My fitness tips - Push Day

In my last blog post, I wrote about my weights routine and the sorts of exercises I like to do on the days I work out. If you haven't already read this post, I'd recommend you <click here> so the below makes more sense to you.

I follow a legs / push / pull split, and in this post I'm going to show you what I do on my push day. My push workout focuses on my chest, shoulders and triceps and I do a variety of exercises to make sure I have a well-rounded workout.

1. Chest (I always like to start with the biggest muscle group, so on my push day, it's chest!)

Incline Dumbell Press

- The bench can be set at alternative heights. I like to put this up one notch from the bottom.

- Do 1 warm up set with a light weight (I'm only little so I'll use the 2kg dumbbells for a set of 20)

- Then do 4 sets of 10-12 with a weight that is challenging enough (for me, it's 6kg)

Tip: use a weight that is about a 7/10 of difficulty for you (10 being that 12 reps is the absolute maximum that you could do). You want it to be challenging but you don't want to completely tire yourself out on the first exercise!!!

Exercise is performed as seen in the photograph

Cable Fly's

After a pressing movement I like to do a fly movement to stretch out the chest. A combination of cable exercises and freeweights is good to stimulate the muscle in different ways, and this is definitely one of my favourites!

- 3 sets of 12-15 reps (here I'm using 3.5kg per side)

Tip: think of your arms like "hooks" when you perform this movement. You want to keep a slight bend in your elbows and keep that same bend throughout the whole course of the movement.

Exercise is performed as seen in the photograph

2. Shoulders - For me, I find doing 2 different kinds of movement useful to target my shoulders: 1 pressing movement, and 1 lateral raise movement .

1 handed dumbbell press

- You can do this movement seated or standing, with one or two dumbbells, or with a barbell or a machine. I like doing one hand at a time so I can really focus on each side!

- Again, make sure you do a warm up set (something nice and light for around 20 reps. I use the 2kg ones).

- For my working sets, I do 4 sets of 10-12 reps (again, you want a reasonably challenging weight, for me it's the 4kg dumbbell)

Exercise is performed as seen in the photograph

Sitting lateral raise

- This is definitely an exercise where you don't need much weight! "Lateral raise" basically just means "lifting your arms to the side" - at the top of the movement you want your arms to make a 'T' shape with the rest of your body.

- For this, 3 sets of 12-15 reps works well for me (I use the 3kgs for this)

Exercise is performed as seen in the photograph

3. Triceps - I would perform any pushing down movement or overhead pushing down movement

Cable push down

- Again, another warm up sets (I use around 5.7kg for a set of 20)

- For my working sets, I do 3 sets of 10-12 reps (on 10.2kg)

- Here, you really want to try and keep your upper arm pressed against your side (it helps stop you cheating!)

Exercise is performed as seen in the photograph

Overhead tricep extension

- Again, one warm up set of around 20 reps

- Then 3 sets of 12-15 reps (as you can see I'm using the 3kg dumbbells here)

- I like to set the bench 2 notches above the bottom one on this movement

Exercise is performed as seen in the photograph

Please note I do not perform these exercises in this order. I only put them in this order as it segments the different muscle groups. You can jump to different exercises as long as you go back and do them all. So, the order I might actually do them in is:

Incline dumbbell press

1 arm shoulder press

Tricep pushdown

Cable flys

Dumbbell lateral raises

Overhead tricep extension

This means each muscle group gets enough rest in between exercises so I can maximise the effort I put into each!

I would love for any of you to follow my programme and try it out for yourself. Please drop me a message if you have any questions at piafashionandlifestyle

Credit: piafashionandlifestyle