The Ultimate Guide: Push Day
Imagine setting a goal to improve yourself in the gym, full of motivation and determination. You’ve got a clear vision of where you want to be, and you’re ready to put in the work. But as soon as you step foot into the gym, an overwhelming wave of self-doubt hits you. The noise, the equipment, the seasoned lifters around you—it all feels like too much. You're left wondering if you're doing things right, or if you're even capable of reaching your goals.
This is a common experience for many gym-goers, whether you’re a beginner or someone who’s been working out for a while. The truth is, it’s easy to feel lost or unsure of what to focus on when you walk into the gym, especially on a "push day". But here's the good news:with a structured plan, you can build confidence, eliminate guesswork, and effectively work toward losing fat, gaining muscle, and enhancing muscular size.
In this guide, we’ll break down a push day workout that’s adaptable for all fitness levels and designed to help you build strength, grow muscle, and maximize your gym time. Whether you’re new to strength training or refining your workout strategy, this plan will give you the tools to achieve a balanced, effective routine. Ready to transform your training sessions? Let’s jump into building your most effective push day workout routine.
What Is A Push Day & Why Is It Important?
Have you ever struggled to push a packed trolley through a supermarket aisle, feeling every turn become more challenging as your arms tire? Or perhaps you've reached for something on a high shelf, only to feel your arms can't quite stretch far enough. These everyday tasks highlight the importance of your chest, shoulders, and triceps—the very muscles targeted in a push day workout. Focusing on push exercises promotes balanced strength development, enhances functional strength for daily activities, and improves overhead strength and stability. Whether you're working on muscular strength, aiming for muscle growth, or looking to lose fat and gain muscle, a push day workout routine helps improve your upper body gains and muscular size, making routine tasks easier and less exhausting. Plus, it allows for proper recovery and rest for other muscle groups, contributing to overall fitness.
Muscle Growth: How Effort and Intensity Impact Size and Strength
When it comes to muscle growth, putting in the right amount of effort during your push day workout is key. Training intensity plays a crucial role, as muscles won’t adapt or grow without sufficient challenge. In a push day workout, focusing on exercises that target the chest, shoulders, and triceps requires you to push your muscles to their limit. Reps in reserve (RIR) is a great indicator— the fewer reps you have left, the closer you are to failure, which stimulates muscle growth. But there are 2 main reasons people get in the gym, for strength and size. So how do we know the right amount of effort needed for each on a push day?
Training for Muscular Size: To grow muscle size, you need to focus on lifting moderate weights with higher reps. The goal is to challenge your muscles in a way that causes them to grow over time. Aim for a weight that lets you do around 8-12 reps/set. Once you can easily hit the top end of that range, increase the weight slightly. By keeping the reps higher and pushing your muscles to work hard, you'll help them grow bigger and stronger. This is usually done with 60-70% of your 1RM (1 rep max, the maximum amount of weight you can lift for just one repetition of an exercise with proper form)
Training for Muscular Strength: To build muscular strength, you need to challenge your body with heavy weights. This happens when you lift a weight that's tough enough that you can only manage about 4-6 reps before you reach failure. As you get stronger, aim to do 8-10 reps with that same weight. Once you can do that, it's time to increase the weight and start the process over, gradually building up your strength. This is usually done with 80-90% of your 1RM (1 rep max, the maximum amount of weight you can lift for just one repetition of an exercise with proper form)
For a deeper dive into how to effectively train for both strength and size, especially with exercises that align with your push day workout routine, check out our comprehensive guide on Building Muscle (Hypertrophy). This blog will provide you with detailed strategies on how to target muscle growth and strength development, that will elevate your training.
Push Day Workout Routine
Below is a breakdown of a push day workout routine designed to target key upper body muscles. Whether you're aiming to build muscular size, muscular strength, or enhance upper body gains, this workout plan incorporates both compound and isolation exercises. To maximize muscle growth and optimize your efforts, make sure to focus on your RIR (reps in reserve) and track AMRAP (as many reps as possible) during your workout.
KEYWORDS
AMRAP: As Many Reps As Possible—push yourself to the limit in each set.
RIR: Reps In Reserve—the fewer reps you have left before failure, the greater the intensity, promoting muscle growth.
Compound Exercise: Targets multiple muscle groups (e.g., chest, shoulders, and triceps) in a single movement, maximizing muscle engagement and strength.
Isolation Exercise: Focuses on one muscle group at a time, allowing for concentrated muscle development.
