you can go heavy. You can get a bigger range of motion. I agree that especially as you get to heavier weights and bigger weights or just relatively heavier weights, you’re closer to something you can only do for a max of five total reps, it’s gonna be harder to get into position, especially if you don’t have a lot of practice with it. Over time, you’re gonna get better at getting those dumbbells into position. The other slight downside is with non-gym dumbbells. So I’m thinking Bowflex adjustables, it can be even more awkward just with the longer dumbbells. That being said, I’m nitpicking here. This is an S-tier movement and something that I also really enjoy. I like all dumbbell, flat, 15-degree, 30-degree, even 45-degree. I usually won’t make 45-degree my primary move. And I think a lot of people struggle to train more chest and less front delt the higher the incline. But they’re all excellent. And I guess incline barbell, let’s flip these around. Let’s do incline dumbbell next, unless you had something else to say about flat.

0:20:58.5 Jordan Syatt: No, I was just gonna add on to the adjustable dumbbell portion. For the majority of our lives that adjustable dumbbells have been around, the issue with the heavier ones is they’ve gotten way, way, way longer. And it was, never mind dumbbell bench press was awkward, but really something like double curls or any curls were really awkward when you brought them to your side, you had to bypass your legs. The newer adjustable dumbbells have basically fixed it. They’re way better.

0:21:24.2 Mike Vacanti: Wow.

0:21:24.7 Jordan Syatt: I don’t have them because I just don’t need them and I have the ones I’ve had since I was 18. But I’ve seen newer adjustable dumbbells that are just the size of a standard dumbbell. They’re amazing.

0:21:34.4 Mike Vacanti: Cool. Good to know.

0:21:37.6 Jordan Syatt: In terms of, oh, so…

0:21:40.0 Mike Vacanti: Incline dumbbell.

0:21:41.2 Jordan Syatt: Incline dumbbell, S-tier. Yeah, S-tier for sure. This is my favorite bench variation. Not the 45, I go between 15 and 30 degrees. It’s just, without question, my all-time favorite.

0:21:54.8 Mike Vacanti: Agreed. And it’s S-tier for all the reasons flat dumbbell is S-tier. It also, if we’re going more of the aesthetics, bodybuilding side of things, most people, when building their chest, struggle more to build the upper part of their chest than the mid/lower chest. And these aren’t separate muscles, obviously, but they’re separate parts of the chest, and you can bias them with the exercise you’re doing and the angle you’re hitting them at. I’m pretty sure there’s a decent amount… I know there’s a decent amount of EMG studies where an incline barbell activates more upper chest and the same amount of mid and lower chest than a flat barbell bench does. And so I don’t think that’s a big enough reason to make incline versus flat, like S versus A. I think incline dumbbell and flat dumbbell are both S-tier for me, but good to know… Good to know for people who care about that kind of thing.

0:23:09.4 Jordan Syatt: Also, if you’re looking for a little bit more bang for your buck, incline will get a bit more front delt as well. So just, I know you were talking about chest, but for someone who’s looking for, if they’re, “Hey, I really want to focus on my delts,” I’ll go main move 45-degree, maybe a little bit higher, really, really heavy pressing just because it is so good at getting the front delt as well. But for the chest, you’d want it lower.

0:23:34.3 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. Yep, good point. Incline barbell bench press.

0:23:39.2 Jordan Syatt: I’m going A-tier again for the same reasons that flat is A-tier.

0:23:44.0 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. Yeah, I don’t even know that more needs to be said there. We might actually have an episode where we don’t have to rush through the end if we’re smart with this. Incline barbell, A-tier. Chest dips.

0:23:55.7 Jordan Syatt: So my bias here is that I just love dips. I think that they’re such a great exercise overall. Really, I think it’s a great skill. It’s a great skill to develop. And so I’m very partial to dips as a whole, even though I’ve never really noticed dips being the greatest chest exercise. I’ve just never been like, “Yeah, this is absolutely an amazing chest exercise.” I feel like they’re much easier for the lower chest, which is, again, not really difficult for people to target. And it’s also very easy to end up cheating on it, where someone thinks they’re doing chest dips, but then it gets difficult and they start doing tricep dips and they start really biasing their tricep as opposed to the chest. It’s very difficult to actually stay in that chest-dominant focus, especially as you’re starting to fail. So I’m gonna give it a B-plus. And if it was not just for chest, then I would give it S-tier overall exercise. I just love it and I do it all the time. But specifically for chest, I would give it a B-plus.

0:25:05.5 Mike Vacanti: Wow. I thought you were gonna be higher. I don’t love dips for me personally because it’s just never felt good no matter what I did with my upper body angle. My shoulders have just both felt a little cranky on dips. I’m thinking of a woman I coach right now who absolutely loves dips. I know a lot of people love dips and they feel really good for them. I would borderline put them in A-tier. One, because it’s a cool skill. Two, the ability to assist and load the movement pretty seamlessly makes it easier to regress and progress based on your strength levels. You make a good point that you target more lower chest than upper chest. And also that on a flat bench press, if you’re doing a set of eight, it’s not like you get to six or seven and then you change your technique to bias a different muscle group more so you can eke out more reps. Whereas, like you were saying, that can happen naturally on a bodyweight dip. So I’m good following you with B-plus, although there are a lot worse exercises you can do for your chest.

