Knowing how to get a defined chest and working towards one is an aesthetically appealing transformation any man or woman can undertake. It promotes self-confidence and helps you feel great about the exercises and physical labor you can accomplish without an issue.
How to Get a Defined Chest
Figuring out how to tone your chest starts by understanding the areas of your upper body you need to focus on. Through targeted workouts using the right amount of weight, it’s important to sculpt your upper and lower chest, along with getting a defined line between your pectoral muscles.
Following nutritional guidelines to burn away body fat on your chest and back is also key for chiseling out your upper body.
Pick the Right Weight
One of the biggest mistakes you can make for how to get a ripped chest is to lift too much weight. Lifting a weight that is too challenging will not make your muscles develop quicker. Doing this puts you at risk for tearing muscles and fatiguing your body quicker than it should.
When it comes to how to tone chest muscles, the goal is to steadily progress. Add 2.5 pound plates to slowly increase the intensity to the exercises. This will also help reduce the risk of plateauing and causing your muscles to slow (or stop) in their growth.
Do Compound Exercises
A fast way to build mass in your chest is by incorporating compound exercises into your workout routine. Most compound exercises that target your chest muscles will be bench press variations.
Bench presses create more muscle activity in your chest compared to other moves. Along with activating your chest, bench presses also work muscles such as your anterior deltoid and your triceps. These exercises will also aid in burning more calories and challenging your cardiovascular system.
Focus on Posture with Back Training
Even if you have a defined chest, it won’t look at prominent if you don’t work on your posture. Slouched shoulders decrease the overall size of your chest visually. Rather than having your chest puffed out, rounded shoulders can cause your chest to curve inward.
When looking for ways on how to get a stronger chest, it’s common to focus on exercises that only target the chest. In doing this, though, it can negatively affect your posture. To successfully get a bigger chest, your back muscles must also be properly worked out.
This helps create balance and makes your chest look even larger. Include exercises such as pull ups and push up rows to improve your posture and strengthen your back.
Eat Properly
Maintaining a proper diet is key to losing weight and keeping it off, especially in your chest and stomach region. After all, if you bring your body to a caloric deficit but continue to eat unhealthy food, your body will still start to collect fat and you’ll notice your definition start to slip.
A proper diet for someone working out and trying to get a defined chest will consist of about 15-20% lean meats, 50-60% carbohydrates, and 15-20% unsaturated fat. This will give you the building blocks your body needs to build muscle and burn body fat at the same time.
Men and women learning how to get a stronger chest will find that eating good, lean meat is key to understanding how to build your chest fast. You’ll be killing two birds with one stone by eating properly and maintaining a simple diet such as this one. Remember, definition comes from both removing body fat and building muscle at the same time.
Chest Building Exercises
Below, we’ve shared three main exercises that are important to add into your chest days to help define and sculpt your upper body muscles.
Do Bench Press Variations
When looking for how to get a toned chest, it’s crucial that you do not only target one group of muscles in your upper body. If you do this, your chest can become unbalanced in appearance. Additionally, it can lead to back and shoulder problems.
To evenly workout your chest, do various bench presses. When it comes to how to tighten the chest for men and women, barbell bench presses are probably one of the top known workouts to include in your routine. There are three main types of bench presses to focus on:
- Flat bench press
- Decline bench press
- Incline bench press
Incorporate these presses into your routine each week to ensure you’re working out your chest muscles from all different angles.
Perform Cable Flys
With presses, it can be hard to develop the inside pectoral muscles. To combat this, incorporate the cable fly into your chest workout. Along with stimulating your pecs, it will also target your deltoids.
One of the biggest benefits of the cable fly is that it places tension on your muscles throughout the whole movement. This gives you a pump and helps target and grow muscles that presses don’t. Additionally, if bench presses cause discomfort in your joints, performing cable flys can be a great alternative to help alleviate some joint pressure.
Include Push-Ups in Your Routine
Push-ups are basic, yet effective moves you can’t forget about when working out. If you’re coming up with a routine for how to work out your chest at home, this exercise is a great option because it requires minimal to no equipment and very little space.
Push-ups focus on targeting your pecs, triceps, and shoulders. They also engage the abdominal muscles and help to strengthen the lower back. If standard push-ups become too easy, there are numerous variations you can try:
- Clap push-up
- One-armed push-up
- Decline push-up
- TRX push-up
- Diamond push-up
Conclusion
As you can see, getting a defined chest is really just a matter of patience and discipline. You don’t have to lift super heavyweights or become the bulkiest man or woman at the gym to get ripped pectoral muscles and see that defined chest you’ve always wanted. Burn calories and eat healthily while maintaining a good chest exercise routine, and you’ll begin to see results.