A popular chest exercise in many gyms, the dumbbell fly was a favourite of bodybuilding legend Arnold Schwarzenegger, providing isolated stimulus to the chest fibres. Many chest exercises, such as the bench pressing variations and dips, are compound exercises; they target the chest muscle, but also recruit the triceps and shoulders to a great degree. The dumbbell chest fly does not recruit the triceps however, and therefore places more direct stress onto the chest fibres.
How to perform the dumbbell chest fly
1. Sit on the edge of a flat weight lifting bench, grasping a set of suitable weighted dumbbells. Brings up so they are rest on your thighs.
2. Lay back onto the flat bench whilst simultaneously bringing your thighs upwards so you can bring the dumbbells above the chest with arms outstretched. Lay flat on the bench, with the dumbbells above the chest, arms outstretched, knees bent at ninety degrees, and feet planted to the ground.
3. Bend the elbows slightly, and fix the elbows in this position throughout the exercise.
4. Lower the dumbbells down an invisible arc, the opposite movement as if you were hugging something large.
5. Stop when the upper arms are parallel to the ground. Reverse the movement back to the starting position by contracting the chest muscles.
6. Repeat for repetitions.
Pre-exhaust with the chest fly
The chest fly can be performed with other equipment, not just a set of dumbbells. The exercise is also commonly performed with cables, which are often preferred due to the continual resistance, smooth motion, and greater flexibility. The “pec deck” is another variation of the fly. The great benefit of the chest fly is its isolation, with minimal secondary muscle groups involved in the exercise unlike the bench press.
Many trainees like to pre-exhaust with the chest fly. Pre-exhausting is a weight training technique in which an exercise is used before another to fatigue the target muscle. The chest fly could be used before the bench press, for example, to ensure the chest is fatigued prior to the pressing. Some trainees find the triceps and shoulders over power the chest during bench pressing, so by performing the chest fly before the pressing we can ensure the chest is fatigued and tired, and will therefore fail before the secondary muscles during the bench pressing.