0:26:24.7 Jordan Syatt: And again, for an overall exercise, I’m giving it an S-tier as an exercise overall, but just for chest, I’m giving it B-plus. Yeah.

0:26:33.5 Mike Vacanti: Six, machine chest press.

0:26:36.3 Jordan Syatt: S-tier. There’s no arguing. The only argument would be, well, which machine are you using? What are the ergonomics of the machine?

0:26:43.1 Mike Vacanti: S-tier if your machine doesn’t suck.

0:26:46.6 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, correct. Yeah, it’s the best. If I could only choose one exercise for chest, it would be the best chest machine that I could find, even more than dumbbell bench, just ’cause the convenience of it, the pin, and it’s just, yeah, there’s no arguing with that.

0:27:03.3 Mike Vacanti: I agree that it’s S-tier. I’m gonna just barely devil’s advocate the upside it has over dumbbell bench press, assuming it’s good. And what is a bad machine? A bad machine is essentially one where you can’t get a full range of motion at the bottom of each rep. That’s the most common reason a machine sucks.

0:27:22.4 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, it’s a good point.

0:27:27.7 Mike Vacanti: The benefit is convenience. Like you mentioned, you don’t have big bulky dumbbells. You don’t have to kick them up into position. You just sit there or lay there and go to work. I like movements where my bar path is free. No matter what it is, I don’t know why, and it might even be a little bit mental, but I like the idea of knowing that I don’t have to be pressing or pulling or anything on a fixed pattern. It’s still S-tier. I still do it constantly. I program it all the time. Safe. It’s a really good movement. It’s great for building chest strength and muscle. But if I were to give the pro versus con on the dumbbell bench versus the machine chest press, those would be the pros and the cons, convenience and then fixed bar path.

0:28:21.0 Jordan Syatt: You know what’s funny? I feel like I’m so hypocritical because on one hand, I’m very much the free movement, let’s move your body in all these different directions, da, da, da, but then for bodybuilding-type movements, I loved that. I love that fixed bar path. I prefer, if I could only for the rest of my life for chest choose between dumbbell bench or machine press, I would do the machine without question. Dude, I like the Smith machine press. I love that fixed bar path. I just really enjoy it.

0:28:53.1 Mike Vacanti: I guess if your focus, like you said, bodybuilding, if your complete focus is on muscle gain and aesthetics, and if we’re looking at strength and muscle which overlap, but if you’re looking at strength and muscle and you said, “I’m 100% muscle, 0% strength,” cool. Then get on that fixed path and blast that muscle. If you shift towards strength, I feel like I want a little more of a little more J in my bench, you know? J for Jordan.

0:31:19.5 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, makes sense.

[chuckle]

0:31:20.7 Mike Vacanti: And those line, they’re like plate-loaded chest press. So you have the pin ones and then you have those. They’re both awesome. Cable crossover/cable fly. So this is gonna be a standing cable fly.

0:31:21.8 Jordan Syatt: I’m gonna give it an A. I think it’s an incredible exercise for your chest. I do it pretty frequently. It’s an accessory exercise. It’s not a main mover. There are a lot of variables that come with it that can make it more challenging, like shoulders, obviously. It’s an accessory movement, and not all accessory movements… It’s not like an accessory movement can’t be S-tier, but this one specifically, there’s just so much variance to it and balance and being pulled by the cables and you’re adjusting your torso position. It’s not stable enough for me to give it an S-tier specifically for the chest, so I’m giving it an A.

0:31:22.9 Mike Vacanti: Absolutely right. You’re standing. When you go heavy, the cables pull your body back a little bit. You inherently have less stability than on basically every move we’ve mentioned outside of maybe dips, but yeah, and maybe even less there. You can combat the stability issue by working against gravity, so leaning pretty far forward and doing your fly down can help, but then you’re biasing more lower chest. So do you want to be doing that? Completely up to you. I think A-tier is a great place for it. And we’re gonna kind of keep going through these because now we’re into this adduction pattern of different fly variations. Number eight is dumbbell fly.

0:31:24.0 Jordan Syatt: I prefer, just to add on quickly, I prefer when I’m doing the cable crossover, slightly lower to higher as opposed to higher to lower for the upper-mid chest. Yeah, that’s just because I get so much lower chest everywhere else, or I do prefer that.

0:31:25.2 Mike Vacanti: And I agree, then you’re sacrificing the stability because you can’t really go low to high and lean forward. I mean, realistically, just roll a bench over, which is a little inconvenient, but then you have stability. Do it seated, you know.

0:31:42.6 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. Sorry, what was the next exercise?

0:31:44.8 Mike Vacanti: Dumbbell fly. Your favorite.

0:31:47.7 Jordan Syatt: I really like the dumbbell fly.

