Cable crossovers for building chest mass

[devenidas]

Has anyone else noticed that “cable crossovers” done right builds just as much mass in the chest, if not more, than pressing movements?

No it doesn't.

Put some steel on the bar, dumbbells whatever if you want thick chest.

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[rmtt]

No it doesn't.

Put some steel on the bar, dumbbells whatever if you want thick chest.

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I see guys doing cross-overs in my gym all the time...pretty much all they do for chest.

Physically they look the same as they did 5 years ago when doing the same thing then....well maybe a little fatter....but you know they can't be concerned about that nutrition.

 

[TheOtherOne55]

It wont be a mass building exercise but its good for a good stretching the muscle out movement. JM always has built his programs around pushing heigh weight, then flooding the muscle with blood THENNNNN a nice stretch movement.

I always do flies last. And if i'm not doing flies I do dips or wide grip stretch pushups. I honestly think a huuuge missing piece of the puzzle is DC/Fortitude stretching after you train a bodypart. MORE AND MORE studies are coming out saying that a stretch 30 seconds + helps with hypertrophy.

 

[heavyhitter]

It wont be a mass building exercise but its good for a good stretching the muscle out movement. JM always has built his programs around pushing heigh weight, then flooding the muscle with blood THENNNNN a nice stretch movement.

I always do flies last. And if i'm not doing flies I do dips or wide grip stretch pushups. I honestly think a huuuge missing piece of the puzzle is DC/Fortitude stretching after you train a bodypart. MORE AND MORE studies are coming out saying that a stretch 30 seconds + helps with hypertrophy.

I train mountaindog style and I still do all the DC stretches after each bodypart.

 

[ThinkTank]

Crossovers are a finishing movement...

 

[TheOtherOne55]

I train mountaindog style and I still do all the DC stretches after each bodypart.

Me too dude. I have used a ton of JM routines and I add some Fortitude principles in there too.

Both Scott and JM are honestly the nicest and smartest dudes in the industry.

 

[RamboStallone]

I train full body, one day I do a chest press for chest and raises for delts. Next day I do a shoulder press with some type of fly or crossover for chest.

Here's what I found best, seated cable crossover machine. Sit with chest up and out, scapula retracted. Your chest has to be out forward. Then pull the handles on an angle basically like you are aiming for the ceiling. Hold and then stretch and redo. 12 reps a set, 3 sets and my pecs are ready to blow. Now the crossovers I see half the gym goers doing, yea those don't do much other then pump up the front delt maybe lol.

 

[OutToLunch]

https://www.t-nation.com/videos/tip-standing-one-arm-cable-press

 

[Fit2Serve]

best stimulation is exercise you can use most weight

flyes puts the chest in probablly its weakest/least leverage possible. so "big" weights cant be used. soooo, imo and logically, most muslce stimulation would be from exercise that allows most weight to be moved. ie, decline press, dips. you could never do flyes and i dont think one person would notice the diff.
-F2S

 

[concreter]

They are doing flies with their body weight for hundreds/thousands or more reps per set, something I can't do. I can feel my muscle fibers contracting quite a lot when I flex my arm but I do not think that there are a lot of fibers actually being recruited under significant tension that will cause growth. I think it is much the same for flies. The number of fibers have to be great enough and under enough tension for long enough for hypertrophy to occur. Plus when doing isolation movements we are taking our stabilizer muscles out of the equation which can lead to accelerated wear and tear I am betting.

I am just about using my bodyweight on these when done first...
Go to failure on every set. Change angles to recruit different fibers and
Isolation is Key for Growth.
Plus using leverage against you makes the muscle work harder...
Pressing, no matter how you preform them incorporates, Delts, trize and even back and bize to a certain Degree...So of course you will use more weight then by chest using pecs alone!

 

[headtrainer]

No it doesn't.

Put some steel on the bar, dumbbells whatever if you want thick chest.

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I respectfully disagree.It all depends on your build. If you have a dominant chest then your chest will take oon most of the work during the standard flat bench and incline bench. However, if you have dominant front delts and/or triceps, cable crossovers work the chest better. That said, even those with a genetically gifted chest can get big pecs by doing cable crossover alone at various angles. Cable crossover for the chest are like curls for the biceps.

 

[headtrainer]

flyes puts the chest in probablly its weakest/least leverage possible. so "big" weights cant be used. soooo, imo and logically, most muslce stimulation would be from exercise that allows most weight to be moved. ie, decline press, dips. you could never do flyes and i dont think one person would notice the diff.
-F2S

That's like saying side lateral raises don't add any additional muscle to the medial head of the deltoids given you do military presses. But we know that side lateral raises do in fact add additional mass to the side delts.