If you're looking to take your muscle-building efforts to the next level, dive deeper into structuring efficient routines on our other blog here.
Complete Warm-Up and Warm-Down Guide for Push Day Workouts
Before diving into your push day workout, don't forget the importance of a proper warm-up and cool-down routine. A well-executed warm-up primes your body for intense exercise, improves mobility, and helps prevent injuries, while a cool-down aids recovery and keeps your joints healthy for future sessions. Proper warm-up and cool-down strategies are key to maximizing performance and supporting muscle growth.
Warm-Up Routine:
General Warm-Up (5-10 minutes):
Light cardio (treadmill, bike, or elliptical) to increase heart rate.
Dynamic Stretching (5 minutes):
Arm Circles: 2 sets of 20 reps
Shoulder Swings: 2 sets of 15 reps
Chest Openers: 2 sets of 15 reps
Tricep Stretch: Hold 15-20 seconds per arm
Activation (5-10 minutes):
Scapular Push-Ups: 2 sets of 10 reps
Band Pull-Aparts: 2 sets of 15 reps
Resistance Band Chest Press: 2 sets of 12 reps
Cool-Down Routine:
Light Cardio (3-5 minutes):
Walk or cycle at low intensity to bring heart rate down.
Static Stretching (5-10 minutes):
Chest Stretch (Doorway): 20-30 seconds
Triceps Stretch: 20-30 seconds per arm
Shoulder Stretch (Cross-Body): 20-30 seconds per side
Side Neck Stretch: 15-20 seconds per side
Foam Rolling (Optional, 5-10 minutes):
Focus on chest, shoulders, and triceps to release tightness.
Bonus Breakdown: Why Each Push Day Exercise Works
In this section we will break down why the workout works and what it sets out to achieve. The purpose of this workout is to focus on muscular fatigue and not adding in pointless exercises, so that you can save time and still get an all rounded workout.
Dumbbell Bench Press (1 set of 8-12 reps, followed by 2 sets of 4-6 reps)
Purpose:
The first set (8-12 reps) warms up your muscles, preparing them for the heavier work ahead.
Starting with higher reps prevents premature fatigue, allowing you to lift heavier in the subsequent sets (4-6 reps).
This approach primes the chest and triceps, enabling you to challenge your body’s strength without compromising performance.
Incline Dumbbell Press (2 sets of 4-6 reps)
Purpose:
The incline angle targets the upper chest and shoulders, hitting fibers that the flat bench press doesn’t fully engage.
Using heavy dumbbells maximizes the challenge, helping to fatigue the chest muscles further and promote muscle growth.
Chest Flys (3 sets of as many reps as possible)
Purpose:
After the compound presses, chest flys isolate the chest muscles, providing a chance to push them to failure.
This ensures that all the muscle fibers in the chest are thoroughly fatigued, stimulating muscle growth and improving chest development.
Triceps Pushdowns (3 sets to failure)
Purpose:
Isolating the triceps allows you to fully fatigue the muscle after the pressing movements, ensuring all aspects of the triceps are targeted.
Using a pushdown helps maximize tricep activation without additional strain on the shoulders or chest.
Shoulder Isolation (Lateral Raises, 3 sets to failure)
Purpose:
By this point in the workout, your front delts have been heavily worked through pressing, especially during the incline dumbbell press.
Lateral raises focus on the side delts, ensuring complete shoulder development by specifically targeting the neglected middle part of the deltoid.
Conclusion
A well-structured push day workout is essential for building strength, muscle growth, and functional fitness. By focusing on compound exercises like the dumbbell bench press and incline dumbbell press, as well as isolation movements such as chest flys and tricep pushdowns, you can target your chest, shoulders, and triceps effectively. Remember, effort and intensity are key for muscle growth—whether you're aiming for strength or size. Don’t forget to warm up and cool down properly to prevent injuries and enhance recovery.
Now that you have a clear push day workout routine, it’s time to take action! Incorporate this plan into your gym sessions, stay consistent, and challenge yourself to push your limits. Share this routine with a friend who might need some guidance or motivation on their fitness journey, and together, push toward your goals. Keep striving for progress, and remember: your strongest self is just one workout away.
For personalised advice and support, consider working with a fitness professional or joining a community of like minded individuals. At FITFAMCO, we offer personal training services and nutrition coaching to help you reach your fitness goals faster and more effectively. Proper nutrition is essential for muscle growth, and our experts are here to guide you every step of the way.
Contact us today to get started on your journey to a healthier, stronger you!
— Written by our trainer, Mark.