0:31:49.7 Mike Vacanti: You do?

0:31:50.6 Jordan Syatt: I do.

0:31:51.5 Mike Vacanti: I thought you hated it.

0:31:52.3 Jordan Syatt: No, I’ve been doing it for the last few months.

0:31:56.5 Mike Vacanti: Oh, wow. You’ve been doing chest isolation work, dumbbell flies for the last few months and you didn’t even tell me? Last few months.

0:32:03.0 Jordan Syatt: A few months, yeah. Well, you know what it’s like… So it’s funny. I was doing a lot of the cable flies, standing cable machine flies, but then I was like, “You know what? I don’t think I’ve done a dumbbell fly since high school.” So I was like, “Let’s do it.” And I started doing it, and I actually haven’t been doing it for my chest. I’ve been doing it because the T-spine extension feels so good. Like, dude, the back cracks that I get on rep two, three, four, when I’m just really pushing the range is unbelievable.

0:32:36.7 Mike Vacanti: Nice.

0:32:37.0 Jordan Syatt: So I’ve really enjoyed the shoulder mobility and the thoracic mobility benefits of it.

0:32:41.0 Mike Vacanti: What are you doing? Are you doing them flat?

0:32:43.1 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, I’ve been doing them flat.

0:32:44.3 Mike Vacanti: Okay.

0:32:44.7 Jordan Syatt: Yep. And I do it with my feet on the bench.

0:32:49.8 Mike Vacanti: Yep.

0:32:50.2 Jordan Syatt: So I don’t… Because if my feet are flat on the ground, I get too much of an arch, so I can put my feet up on the bench. For chest, I mean, bodybuilders are gonna be like, “You’re an idiot.” I’m gonna give it like a B or B-plus.

0:33:05.0 Mike Vacanti: I don’t think they’d say you’re an idiot.

0:33:06.4 Jordan Syatt: The reason I don’t really like it is… One of the reasons I do like it is you get a really nice big stretch at the bottom, which is great. But the amount of tension as you go up higher and higher and higher just radically diminishes to the point where as soon as you’re about halfway up, it’s like you’re really not…

0:33:25.5 Mike Vacanti: Lifting weights anymore. What are you even doing?

0:33:27.1 Jordan Syatt: They’re just floating. So you’re using your passive joint structures to just hold the weight up.

0:33:33.8 Mike Vacanti: If that.

0:33:34.1 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. Yeah.

0:33:34.6 Mike Vacanti: You could be holding two cups of tea with your little pinky sticking out and you’re not even doing anything at the top of each rep. You’re just chilling. That’s a great… Because you put the cable in A and you put the dumbbell in B, which makes all the sense in the world. You have full tension throughout the range with the cable. On the dumbbell, like you said, great stretch, but you lose tension as you come up. You have no tension at the top. Yeah, but we care more about tension in the stretch position. Cool, but I also care about tension in the fully contracted position. And so if a movement can have both, great. I guess what’s the… What’s the devil’s advocate argument for the dumbbell fly? If someone’s not in a gym, they have limited equipment, incredible, great exercise. You don’t have cables available.

0:34:22.0 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, yeah. Absolutely.

0:34:24.2 Mike Vacanti: Maybe you’ve been doing tons and tons of cable flies, you want to mix it up like Jordan’s doing right now. Awesome. That variation in exercise selection is wonderful. But I think… I think B is a good place for that move. Pec deck.

0:34:36.3 Jordan Syatt: S-tier.

0:34:37.2 Mike Vacanti: S-tier. You do like a fixed bar path.

0:34:39.7 Jordan Syatt: I love a fixed bar path. And this is… I was preparing for this one when I said not all accessories… Just because it’s an accessory movement doesn’t mean that it can’t be S-tier. I was literally talking about this one.

0:34:52.1 Mike Vacanti: Just to interrupt you annoyingly, can I have you rank the seated cable fly?

0:34:56.6 Jordan Syatt: Seated cable fly? So instead of standing, you’re just sitting down?

0:34:59.9 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, you’re sitting, you have a full bench, so you have full back support.

0:35:06.2 Jordan Syatt: S-tier.

0:37:16.3 Mike Vacanti: Okay, cool.

0:37:31.6 Jordan Syatt: S-tier. Yeah, that’s also S-tier. The only reason that I would prefer the pec deck is because it’s more convenient. I don’t have to bring the fucking bench over or the seat over. But then… Yeah.

0:37:46.9 Mike Vacanti: I know you don’t know this because you’re a home gym fellow these days, but for us gym goers, pec decks are like impossible. I don’t know who on TikTok is hyping up the pec deck…

0:37:47.9 Jordan Syatt: Oh, really?

0:37:48.0 Mike Vacanti: But I can’t get on a pec deck to save my life. It is the most used piece of equipment in the gym, hands down.

0:37:48.9 Jordan Syatt: I would have thought it would be way more difficult to bring over a bench in the dual cable machine than to get the pec deck.

