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I get a TON of questions each and every week about chest exercises. Everyone wants to build a huge chest (or just get a “bigger” one), but not everyone knows the best way to achieve this goal. So for the benefit of everyone who wants some information on this topic (and everyone wants to know “what’s your secret, Caleb?”) I’m going to provide a little help in this article. While I certainly am not ready to give all of my hard-won secrets away, here are a few of my favorite chest exercises.

First, I’d like to share a little general information for the newbies out there (hello and welcome!). Your chest muscles consist of the Pectoralis major and minor - the familiar term “pecs” is short for this. The Pectoralis major attaches to the arms and clavicles; the minor is a thinner, roughly triangular shaped muscle which is beneath the Pectoralis major.

Now, let’s start with some exercises for the upper chest and work our way down, shall we? Flyes and push-ups are old standbys for the upper chest, precisely because they are very effective for building this part of your chest. Without further ado:

Inclined Dumbbell Flyes - Start by Lying flat on your back on an incline bench. Take a dumbbell for each hand (if you have a spotter, have them hand those to you). Gripping one in each hand (duh!) and with your palms facing each other… raise the dumbbells up towards each other, meeting over your head. Then you want to squeeze your pecs for a one count (really squeeze em!) while the dumbbells are at their peak. Lower the weights under control and repeat as many times as you can.

Declined Push-Ups - You may be familiar with a regular pushup and this is the same except for one thing: your feet will be elevated by resting on a low bench. As always with push-ups, keep your back as straight as possible. Also, to get the greatest benefit and to make sure you work every part of your chest, vary your hand widths. Now there’s a lot of different exercises for the middle chest — but I’ve chosen one which provides a lot of benefit to bodybuilding newbies and pros alike.

Dips: these are great for building the mid-chest. Using a set of dip bars, position yourself with knees bent and legs crossed at the ankle. Slowly lower yourself until your chest touches the bar and then return to your starting position. Repeat as many times as you can.

Now the final part of the chest - the lower chest. This is a variation on the bench press - something which I KNOW you know how to do, but this is even more beneficial to the lower chest.

Declined Barbell Bench Press - Pretty much it’s like any bench press - except you want to grip a little wider than the width of your shoulders, lower slowly and carefully. One more poitn about this one: It’s OK to touch the bar to your chest when doing a bench press in this position - but of course as with any bench press exercise, make sure you have a spotter at all times. You’re going to repeat for your prescribed rep and set scheme for this workout.