Get shoulders like coconuts with this exercise

Shoulder Birds can be incorporated into any upper body training routine. It is considered an accessory exercise to the large muscles.

What is?

The shoulder fly, also known as the rear deltoid raise or reverse dumbbell fly, is a training exercise that targets the muscles of the upper back and shoulder muscles, particularly the rear deltoids. Rear delt raises are useful isolation exercises that can prepare us for more complex compound exercises like deadlifts, bench presses, and inverted rows.

With proper technique, this rear deltoid exercise can also engage the triceps, rhomboids, infraspinatus, and other scapular muscles around the shoulder blades. It’s a shoulder exercise that can be done with dumbbells, a cable machine, or a machine of chest. This move involves lifting weights to your sides in an arc motion.

The main target of the exercise is the rear deltoid muscles , which are located at the back of the shoulders. But this move will also strengthen your traps (the muscles around your neck and upper back) and your rhomboids (the muscles between your shoulder blades).

Anyone dealing with shoulder pain or impingement should avoid doing shoulder birds. It’s probably best to skip the incline version of this exercise if you also have lower back pain. Doing this movement standing up with a pulley machine may be more comfortable.

Technique

To get the most out of this exercise and keep your shoulders safe, good posture is key. The step by step instructions are:

1. We will start standing with our feet hip-width apart and hold a dumbbell in each hand.
2. We will push the hips back and bend the knees slightly while leaning the torso forward with a flat back. We will maintain this hip hinge position throughout the exercise.
3. We will let the weights hang towards the ground with the elbows slightly bent and the palms of the hands facing each other.
4. Keeping your shoulders away from your ears and with your elbows slightly bent, lift the weights out to your sides until they’re in line with your shoulders.
5. We will lower the dumbbells with control.

To ensure that we are activating the correct muscle, we will keep the movement slow and controlled. The rear deltoid is quite a difficult muscle to train, so technique is important when doing this exercise. It’s best to start with a pair of light dumbbells and do 10 reps. Then, as we get more comfortable with the exercise, we can increase the weight.

Benefits

There are several advantages to doing shoulder birds, beyond strengthening this joint.

Improves strength and endurance

The rear deltoid raise increases strength and endurance. Unlike other isolation exercises (movements that target a single muscle), this strength move works multiple muscles in your upper body at once.

In addition, when we perform it in an inclined position, we also work the quadriceps and the abdomen.

improved posture

If you spend a lot of time hunched over your phone or computer, you’re likely to have some posture issues, including a rounded upper back. Having weak muscles in the upper back and back of the shoulders aggravates the problem.

Strengthening your rear can help correct muscle imbalances to improve posture. That change in position can also help relieve shoulder pain and headaches.

stronger bones

Weight lifting exercises stress the bones. This may sound like a bad thing, but it can actually increase bone density, which lowers your risk of developing conditions like osteoporosis.

So shoulder birds will also strengthen the bones from within. These micro-impacts will make the shoulder joint more stable and less prone to injury.

Common mistakes

There are some common mistakes that people make when doing the exercise. We must be attentive to the posture to avoid these errors.

curve the spine

To target the rear delts, we must maintain a long, neutral back. But many people round their backs. This position alone can be difficult to maintain due to the demand on the hip and core muscles. We can also unload additional, potentially painful stress on the lower back.

If you’re having a hard time maintaining this hinge position, it’s recommended to do this exercise lying face down on an incline bench to provide additional support for your core.

straighten elbows

Even though your arms reach shoulder height with this exercise, you don’t want to make a perfect “T” shape. Locking your elbows can add unwanted stress to your joints, leading to long-term pain or injury.

Instead, it is advised to maintain a micro flexion in the elbows while lifting the weights to avoid joint damage.

lifting too much weight

It is highly recommended that we do not start carrying a lot of weight with the shoulder birds. Control is the goal. If we’re really trying to isolate the rear delts, we want to make sure the weight isn’t too heavy. If the weight is too heavy, we will have to use other muscles to complete the movement.

We’ll start with 5-pound dumbbells until we’re sure we can move more weight with good technique. We will try to increase the weight in half kilo increments.

use the boost

We also don’t want to rely on momentum to lift the dumbbells. During this exercise, you don’t want to feel your knees sink and your back rise with each rep. Instead, we will focus on keeping our back totally stable with a strong core.

We can modify the exercise on a bench if we have difficulty keeping the upper body stable in the incline position.

shrug

When we get fatigued, posture inevitably begins to falter. Often, after too many repetitions of this exercise, the muscles of the upper back and neck (trapezius) begin to take over, lifting up to the ears as we raise the weights.

It’s best to lower your rep range and focus on squeezing your shoulder blades down and together. If we notice that the shoulders rise, it is probably better to finish the series.

Modifications

There are a few variations that can help reduce or increase the intensity of shoulder birds.

use a bank

We can set up an exercise bench with a low incline and lean our chest over the bench with our feet planted on the ground around the seat. The bank gives us a little more stability and removes the possibility of taking advantage of the momentum. We can also use a flat bench.

Seated

If our legs or lower back get tired, we will try to do the exercise sitting down. We’ll simply sit at the end of a bench or chair, lean forward with a flat back, and do the lifts. The posture for sitting shoulder birds is slightly different than what we would do when standing:

• We will place the dumbbells near the edge of a bench.
• We’ll sit on the edge of the bench so we can keep our knees together.
• We will lean forward until the torso is almost parallel to the ground.
• We’ll bend over for dumbbells.
• We will start lifting.

pulley machine

If you have lower back pain, doing this move from a standing position can help. To work the rear delts while standing, we’ll use a pulley machine.

To set up a reverse pulley machine fly, we’ll need two cables side by side, set to the highest setting. With no accessories attached, grab the right cable with your left arm and the left cable with your right, keeping your arms in an X shape in front of you at shoulder height.

Then we will simply spread the arms apart until the fists are in line with the shoulders. We will maintain a slight bend in the elbows at all times.