Comments on: How To Build Muscular Pecs Like A Cartoon Superhero!

By: Sgt Matthew H Tartaglia Ret.

Sgt Matthew H Tartaglia Ret. — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 09:15:16 +0000

Greetings,
You are sharing your discoveries with others and I think that is great. I have been recruiting muscle fiber for some time now, 25 years actually, wow I can’t beleive I just wrote that, ti,me sure has a way of being irrelevant until you stop and look at it like I just did, oh sorry I was saying, been recruiting fibers for some 25 yrs and there are few exercies that I have not attempted, or utilyzed for rotations. I like the peck dec myself, at the same time I like cables for a standing low cable, standing out from machine a little and bringing cables up in front of me, if youcombine these two you will find that your work will actually be a lot more exhausting and like two greats who have left before sharing their bigger secrets I beleive, Mike and Ray Menntzer, “it’s not how much can you do”, they said, it is how little can I do correctly and make maximum gains thereby almost completely eliminating overtraining and also halting as much free radicals, such as lactic acid, from your bodies system, as well (check this out) you keep your immune system from breaking down very effectively. Well I don’t want to take anyones thunder, enjoyed sharing my experiences and knowledge as you all have thnks for an easy to follow fast loading and nice layout of your site. Will visit again, share more and learn more, as I say in my book that I will not mention no plugging a respect thing you know, “Your never too young or too old to learn or teach”, isn’t it the truth though!
Sarge

do the Google “Survive and Thrive All”

By: Rich

Rich — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 05:25:05 +0000

“Mark McManus in not using free weights shocker!”

🙂

Well I’m quite surprised to hear this from you but you give great advice so I’ll give it a go and see how I get on. Can’t say I’m a fan of machines though, weird angle on my shoulders and biceps. But you are right about the peak contraction, and this fits in with my aim to maximise the mind-muscle connection.

By: Charlie

Charlie — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 20:30:07 +0000

Hey Mark, what a timely article! I just read this today and until Monday had been performing lying dumbell flys. It never really hit the mark and and can relate to all the points you raised, so I switched to the pec deck. The difference was immediate and whilst I performed the reps slowly, I missed the pause. So thanks, will build that in on Monday!

By: Ahmed

Ahmed — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 15:37:36 +0000

Hi mark…

If there is 10 stars on you tube will abslte give……..love you and like your practice!!!

By: Pillai

Pillai — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 11:38:55 +0000

cant we do this exexrcise sitting upright and using dumbbells in the same motion as using the peck deck above?

By: David

David — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 02:56:19 +0000

Mark,

Two questions regarding your Bicep and Pec exercises, which also applies to any future exercises that implement the thesis.

1. How do ‘optimal’ exercises fit into larger workouts that involve suboptimal ones (like Glenn’s question regarding bench presses)? Do you do the optimal exercise first? Do you just do more sets of only optimal exercises?

2. It seems like gravity is the problem, as it only pulls down, and so there seems to be a trend towards using pulleys in some way. That seems great for single focal point exercises. How will this play out with compound exercises?

Thanks.

By: Keith Davis

Keith Davis — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 20:19:27 +0000

Hi Mark
Looks like a great piece of kit!
Looking on the net it is abour £400….
Do you know of any low cost retailers in the UK?

By: Adam

Adam — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 11:47:31 +0000

Mark – thanks for sharing and confirming something I’ve stumbled on in the last few weeks as well! I was doing quite a bit of bench dumbell flyes and dumbell press, but I definitely felt my triceps were being called in to play too much. I have since incorporated pec deck in over the last couple of weeks and now I find that I’ll only use a set or two of bench flyes to “shake things up” once in a while.

Thanks once again for being so damn helpful! Cheers from North Bay, ON, Canada!