 

[headtrainer]

I train full body, one day I do a chest press for chest and raises for delts. Next day I do a shoulder press with some type of fly or crossover for chest.

Here's what I found best, seated cable crossover machine. Sit with chest up and out, scapula retracted. Your chest has to be out forward. Then pull the handles on an angle basically like you are aiming for the ceiling. Hold and then stretch and redo. 12 reps a set, 3 sets and my pecs are ready to blow. Now the crossovers I see half the gym goers doing, yea those don't do much other then pump up the front delt maybe lol.

I agree-"chest has to be out forward!"

 

[headtrainer]

It wont be a mass building exercise but its good for a good stretching the muscle out movement. JM always has built his programs around pushing heigh weight, then flooding the muscle with blood THENNNNN a nice stretch movement.

I always do flies last. And if i'm not doing flies I do dips or wide grip stretch pushups. I honestly think a huuuge missing piece of the puzzle is DC/Fortitude stretching after you train a bodypart. MORE AND MORE studies are coming out saying that a stretch 30 seconds + helps with hypertrophy.

What's a stretching out exercises? Sounds like YOGA, not bodybuilding. All exercises stretch the pecs, but the worst thing you can do is over-stretch because it will damage your rotator cuffs.

 

[rmtt]

I respectfully disagree.It all depends on your build. If you have a dominant chest then your chest will take oon most of the work during the standard flat bench and incline bench. However, if you have dominant front delts and/or triceps, cable crossovers work the chest better. That said, even those with a genetically gifted chest can get big pecs by doing cable crossover alone at various angles. Cable crossover for the chest are like curls for the biceps.

I see your point ...but I think a lot has to do with how you set the exercise up in the first place.

I can guarantee you that if you setup properly on the bench....you can take a lot of the delt and triceps out of it.

In fact when I bench....the muscle group that gets impacted the most after chest is actually my lats.

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[headtrainer]

I see guys doing cross-overs in my gym all the time...pretty much all they do for chest.

Physically they look the same as they did 5 years ago when doing the same thing then....well maybe a little fatter....but you know they can't be concerned about that nutrition.

I could say the same for people who live on the flat bench press.

 

[biglizard225]

It's bio mechanics.

If you do better by flys and crossovers then use those first.

It's pretty common sense. Chest is one of the easiest body parts to train in terms of putting on size, it's so straight forward. You either fly or press. Or you can do both if you like

 

[heavyhitter]

I am just about using my bodyweight on these when done first...
Go to failure on every set. Change angles to recruit different fibers and
Isolation is Key for Growth.
Plus using leverage against you makes the muscle work harder...
Pressing, no matter how you preform them incorporates, Delts, trize and even back and bize to a certain Degree...So of course you will use more weight then by chest using pecs alone!

You’re using 125 pounds for dumbell flyes?

 

[headtrainer]

I see your point ...but I think a lot has to do with how you set the exercise up in the first place.

I can guarantee you that if you setup properly on the bench....you can take a lot of the delt and triceps out of it.

In fact when I bench....the muscle group that gets impacted the most after chest is actually my lats.

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I can get set up properly on the flat bech press ( chest held high, shoulder blades down and retracted, keep elbows at 45 degree angle while lowering and lifting the bar and hitting near the to nippke line), but I still get mostly a triceps workout. However, I can shorten the stroke and take some of my triceps out of the movement by doing decline presses on a 10-15 degree angle.

 

[buck]

I am just about using my bodyweight on these when done first...
Go to failure on every set. Change angles to recruit different fibers and
Isolation is Key for Growth.
Plus using leverage against you makes the muscle work harder...
Pressing, no matter how you preform them incorporates, Delts, trize and even back and bize to a certain Degree...So of course you will use more weight then by chest using pecs alone!

With that amount of weight flies can be effective. I used to use the 95 lb. DB for flies back in the 90's when I was weighting in just over 200lbs. And got some decent results from them. But it is rare to see any one use more then 20% or so of their body weight. But to stretch a muscle out and isolate it with a heavy weight is very risky as all the stabilizer muscles including rotator's are trying to be taken out of the equation. After 30 years of watching people that rely on flies as their main movement do not get a big and thick as people who press. And the original question was can flies build as much mass as presses.