If you look at any superhero, any suit of armour, or even an anime robot, you’ll notice they all have something in common – an epically sized chest. What this tells us is that a large chest is an important symbol of power, heroism and manliness. While big arms make you look strong and ripped abs make you look fit – it’s a giant chest that will give you a booming voice and an imposing stance. Girls love putting their hands on the giant chest of a man who works out and if you ever want to make yourself look noble all you have to do is puff it out. Superman’s ‘S’ wouldn’t look half as impressive were he flat chested… Furthermore, the chest muscles – known as pectorals or pecs – are some of the most useful in the human body being responsible for almost every pushing movement you’ll ever need to use on a day to day basis. From pushing a car that’s broken down to punching someone in the chops, a big chest will give you the power you need. So how can you get your pecs look massive and what is the best chest exercise you can do in order to get some of that power and status yourself?

The bench press is one of the single most used exercises in any gym goer’s repertoire. This is because it’s versatile and challenging while targeting the pecs almost directly. Furthermore, it’s a compound movement which means it will work other muscles in unison and teach your body to push in a way that has real-world validity. Furthermore, by engaging so much of the upper body at once it will trigger the release of anabolic hormones in the body leading to increased production of growth hormone, testosterone and other muscle building chemicals. In short then the bench press is not only the best chest exercise but also one of the best exercises full stop and is used by many as the official measure of strength. How much can you bench?

The bench press can also be performed in a variety of ways. The standard way is using a bench and barbell. Here you lie flat on the bench with your feet planted firmly on the floor and hold the barbell at about shoulders width. From here you remove it from the rack behind you then lower the bar towards your chest and back up again. There it is – probably the best chest exercise ever. To mix it up though you can try incline or decline bench presses where you angle the bench upwards or downwards respectively. Another variation is to use the ‘Smith Machine’ which holds the weight on tracks for you meaning you don’t have to balance it with your supporting muscles and don’t need to worry about dropping the weight. The variations available are also what make the bench press the best chest exercise around.

Mack LeMouse

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