ash_leto wrote:bentover lateral raise
-upright lateral raise
-overhead press
-hold arms out straight to the front
This is a very nice shoulder routine. I can see it starts with the posterior deltoid, the medial deltoid, a compound movement for the entire shoulder girdle (even if overhead pressing sometimes favours the front a little too much sometimes due to form) and finally the last hits the anterior portion of the deltoid. That's probably one I avoid having heard of its predominance during overhead and bench pressing.
I am particularly interested in the lateral raise for the medial deltoid as this is the area which most increases the width of the upper body in an aesthetic fashion, and is the fibre which while it acts as a synergist to the actions of the anterior/posterior during pressing/pulling movements, is not emphasized.
The shoulder abductors, just as the hip abductors (such as the medial glutes), add mass in area which do not interfere with movement because they are on the outside of the body. They also add to the effect of the hourglass figure. They are small muscles, but one it is very easy to become vain about =)
I remember in one of the videos... not sure exactly where, but I think I remember seeing Mr. Kurz doing some lateral raises with dumbbells. Except that unlike many people he did not halt at holding the arms parallel, but did a full sweeping range of motion until the dumbbells were overhead, it was like the anatomy chart or the Vitruvian Man or something... I forget the specific word, something Leonardo drew possibly.
Many neglect the other portion of that, something about "well it's mostly traps" which I've never bought. I just think there is more than the traps at play there. It seems to me that using this full range of motion would be of greater benefit to overall mobility, especially when considering contribution to moves such as the military press and in training the medial deltoid to contribute to it.
Since I normally don't do it that way, it felt strenuous to lift that high even with bare arms or 5lb dumbbells in spite of being able to lift far heavier weights to parallel. I think this demonstrates the importance of contracting the muscles this much and going completely overhead.
It is wonderful how the shoulder rotates. When you lift in a straight line you begin with the palms facing your hips at the bottom, yet they face away from each other at the top. From the perception of lifting laterally the arms don't seem to rotate at all, yet if you lifted overhead going in a line to the front, they have changed 180 degrees through some combination of forearm pronation and internal shoulder rotation.
Alternatively, I suppose one could begin the lift with the palms facing away from the hips and ending facing together. The same thing seems to happen though, I wonder if you have to internally rotate to lift above shoulder level or if I'm getting mixed up... some word like 'circumduction' comes to mind.
I like when doing transverse abduction (rear lateral raise for post delts) to have the elbows facing up. Then tension in the triceps is required to keep the elbows extended, it's like the top of a triceps kickback, a nice pump.
No, I do not dance at the dojang. Wouldn't that get wierd looks! Only at home. Try kata in tempo to music, but don't dance.)