By: cedric

cedric — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 04:43:57 +0000

Hey Mark, today at the gym I tried something a little different; instead of hammering out a set (bicep exercise), I did the whole set (up and down) very slow until I got to 8 and then from there to failure; so usually I got to about 10 or 11; however, the weight I was using was much lower had I just cranked out the set. But the burn I felt was second to none, I have not felt something like this in a while. Would it be better to perform all my exercises like this that you gave in you gave in your e-book?

By: Steve

Steve — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 04:30:24 +0000

Mark- can’t wait to try this out. The cable preacher curl is working great for me. I really appreciate your advice… I have been working out for years sorta wasting my time. I have been checking in at your site now 2 months and am seeing results!

By: Mitch

Mitch — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 02:15:11 +0000

Mark, I’m starting to see where you’re going with this and how you’re going to develop this into a full body workout. Can’t wait to see what you have up your sleeves. I have some ideas of my own that I want to try once I’m done with my current program. Thanks

By: dave

dave — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 23:37:35 +0000

i completely agree with this post – did these exact exercised for years and then switched to dumbbell presses and they just are not as hard, particularly on center and upper chest

however, be warned: if you use the variation on this equipment in which your forearm is not resting against a pad (e.g. a free hanging handle, very common, in which the elbow is free hanging), be VERY careful – i developed a form of tennis elbow using such a machine for about two years, it’s like simulating a very heavy tennis swing so to speak, so stick with the machine that looks like the one in the vid above (where the forearm has support)

By: matt

matt — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 23:03:33 +0000

Hi mark, do you mind me asking why you decided to go for the equipment you did i.e. smith machine instead of a power rack? Seems that alot of your new updates seem to be going in the direction of cable exercises but i can see where your coming from! Keep up the good work mate wicked site very helpful!!!

By: Mark McManus

Mark McManus — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 22:49:57 +0000

@Andy @Ray. Thanks guys.
@Glenn. Yes, top of the list. If you’re on TSPA, I recommend you sub the flies for these.
@Nikola. Unfortunately it isn’t optimal. It’s good but again you’ll involve your biceps. However, if you are sure that when you reach failure that it’s because of your pecs, not your biceps. it’s fine.
To help minimize it, don’t grip the handles at all. Rest your forearms against them with a slight bend at the elbows and perform the movement – try it and see how you go.
@Keith. It’s all in one and a great piece of equipment. I’m not using anything else at the moment at all (besides dumbbells). Looks like this…
https://www.eurocosm.com/Application/images/fitness-equipment/Marcy-MP3100-Smith-Machine-lg.jpg
Hope that helps 🙂

By: Keith Davis

Keith Davis — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 22:16:56 +0000

Thanks Mark
As you say, flies are good but at the point of max contraction… no resistance.
Great info but… don’t have a pec deck!
How much equipment have you got?
Perhaps we need a post about equipment.
Starting to look expensive.

By: Nikola

Nikola — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 22:14:44 +0000

As usual, wonderful and very informative article Mark. Great to hear that one of the exercises that stimulates the pecs most can be done individually, and is very much safe. Not saying at all that it should completely replace various bench presses.
I have a question regarding this one though. The gym where I practice, the machine is slightly different than the one you present. What I am talking about is this: https://goo.gl/HhBb Notice the big different in the handles. What do you think about this? The grip and arm overall arm placement will surely be moderately different than what you just presented. Your suggestion on how to handle this type of machine? Hopefully it won’t be difficult for you to explain this in written 🙂
I don’t really wanna waste my precious PCP moments doing the workout the wrong way! Keep up the great work here… you keep me going article by article!

By: Andy

Andy — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 21:53:21 +0000

I’m one of those guys who loves asking “Why?,” so I’m really enjoying these explanations!

By: Glenn

Glenn — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 21:49:45 +0000

This seems out of left field…?

So are you favoring the pec dec over flat dumbell presses, inclined dumbell presses, or dumbell flyes (your TSPA routine) as part of your 7-9 sets for chest? Is it at the top of the list for chest now? Thanks

By: Ray

Ray — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 21:46:05 +0000

Really lovin the vids Mark. Thanks for all you are doing here!
Very helpful indeed.