0:37:49.8 Mike Vacanti: Usually two pec decks max, whereas one, two, three… There’s at least four, if not more, spots where you can do a double cable.

0:37:50.6 Jordan Syatt: That’s a nice gym.

0:37:51.4 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. So there’s… That’s the downside convenience-wise. I think I still might rather wait a little bit and do something else than lug a bench from like 150 feet across the gym or however far you gotta go. But…

0:37:52.2 Jordan Syatt: Yeah.

0:37:52.7 Mike Vacanti: The pec deck’s an awesome move. Do you have a preference on those two?

0:37:53.1 Jordan Syatt: Pec deck.

0:37:53.5 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, you just like the fixed path.

0:37:54.0 Jordan Syatt: I love it, dude. I absolutely love it. Yeah.

0:37:54.8 Mike Vacanti: You like structure.

0:37:55.6 Jordan Syatt: I literally… I almost impulse bought a pec deck like a month or two ago.

0:37:56.4 Mike Vacanti: You think that’s physical or psychological?

0:37:57.8 Jordan Syatt: What do you mean?

0:37:58.3 Mike Vacanti: You think it’s similar… Do you think you like structure in… You like being told to post and reminded and it motivates you, and you like being on a fixed path versus having the freedom to… “Should I post this? Should I not post today?” You like the freedom to do what you want with your bar path. No, you need a fixed bar path that keeps you in line.

0:38:02.7 Jordan Syatt: No, because I love moving my body in ways that is unique and I love the free movement. I just… I feel it better when I’m on a fixed bar path. When I’m trying to isolate a muscle, there’s just no question, I feel it way better on a fixed bar path. Whether it’s Smith machine pressing or… I also love… There are some bicep curl machines. Planet Fitness has an amazing bicep curl machine that’s like…

0:38:03.8 Mike Vacanti: Like a preacher curl? Like a machine preacher curl?

0:38:23.6 Jordan Syatt: Dude, I love it. Yeah, I love it.

0:38:24.0 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, we’re different. We’re just different kind of guys.

0:38:24.5 Jordan Syatt: Well, you don’t like preacher curls in general.

0:38:24.9 Mike Vacanti: I don’t like being fixed.

0:38:25.0 Jordan Syatt: Don’t try and hold me down. “I’m gonna do what I want.”

0:38:25.4 Mike Vacanti: What was that book? ‘The Four Tendencies.’ ‘The Four Tendencies’ was a book that perfectly described why Jordan and I work well together in business and life.

0:38:26.2 Jordan Syatt: Because you’re ISTJ and I’m ESTP.

0:38:26.6 Mike Vacanti: No, it wasn’t… I mean, sure, but this was a book where there was like pleaser… Hang on, we’re gonna real quick sidetrack. It’s personality types, but it’s different.

0:38:27.1 Jordan Syatt: Oh, you’re the enforcer.

0:38:27.2 Mike Vacanti: That wasn’t the name of one of them, but it might be similar to that. Upholder, Questioner, Obliger, and Rebel.

0:38:27.3 Jordan Syatt: Oh, you’re the Upholder.

0:38:27.4 Mike Vacanti: I think I’m a combination of Upholder and Rebel, but it’s the upholder part of me…

0:38:27.5 Jordan Syatt: And I’m the Pleaser.

0:38:27.6 Mike Vacanti: You’re the Enforcer and Pleaser, just making your own names up. Yeah, you have a lot of Obliger in you.

0:38:36.3 Jordan Syatt: Yeah.

0:38:37.0 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, yeah.

0:38:38.2 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

0:38:39.1 Mike Vacanti: It’s good. Although it hasn’t. I haven’t been upholding well, and you haven’t been obliging well on these last two and a half weeks. Decline barb. Did I rank those? Dumbbell fly B. Pec deck. I’m putting at… I guess if I put the standing cable at A, I’m gonna go S-minus, I suppose. I can’t put a chest isolation exercise the same. You just can’t load it as heavy as you can a dumbbell bench. Yeah, it’s an A-plus, S-minus in that range. Decline barbell bench press. And we’re gonna rank it as we are now, and then we’re gonna rank it as if we were 16 years old.

0:39:31.4 Jordan Syatt: If I was 16 years old, this would have been an S-tier. Yeah, this was the move. Peak move. Yeah, you’d get in your decline, you’d have your buddy come over. Yeah, dude, this was. Yeah, I’d love that. Now I’d probably give it B.

0:39:48.9 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, I mean, it’s just more lower chest, less upper chest emphasis.

0:39:53.0 Jordan Syatt: All lower chest.

0:39:54.4 Mike Vacanti: And I mean, dumbbells you get because you can’t get into position with dumbbells on a decline on your own. So now you’re having a stranger at the gym help you out. That becomes…

0:40:07.2 Jordan Syatt: Hey. Hey.

0:40:08.3 Mike Vacanti: “Hand me these 90s, please.”

0:40:13.0 Jordan Syatt: Because you can go heavy. A decline bench. And by the way, I don’t know if I’ve decline benched in the last decade, so I’m going off of memory. A decline bench is way closer to flat bench in terms of how much weight you’re using than a flat bench to an incline.

