Shoulder training: the military press is not something you wing

Military press: shoulders are trained through pogre, not by bouncing

Do you need a shoulder exercise with pogre overload, or is the indirect work from bench presses and pull-ups enough? According to this method, no. A military press taken to failure, with a single main exercise and maximum recoverable volume, is the core of the routine.

The first rule is isolating the chest on chest day. No incline press as the main lift: a flat press on a converging machine protects the shoulder through its range of motion, not through scapular retraction. For the back, the centerpiece is the Yates row. The pogre involved is striking: from 45 kilos to 85 kilos for eight reps, at a body weight of 84 kilos, between November 2024 and today.

The classic objection is that so much military press steals work from the back. The counterargument is that muscle responds to the stimulus, not to the tool, and that a twice-weekly frequency with two movement patterns (rows and pull-ups) is enough to develop the lats without wrecking elbows or forearms. Skeptics demand 100-kilo lat pulldowns, 48-kilo dumbbells and weighted pull-ups; the practical remind them that ego has no place in programming.

The final anecdote: on rest days, you head out on the water. Kayaking, with good technique, recovers and develops shoulders, arms and back. If the shoulder is congested but not damaged, it improves by the next day. Everyone chooses their own faith.