NPC-HEAVYWEIGHT wrote:Always use incline for a primary heavy lifter for chest ---but to get that great shaper for the chest I always do wide semi- heavy dumbell flys on the flat bench --get a good stretch and its great for a finisher at the end of the chest workout            

halfast wrote:The question you need to answer is what type of lift (incline, flat, decline) can I lift the most.
Pretty much every time the answer will be flat bench, so does that mean that will be the best exercise to skulpt your chest? No, the key is variety.

If you are going to focus on getting big you need to make sure you have got the right program together for you, not follow what everyone else is doing in the gym.

You want to make sure you are using compound movements, not isolation exercises.
So your staple exercises are going to be flat, incline and decline presses with bar/dumbell and weighted dips.

You also want to get variety, people make the mistake of sticking with the same program too long, or sometimes not long enough to gauge if there is any progress. You want to change your program say every 5th week. That gives you long enough to see how your progess is comming along, but not too long so your body adjusts and the growth starts to slow.

So lets say your first program was:

Flat bench press 3 x 4-6 reps
Incline dumbell press 2 x 4-6
Decline bench press 2 x 4-6

Make your next program:

Incline bench press 3 x 4-6 reps
Flat dumbell press 3 x 4-6
Weighted dips 2 x 4-6

Four exercises does not sound like alot of variation when designing a program but when you alternate between barbell and dumbell and change the order in which they are done in the workout you have many combinations to choose from.

So to answer your questions in short ( yes I know I rabbit on alot) one exercise is not going to give you that sculpted chest, it is a combination of variety of compound movements plus overload, the only other factor is genetics.
Everyone has different insertion points and bone structure so work with what you have got, if your chest develops quickly in the upper portion do more decline movements to keep the growth even, or visa versa (which is the case for most people) if the lower chest develops more quickly incorporate more incline movements.            

Pureblood wrote:I've always felt in more when doing inclines.When I flat bech,I never really feel it as good and don't seem to get much of a pump,no ,matter how strict my form is...Go figure?