0:40:27.1 Jordan Syatt: Oh, yeah, yeah, absolutely.

0:40:29.1 Mike Vacanti: I might. In high school, my decline might have been stronger than my flat at one point. That’s how much we just.

0:40:35.8 Jordan Syatt: Absolutely. Yeah, it’s a way shorter range of motion. Significantly shorter range of motion. The leverages are way easier. It’s and when you’re in high school, it’s look, I’m upside down and I’m doing this. Let’s get the highest decline possible, just get this ridiculous angle.

0:40:56.1 Mike Vacanti: We might have had four. No, I think it was 4-2-2. I think we had four flat, two incline, two decline. But I thought we had one more decline than incline, but I think it was two and two. Yeah, B is a great place for it. Push-up. Let’s rank just a bodyweight push-up, feet and hands on the ground, and then we’ll rank the best variation possible to build your chest.

0:41:25.4 Jordan Syatt: So first, just push-ups as an overall exercise in general, S-tier. There’s so many variations you can do, so many ways to progressively overload it. So good. As an overall exercise, it’s S-tier. For chest specifically, I’m gonna give it A. And I’m assuming you’re progressively overloading it enough, that you’re adding weight to it or changing the range of motion or to get a bigger stretch, whatever it is. But there are ways to make it absolutely incredible. I’m gonna give it overall an A because it does hit the chest really well and it’s very easy to progress.

0:42:04.1 Mike Vacanti: Good. All right, I’ll do the same thing you did. Here’s the thing. As you get really advanced and for men more specifically, just because men tend to have more upper body strength than women, you have to put so much weight on your back or control the eccentric or do pauses or do a ton of reps. All of these things that just make it less efficient for building muscle. Not even less efficient, just more of a pain in the butt, right?

0:42:40.1 Jordan Syatt: It’s not as comfortable.

0:42:41.3 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, the juice ain’t worth the squeeze. That being said, they’re a really good exercise for a lot of people. For the majority of people, they’re a great strength and muscle building exercise. And like you said, you can put your hands on plates to increase the range of motion. You can put a plate or a sandbag on your back, you can put a band on your back, you can change the tempo. You can do a lot of things to make this exercise more difficult. Great movement for getting the shoulder blades moving. Your shoulder blades are moving a lot more here than they are on something like a barbell bench press. Taking all that into consideration, I’m going A. Look, we have dumbbell flys at a B. So yes, I think A is a great spot for these. I think they can be an S-tier, and I think they could probably trend all the way down to B-plus if you take someone who’s been lifting for 20 years and you say, “Hey, for your first move of the day, we’re gonna do bodyweight push-ups because we want to build your chest.” It’s like, no. I mean, that’s not even a B-plus. That’s dumb.

0:43:53.4 Jordan Syatt: But I think the elite calisthenics guys are the best example of how good a push-up can be. Because the elite calisthenics guys have wild chests, but you have to remember is they’re doing hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of push-ups every day, often going to failure. They push themselves on push-ups in a way that the vast majority of people in the gym are not going to push themselves on push-ups. And so they are really taking it to an extreme level of intensity that the vast majority of people never would. So I think they’re the example of they can be a legit S-tier if you do the right variations to the level of intensity that you need, which requires either significant amounts of extra weight and/or insane amounts of reps just to make sure you’re getting enough intensity. Yeah. My favorite way to do them to get enough intensity is I get parallel dip bars, I get parallel bars that are close to the ground or weights or yoga blocks, whatever, I do deficit, like in a pretty big deficit, and then I put a weighted vest on.

0:45:00.8 Mike Vacanti: Good.

0:45:01.6 Jordan Syatt: And I’ll do anywhere from like 12 to 20 repetitions, basically going to failure. And that’s for me the most comfortable way to add extra load is the weighted vest because the plates are sometimes getting in the way of my shoulder blades and they’re just falling off and all that. The weighted vest is a very easy way to load it up.

0:45:21.1 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, I agree. Not every gym has them, but if you have access, absolutely. And even better if you’re pre-fatigued a little bit, right?

0:45:47.3 Jordan Syatt: Yes.

0:45:48.3 Mike Vacanti: If you did your slight incline dumbbell bench press for a few heavy sets and then…

0:45:49.3 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, it’s not my first move.

0:45:49.8 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, yeah. Even weighted and in a deficit.

0:45:51.3 Jordan Syatt: Correct, it’s not my first move.

0:45:52.3 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. I’m not gonna die on this hill exactly, but I would like to see the cream of the crop calisthenics guy do a side chest pose against like a CBum or someone.

0:45:53.2 Jordan Syatt: Well, yeah, of course. Yeah. They’re also super lean, so they could just see their muscle more. I mean, that’s fair. Yeah.

0:46:00.4 Mike Vacanti: In terms of actual muscle gain and size, they become really good at push-ups, don’t get me wrong, and impressive physique.

