Exercises to Build Muscle

The Best Exercises to Build Muscle I: Legs and Back

Building muscle takes time, commitment, and motivation.  The best form of motivation is seeing your body improve over time.  This tells you that all the hard work you put in the gym is paying off.  If you want to build muscle in the shortest amount of time, you need to perform the best exercise to build muscle. 

Legs

Squats: This is often called the king of all exercises to build muscle and for good reason.  Although squats are a leg exercise, they build muscle from head to toe.  If you are serious about packing on muscle and don’t have a bad back or sore knees, squats should be a part of every lifters program.

Variations: front squats, box squats, close stance squats, power squats

Leg Press:  Leg presses are a good exercise to build your quadriceps.  The learning curve is short due to the fact you don’t need great coordination and balance to perform this movement.  There are many leg press machines and they are all built differently.  500 lbs on one machine may feel heavier or lighter on a different machine due to leverages.

Other quadriceps exercises: lunges, step ups

Stiff Legged Deadlifts:  This is a variation of the deadlift that really hits your hamstrings.  These are performed by holding a barbell in front of your body and bending at the waist until you feel a stretch in your hamstrings.  The weight you can handle might be limited by your grip strength so you might need to invest in a pair of lifting straps.

Other hamstring exercises: good mornings, lying leg curls, seated leg curls

Calf Raises:  Calf raises are fairly simple.  Most gyms will have a machine for seated or standing calf raises.  Calves usually respond better to higher reps.

Back

Deadlifts:  If squats are the king of exercises to build muscle, deadlifts are a close second.  This is primarily a back movement but it builds your traps, lower back, hamstrings, and calves.  Many people avoid deadlifts due to fear of injury.  However, like most exercises, they are safe if you utilize good form.

Bent Over Rows:  Bent over rows hit your lats and upper back.  These are performed by bending over with a barbell and pulling the weight to your abdomen or sternum.  The lower back must stay tight to avoid injury.  These are call horizontal rowing movements because they are pulled perpendicular to your body.  Horizontal movements promote back thickness.

Other horizontal rowing movements:  dumbbell rows, machine rows, T-bar rows, cable rows

Pulldowns: Pulldowns also hit you lats.  Unlike the horizontal pulling exercises, pulldowns focuses on lat width.  Because you are pulling the weight parallel to your body, this is considered a vertical pulling movement. 

Chin ups/Pull ups:  This is another vertical pulling exercise where you are pulling yourself up to a bar above your head.  This is a very effective exercise but the main disadvantage is that not too many people are strong enough to perform the repetitions needed to stimulate muscle growth. 

Other vertical pulling movements: any machine variation of pulldowns.

Traps

Shrugs:  Your traps get hit to some degree with heavy deadlifts but in order work your traps directly, shrugs should be part of your arsenal.  This exercise is very simple but effective.  Hold a barbell in front of you at arms length and shrug your shoulders up towards your ears.  You can also perform these with dumbbells.

These are exercises to build muscle in your back and legs.  In part II, we’ll discuss building your chest, shoulders, and arms.

In the first part of the Best Exercises to Build Muscle, we covered the legs and back.  In this installment we’ll cover chest, shoulders, and arms.

Chest

Bench Press:  This is one of the most popular exercises to build muscle.  If you’ve been in any gym, you’ll notice the bench press area is the most crowded.  This exercise is performed lying on a bench.  While lying on the bench, you lower a loaded barbell to your chest and press the weight back up to the starting position.  This exercise hits the chest, front delts, and triceps.  The main problem with the barbell bench press is that some people develop shoulder problems, due to poor technique, and are forced to find alternative chest exercises.

Incline bench press:  The incline bench press is similar to the bench press except the bench is fixed in an incline position.  The incline usually ranges from 20-45 degrees.  This exercise targets the upper chest, delts, and triceps.  Depending on your benching style, you may have less chance of developing shoulder issues compared to using a flat bench.

Dips:  Dips are one of most underrated exercises to build muscle.  It seems too simple to build a lot of muscle.  Most gyms have a dip station where you can perform dips.  You can add weight by tying a dipping belt around your waist and attaching plates or you can hold dumbbells in between your feet.

Other chest movements: decline bench press, dumbbell variations of all bench presses, machine (Hammer Strength) bench, cable crossovers, pec deck flyes, dumbbell flyes, floor presses, and board presses

Shoulders

Military Press:  The military press is one of the primary exercises to build muscle in the shoulders.  These can be performed either sitting or standing.  You grab a barbell, hold it in front of you at shoulder level, and press it over your head.  These can be performed with a barbell or dumbbells.

Lateral Raises:  The deltoid muscle has three heads: lateral, front, and rear.  The lateral raise is performed by holding a dumbbell at your side and raising it until you arms are parallel to the floor.  These can also be performed with cables.

Front Raises: These are similar to the lateral raise except that the dumbbell is raised in front of you as opposed to your side.  These can also be performed with cables.

Rear Flyes:  This exercise hits your rear deltoid.  In order to perform these with a dumbbell, you need to be in a bent over position.  You can either be standing and bent over; or seated on a bench and bent over.  While in this position, you raise the dumbbell until your arm is parallel to the floor.  You elbow will be moving towards your back.  These can be performed with cables also.  Rear delts can be trained by performing a reverse pec deck fly.

Triceps

Close Grip Bench Press:  This is one of the best exercises to build muscle on your triceps.  You can overload your triceps with more weight than other triceps movements.  This is similar to a bench press except that your grip is closer together on the bar.  The space between you hands should be 12-24 inches to activate the triceps.

Skull Crushers:  a.k.a. nose breakers and French press.  This is performed with a shorter bar, usually an EZ curl bar.  You start by lying on a bench with the loaded bar extended at arms length above your head.  Begin the movement by bending your arm at the elbow until the weight is right above your head and reverse the movement until the bar is extended over your head again, hence the name skull crusher.

Pushdowns:  This triceps movement is performed at a cable pulley machine.  There are many attachments available that you could use.  You just grab the handle on the attachment with your elbows close to your side.  Push the handle downward until your arms are fully extended.

Other triceps movements: dumbbell kickbacks, overhead dumbbell/EZ bar extensions

Biceps

Barbell Curl: This is a very basic movement that targets the main head of the biceps.  While standing, grab a barbell while your arms are fully extended and curl it up to your shoulders.

Hammer Curls:  These are performed with cables or dumbbells.  Instead of curling the weight up in a straight line, the weight is curled to the opposite shoulder.  This movement hits the brachialis which is the muscle near your elbow joint.

Other biceps movements: dumbbell curls, preacher curls, cable curls, any machine variation of curing exercises

These were a few exercises to build muscle.  Anyone who works hard at these exercises will gain muscle provided that the trainee focuses on progressive overload and maintains a sound nutrition strategy.