Attn: IronFist

Wai Jia: The Kung Fu Forum Kung Fu Training and Health
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Hi,

I read your post in the thread about Lovehandles.

I lift using Pavel’s PTP methods, and I find myself arguing with people every now and then about most of the things you mentioned in your post.

Recently I got into an argument about upper/lower pecs and incline bench. The guy showed me a diagram of the pec muscle and pointed out how it’s divided into the clavicular head and the sternal head. His claim was that these heads can be targeted seperately. I made a post on the dragondoor forum about it and most of the people there seemed to think the upper and lower pecs could be targeted. Even Pavel made a fairly vague post that seemed to say that incline/decline bench did work different parts of the pec.

I ended up with nothing to really back up my argument and had to admit defeat, so I’m interested to hear your theories on upper and lower pecs.

I found an article discussing this here, you’ll probably find it interesting.

Thanks.

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To the best of my knowledge, when a muscle has multiple heads (such as the pecs), you can target the heads differently. The problem with pecs and incline and flat bench and related issues is that most people don’t know the boundaries of where the two heads are.

If a muscle has multiple heads, meaning each head has it’s own insertion point, they can be targeted differently. Something with only one head, such as abs, cannot have different sections targeted.

Problems occur when people get confused. For example, biceps have two heads. That’s why they’re biceps :slight_smile: Now, you pretty much only see one head, because the second on is underneath the first one. Some people think that you can target different parts of the outer bicep head with different exercises, but since it’s only a single head, it’s either all flexing or not flexing at all.

Ok, so here’s the deal with the pecs. I tried to find a good picture to back up my anatomical references, but I couldn’t. Anyway, the following is to the best of my knowledge. The pecs do have different heads, yes. And like I said, anything with it’s own insertion points can be targeted independently. Now, the “upper pecs” (clavical head), are very high, just a bit below your neck. When people say they’re doing incline bench to hit their upper pecs, they usually point to the upper part of their own sternocostal. The entire sternocostal head is one big head and you cannot isolate UPPER or LOWER sections of it (just like how you can’t do upper or lower abs). Here is a picture, but it’s a bit hard to follow. Put the cursor on the white part and look at the little dots appear. Put the curosr on the dots and it will give you the name of the muscle. Look at how high the “upper” pecs are.

Pic

So, does this make sense? In essence, the “upper pecs” can be targeted, but, the true “upper pecs” are NOT where most people think they are, which therefore makes their claims of where they are actually targeting false.

Hope this clarifies things. btw, if anyone has a better and more clear pec anatomy chart, please post the link.

IronFist

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can you see upper/lower pecs in this picture?
http://www.schwarzenegger.com/global/images/gallery/fs_23.jpg
ironfist, sounds like youre saying that you can target upper/lower pecs with benchpress? but, most people when they say theyre targeting the upper pecs, are pointing to somewhere else?

me and my friends have always considered upper pecs to be just below the clavicles, if they existed at all. but anyway, was my summary correct?

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Thanks, that all makes perfect sense. You’re right, most people do point a lot lower than the clavicular head, I hadn’t thought of that. I doubt that’s going to help my argument at this stage though. Luckily I’ve managed to bow out of it gracefully.

These diagrams are a little bit clearer.

Sternal Head
Clavicular Head

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Apparently, there’s EMG evidence to support the notion of working the different heads of the pect major. Decline presses work the sternal portion more, and narrow grip works the clavicular portion more. I found it mentioned along with other related stuff at http://www.abcbodybuilding.com/magazine/physiologicalaspectsofphysiquebuilding2.htm

Anybody know why they look at narrow vs. wide grip rather than specifying elbows in or elbows out?

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i havent read that yet man.. but i assume that its because they assume to the lowest common denominator.

for myself… i try and use really close grip AND close elbows for tricpes.