0:46:07.1 Jordan Syatt: And they have real chest development, but not relative to like a bodybuilder with way more muscle mass.

0:46:12.6 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. Yeah.

0:46:15.2 Jordan Syatt: All right, we got to kind of move a little.

0:46:17.3 Mike Vacanti: 13, incline dumbbell fly.

0:46:21.3 Jordan Syatt: B.

0:46:21.5 Mike Vacanti: B. Seated cable fly, we put in S-tier. Got that extra stability compared to the standing. Dumbbell pullover.

0:46:29.5 Jordan Syatt: For chest?

0:46:30.5 Mike Vacanti: For chest. As an exercise, amazing. It’s the RDL of the upper body. We like it. Cool. Really, I do it myself, I program it.

0:46:39.6 Jordan Syatt: I love dumbbell, I love barbell pullovers. Yeah.

0:46:42.3 Mike Vacanti: Great for lats, great for mobility. Yeah. For chest, how are we ranking this thing?

0:46:47.3 Jordan Syatt: D.

0:46:47.5 Mike Vacanti: D. Yeah. And I think sometimes we get a little confusion because someone might hear and be like, “Oh, you gave dumbbell pullover a D.” We’re specifically in this episode talking about chest development. And I don’t care, I love that earlier in the episode I’m like, “The EMG says more upper chest,” and then I’m like, here it’s like, EMG says the chest is activated in the stretch position of this movement, but I don’t feel it. And I feel it a ton in my lats, and that’s what I hear from everyone else. And I don’t know, I don’t know a lot of people who are… Yeah, yeah.

0:47:17.9 Jordan Syatt: It’s just… I almost gave it an F. I’m gonna give it a D mainly because of the EMG. That’s the only reason I’m giving it a D. Great exercise. I do dumbbell or barbell pullovers basically every week. They’re amazing, but not for chest development.

0:47:32.9 Mike Vacanti: I’m with you. D-tier. Decline push-ups. Oh, I’m sorry. Oh, they’re calling a decline push-up feet elevated. I think of this as an incline push-up because it’s…

0:47:48.0 Jordan Syatt: No, incline push-up is hands elevated.

0:47:50.2 Mike Vacanti: Disagree. I don’t care what your textbook says, NSCA, MSPC, CSNBC, whatever. The incline bench targets the upper chest. The incline push-up targets the upper chest because your feet are inclined.

0:48:06.7 Jordan Syatt: No. No, because incline bench press, your head is elevated. Incline push-ups, your head is elevated.

0:48:15.0 Mike Vacanti: I’m not training my head on chest day. I’m training my chest, Jord, all right?

0:48:20.6 Jordan Syatt: Your chest is elevated on both.

0:48:23.3 Mike Vacanti: No, I’m talking about incline upper chest, decline lower, all right? So call it what we want it, but the variation where your feet are elevated first…

0:48:36.4 Jordan Syatt: I mean, it’s gonna depend how high the elevation is, but the higher you go, the more shoulders and triceps and less chest. So I’m gonna give this a B.

0:48:45.8 Mike Vacanti: Interesting. It’s important to note that I don’t think elevation… I think minimum elevation would be like four inches, and I think maximum elevation would be a bench. So it’s gonna put me in like an incline pressing position. It’s not gonna put me in like a 60-degree, like a shoulder press position. This is one of the variations of push-up that I like for the reason that I like all these other push-ups. You can incline your hands, you can create a bigger range, you can wear a weighted vest, you can put a weight on your back, you can slow the eccentric. Great for hitting… You get more upper chest. I don’t even need the EMG to tell you. I know that inclining your feet is gonna give you more upper chest than a flat push-up. So I’m giving feet… Let’s just call it feet elevated. I’m giving feet elevated push-ups an A.

0:49:41.8 Jordan Syatt: Oh, wow. Yeah, I’ll go B, just like… For me…

0:49:46.9 Mike Vacanti: Same place as the dumbbell fly for chest development.

0:49:48.1 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. This one because I’ve never really been able to feel this one in my chest very much.

0:49:51.8 Mike Vacanti: I’ll teach you.

0:49:53.4 Jordan Syatt: I’ve been more like I feel this more shoulders, triceps, and far less chest.

0:49:57.7 Mike Vacanti: Do you feel that with dumbbells too?

0:50:00.2 Jordan Syatt: No.

0:50:01.0 Mike Vacanti: Hey, we all have different anatomy, right? We all got to each their own. Some people like chicken breast and think that that’s good for you. Some people love soy protein and just estrogen levels through just a soy guy. You know, hands-elevated pushups.

0:50:21.3 Jordan Syatt: I mean, if you aren’t at a level in which you can do them from the ground and it’s difficult for you, then that’s a really great exercise.

0:50:31.3 Mike Vacanti: S, maybe.

0:50:32.5 Jordan Syatt: S, yeah. But for once you’ve developed enough strength to where you can do hands elevated for 10, 12 reps, you should be doing them on the ground.

0:50:45.4 Mike Vacanti: Yeah.

