They give you a great pump. And no one can deny that they isolate the chest perfectly. It’s not too much to say that you will not put together your best chest workout without them.
I have a bit of a thing about how they should be done. I hate to see someone wasting their time in the gym with a fly machine, for example. What an incredible waste of time, compared to standard flys, not to mention that any machine is going to limit your range of movement, and lock you into a pattern. Why is this so bad? Do a Google search on repetitive movement injury and see…..
Here is how you should be doing your flys:
- Lay on a flat or incline bench while holding your dumbbells up close to your chest
- Extend your arms out and upward, keeping a bit of an arc in them. Your elbows should not be straight. If they are, you will be putting too much stress on them at the bottom of the movement.
- Lower the weights out to your side, at a deliberate pace. Exactly how fast depends on which school of thought you subscribe to vis a vis lifting speed, but most people find that a 2 count is good.
- Pause briefly at the bottom of the arc, then smoothly bring your arms together in front of (or above) your chest.
- If you like, you can pause here and “squeeze” the pecs in an attempt to create an inner chest workout but I have found that this gets me nothing except a sore chest the next day, if taken too far.
Remember that the fly is an assistance exercise. It is not going to replace presses, and it should probably not be the first exercise in your chest routine.
One variation that I have used in the past is the combination fly and press. This makes for a great finisher, and if you have been feeling like you’ve lost that “mind – muscle connection” with your chest exercises, this will bring it back big time.
- Set up to do your flys as above.
- At the end of your first rep, bring the dumbbells down to your side, to the beginning position of a dumbbell press.
- Do one. At the top, do another fly
- Repeat until you cry
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
A great guide! What muscle groups in the chest does this exercise target, what about the variation? I’m looking to beef up the middle part of my chest, will these help flesh out my routine?
Hi Bob,
Glad you liked the article.
The only muscle group you are after is the pectoralis. There is a major and minor to this, but any chest exercise you can do for one will attack the other.
Whether you have pecs that attach to your sternum near the middle of your chest is what determines how they look.
The good news is that you can structure your chest routing so that you are emphasizing the upper chest or the lower chest.
This is because a routine that emphasizes the upper chest will also hit your anterior deltoids and all the small supporting muscle groups that assist with lifting in that direction. Here’s a simple workout for upper chest:
Incline bench presses
Incline dumbbell flys
Pushups with feet raised
Here is what a routine for lower chest would look like:
Flat bench presses
Dumbbell Flys
Decline Presses
You could also throw dips in there, to give your triceps something to keep them from becoming bored.
Hope this helps!