0:50:46.0 Jordan Syatt: There’s no reason to be elevating your hands unless you can’t do them on the ground.

0:50:49.7 Mike Vacanti: So if doing a set of these takes you relatively close to failure, and if it’s challenging for you, it’s A or S-tier. If you have developed past that level of strength and you’re still doing these, then it’s D at best, potentially F, just because you’re not going hard enough. Hex press or squeeze press. Two dumbbells, press them together, and you’re maintaining that tension between your hands/the dumbbells while doing a flat or incline bench press.

0:51:27.7 Jordan Syatt: I’ve actually, historically, really liked this one. I’m gonna give it a B.

0:51:33.4 Mike Vacanti: Okay.

0:51:34.3 Jordan Syatt: I’m gonna give it a B. I like this one.

0:51:36.6 Mike Vacanti: Man, you’re putting this move in the same place as the feet-elevated pushup.

0:51:40.1 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. I feel my chest way more on this one. I know feeling isn’t everything, but I really like it.

0:51:47.0 Mike Vacanti: Cool. Hey, little nostalgia, a little personal preference. I like the speed at which you’re taking on this list with that relatively short answer. I’m happy with it. I’m gonna go… Where did you put it? B? I’ll go C, just because you’re… Making sure I’m right here… At the bottom of each rep, you have less chest stretch.

0:52:07.5 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, true.

0:52:08.5 Mike Vacanti: You can’t go as heavy. And I’m almost fighting against the myth that you’re training more of the inner chest when you do this, which I don’t think is right. C. I’m going C.

0:52:27.3 Jordan Syatt: This one would be a good one to pair… Let’s say you only have dumbbells… If you paired dumbbell flies where you’re getting a big stretch at the bottom with something like this where you’re getting more tension at the top. That would be a good pairing so you get the best of both worlds.

0:52:43.2 Mike Vacanti: I like that. Would you do a set of flies and then, no rest, go straight into this dumbbell squeeze press?

0:52:51.4 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, yeah. That’d be great. That’d be a great just combo.

0:52:54.1 Mike Vacanti: I think that would be a good combo. I’m with you. Plate press. So you take a… Same move, but you take a single plate and you put your flat palms on both sides of it and you go up and down.

0:53:10.8 Jordan Syatt: That’s a D, because the amount you can load that is… You’re so limited by how much you can squeeze it. And the range of motion is way smaller because the plate is getting in the way. It’s like a board press with a plate. It’s just no.

0:53:24.6 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, D-minus. D-minus on the plate press. Chest press machine variations. We already hit that. Floor press.

0:53:34.4 Jordan Syatt: I’m gonna have to go… I’ll say C-minus. I think it’s better than the plate. Yep, it’s better than the plate. You can load it way heavier. But the range… I’ve never really liked floor press. Even when I was powerlifting and I was powerlifting in the days when floor press was big, I hated floor press.

0:53:52.0 Mike Vacanti: Not a floor press guy.

0:53:53.2 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. It’s more of a tricep move than a chest move, realistically. You get no stretch on the chest.

0:53:58.3 Mike Vacanti: Get no stretch. And look, I want to load it in its shortened position, too, but I really want to load it in its lengthened position, and we’re not getting that here. The theory around this move isn’t that it’s a good chest builder. The theory is that it is beneficial for developing your bench press because it’s training a specific point in the bench, which you have pointed out before. Most people’s sticking point on a bench isn’t the top half of the range.

0:54:25.4 Jordan Syatt: Yeah.

0:54:26.1 Mike Vacanti: So for the people who that is their sticking point—you can get it off your chest, you can get it at least a few inches up, and then you’re failing… Cool, maybe do this to help develop your bench press. If you’re trying to build your chest, it’s not a great exercise.

0:54:40.0 Jordan Syatt: Yeah.

0:54:42.7 Mike Vacanti: Convenience, variety. Someone has a nagging shoulder issue that’s really bothering them when they’re going full range on a horizontal press. They only have access to dumbbells, but they still want to work out. Yeah, I might program a floor press there. Limited equipment in general. Okay, but I think it’s probably a C on average.

0:55:06.1 Jordan Syatt: For chest, yeah. And I actually really like floor press, dumbbell floor press for combat athletes, jiu-jitsu athletes, ’cause a lot of times you’re on the ground, you have frames up and you’re already not flat against your chest trying to push. You’re halfway up in that almost floor press position and you’re trying to frame and push off from there. So I actually like that. I like it for football players. Oftentimes they’re doing these powerful presses from this already almost 90-degree position with the elbows. So there’s a time and a place for it, but not for me for chest development.

0:55:37.8 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, not for anyone really for chest development. But those are a couple of great performance-based reasons for programming this. The guillotine press. And for those who don’t know, you’re going a little bit wider grip. You can do it barbell or dumbbell, but is this barbell? Yeah, it says barbell. A little bit wider grip. You’re not depressing your shoulder blades. All right, so think barbell bench press, a little bit wider grip. Instead of trying to tuck your shoulder blades down towards your butt, you’re letting your shoulder blades elevate, you’re letting your traps activate a little bit. Your upper traps, your shoulders come up to your ears a little bit and you’re flaring your elbows out way wide. And then you are essentially… I feel like this is a move you could either be obsessed with or hate, but you don’t seem that familiar with it, so I don’t think you’re gonna love it. But then you are essentially benching like the bar path is going towards your neck.

0:56:31.8 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. I think this is a fun exercise. It’s a fun way to potentially improve shoulder range of motion, shoulder strength, but if you don’t have that range, don’t fucking do this exercise. It’ll fucking wreck your shoulders if you don’t have that range already. Sort of like a behind the neck press. It’s a cool goal to work towards, but if you have poor shoulder range, do not do this at all. The risk of having a shoulder injury is significantly higher. Never mind the dangers if you don’t have a spotter. If you’re going to…

0:57:04.5 Mike Vacanti: Even if you do have a spotter, they gotta be unbelievably competent to…

0:57:07.6 Jordan Syatt: Yeah.

0:57:08.3 Mike Vacanti: Imagine you rip a pec and the bar goes straight on your trachea.

0:57:12.5 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, just not worth it. There’s enough people who die from bench pressing every year normally, never mind adding this variation into it.

0:57:18.5 Mike Vacanti: Yeah.

0:57:19.0 Jordan Syatt: So and also I don’t think it really hits the chest that well. I think it’s much more stress on the front delt, much more stress on the shoulder structures as you’re coming up to your neck. It’s almost like a face pull position but in a press as opposed to a pull. So I’m gonna give it a D. As an overall exercise, it’d be fun, it’d be a cool skill to work on, but not for chest development at all.

0:57:46.6 Mike Vacanti: I think I’m… Yes, bigger risk. I think there’s a crew that would argue against this, but I do think that it’s a bigger risk of shoulder injury, especially if you’re not used to benching with your elbows flared way out, let alone flared out this far. So if you’re gonna do it, one, do it with dumbbells so if you fail, you don’t kill yourself, right? And two, start unbelievably light with the weight. That being said, because I do think you’re definitely getting more of a stretch than you are in an arched powerlifting position, but stress on the shoulders and the real negative on this is just risk of death and danger, having a horrific injury. So I think D is a pretty safe place for the guillotine press. We got a few more. Single arm dumbbell press.

0:58:38.5 Jordan Syatt: One of my all-time favorite variations ever. Not for chest. It’s a great exercise. I program this all the time. I love this exercise. I’m gonna give it an A. The only reason it’s not S is because the instability, mainly the reasons why I love this exercise overall, which is you get a great amount of core activation, it’s just a great skill to have. But I would say as an overall exercise, I’d give it an S, but for chest development, I’m gonna give it like an A-minus.

0:59:13.6 Mike Vacanti: I agree. The reasons you like it, and I really agree because I program this a solid amount, not to build the chest specifically, but like you said, a lot of core activation, a lot of “functional-ish strength,” which I actually do believe on this movement. That instability is taking away from our ability to build chest strength and muscle. So overall, great move, very highly ranked. In terms of an actual chest builder, I don’t even think I can go A, because if we have a dumbbell fly at a B, I think this is probably a B also. I think I have push-ups in A largely, and yeah, so that’s where I’m going with this one. But I do it myself and I program it, but not as a chest crusher. Banded push-ups we kind of hit. I don’t even want to review reverse grip bench press. Do you have a strong opinion?

0:59:32.4 Jordan Syatt: No.

1:00:16.7 Mike Vacanti: Do you do it?

1:00:17.4 Jordan Syatt: Never. I’ve done it during my powerlifting days, but I don’t do it now.

1:00:21.1 Mike Vacanti: And here I’m throwing Jordan a bone here, and I actually like this too. Smith machine… We’re going to say just group Smith machine bench press variations. So whether it’s…

1:00:24.1 Jordan Syatt: S-tier.

1:00:29.6 Mike Vacanti: Yeah.

1:00:30.5 Jordan Syatt: Love this one. One of my all-time favorites.

1:00:33.2 Mike Vacanti: You love that fix. You love being fixed.

1:00:35.1 Jordan Syatt: Love it. Love it.

1:00:37.6 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. You’re able to go heavy, borderline, because there’s a little bit less skill involved, I do agree with you. If you compare a flat barbell bench press to a flat Smith machine bench press, I think there’s less to think about on the Smith machine, and so you can almost focus more on just pumping your chest and really working your chest and less on some of the more nuanced technique variables in the movement. So, it’s a highly rated movement.

1:01:11.0 Mike Vacanti: Thank you very much for listening. We are gonna be back next Tuesday. We’re here every single Tuesday. Jordan’s gonna be posting on social media @personal trainer podcast. Go give us a follow, leave a comment in there, just be like, “Jordan, daily post. Let’s go, baby.” It’s gonna pump him up, seriously. Subscribe on YouTube. We appreciate you listening. See you next week.

1:01:28.9 Jordan Syatt: See you.