---
title: 'The #1 Workout To Grow WIDER Shoulders Fast!'
source: 'https://youtube.com/watch?v=EO9Z1PezSxE'
video_id: 'EO9Z1PezSxE'
date: 2026-06-28
duration_sec: 405
---

# The #1 Workout To Grow WIDER Shoulders Fast!

> Source: [The #1 Workout To Grow WIDER Shoulders Fast!](https://youtube.com/watch?v=EO9Z1PezSxE)

## Summary



## Transcript

What's up guys? Jeff Cavalere,
athletics.com. So, if bigger, wider
delts are what you're after, the good
news is you can do it with just
dumbbells. As a matter of fact, I'm
going to prove it to you today by giving
you a full workout at the end of this
video to make sure that it happens.
Because if I were to take out this
circle and diminish the size of the
front and rear delts, well, look what
just happened to the roundedness of the
middle delt. It gets flattened out. But
when you're really starting to think
about building big shoulders, you really
have to start thinking beyond just
shoulders or push day. As a matter of
fact, there's plenty of opportunity to
work them again on back or pull day. And
when you're looking to build those wider
shoulders, the volume is going to add up
to help you to get them. So, of course,
on a push day, those non-direct shoulder
exercises like bench press, push-ups,
and divs that you're doing for your
chest are going to have a heavy overlap
in terms of helping that front delt of
yours to grow. So, some of the onus for
that direct front delt work is removed,
however, not completely, which is why
you're going to still want to make sure
you include it when you're training your
shoulders directly. But it's here that
we have the greatest opportunity to
increase the size of our shoulders by
not overlooking that second chance to
increase the volume of the most
underdeveloped two heads of your
shoulders right now, the middle and rear
delts. So exercises like the chest
supported row that allow for the elbows
to be flared out to the sides to work
more of the upper back or in this case
heavily load the rear delts is something
you're not going to want to miss. The
high pull is one of the best ways to
safely overload the middle delts and
again sneak it in under the guise of
being a generic pull exercise. but again
with heavy focus on building up those
middle and rear delts. And of course,
one of the most powerful rear delt
exercises of all time, the seated cable
row is one that you have a great
opportunity to make sure you're
including in your back or pull day
workouts. And just like there's no
skipping leg day, there's no skipping
face pulls on leg day as yet another
great opportunity to bring up that rear
delta view of yours to make sure that
you're looking round no matter where
someone looks at you from. But it's on
the dedicated shoulder day that the real
gains are possible because if you're not
devoting at least some portion of your
effort to be focused on developing all
three heads of the delts, you're not
going to develop them fully. So, we like
to kick this off with a dumbbell
standing overhead press. Now, if you're
doing a push day, then you already got
this covered on that day. But, if you
have shoulders split apart on their own,
then I recommend starting with a basic
dumbbell standing press. The reason why
I like the standing variation here is
because it's the safest for your
shoulders. It's uninterrupted by the
back of the bench in terms of normal
shoulder biomechanics. The bottom line
is it's a good way to kick off your
workout. We just do two to three sets
with a weight that will cause you to
fail in the 8 to 10 rep range. Next, I
want you to move right into that focused
front delt work. Well, here we can make
that happen by doing a dumbbell iso
alternating front raise. And there's a
couple key points here. If you just
isolate the front delt to do that
initial lift, you can then power the
dumbbell up the rest of the way. but
you're guaranteeing that you're engaging
and recruiting the front delt to the
task. That's a good way to start the
exercise and a good way to ensure that
you're getting the maximum development
of that front delt and the roundness.
And all we need is one to two really
good hard sets with a weight that will
cause failure in the 10 to 12 rep range.
And we start with something very similar
in terms of concept, the upper limit
lateral. We sit down on the floor with a
lighter pair of dumbbells, much lighter
than usual. And all we have to do is
start with those dumbbells one inch off
the ground and then lift them up out to
the sides. Do not let the traps take
over. This alone is going to feel unique
to a lot of you. When you get to the
top, give that little extra squeeze and
then lower back down. But don't let the
dumbbells touch the floor. This constant
tension will light up your middle delts
and it will teach you most of all how to
engage them. And once you know how to do
that, you can grow them. This is a great
way to do it. We do it with three sets
of a weight that causes failure in about
the 12 to 15 range. Again, going a
little bit lighter here. What we do
light, we can also do heavy. And we can
also do explosively. That's why I like
to do another lateral raise, but this
time the dumbbell cheat lateral raise.
And instantly, I can grab a heavier
dumbbell here. And I'm not so focused on
the isolation because here I know that
if I could apply heavier loads and a
more overloaded eccentric portion of the
exercise, thinking about how you could
actually fight or stop the dumbbell on
the way down, knowing of course that the
heavy weight is not going to allow you
to. Then I'm getting a different
stimulus for growth. Here you're doing
three sets of six to eight to failure on
each arm to make sure you get that done.
But now we got to complete that 180 and
get all the way around to the back to
work on those rear delts. And again, if
you've listened to my advice already,
you figured out a way to work them into
the other workouts of the week. But here
on dedicated shoulder day, what are we
going to do? We start off with one of my
favorite. It's the rear delt row. And
this variation of a dumbbell raises is
actually really effective at hitting
that rear delt. And mostly because we're
doing it with extension as the main
goal. We're looking for just two to
three sets here in that 10 to 12 rep
range on each arm. And from there, I
want you to put that final nail in those
rear delts by doing something we call
the dumbbell hip hugger. And this is
actually a great exercise for tying
together the abduction of the middle
delt and the extension focus of the rear
delt to hit both of these more
underserved areas of the delts in one
shot. Your elbows would likely drift
backwards and your elbows out to the
side to give you the effect of what a
hip hugger would feel like. If you do
this right, you will feel one of the
most intense contractions on both the
middle and rear delts. perform two to
three sets with a weight that will cause
failure in a higher 12 to 15 rep range
to ensure those gains come. And for the
slightly masochistic out there, you do
have one extra little option if you're
just looking to try a little final
finisher. We call it the iron cross
finisher. And all you're going to do is
take a slightly lighter pair of
dumbbells and you're going to alternate
between these front raised isometric
holes and these lateral raised isometric
holes. And the nice thing about it
positioned at this point is the
isometric strength that you have is
going to always exceed your concentric
abilities. So if you have anything left
at the tank at all at this point, you
likely have the ability to perform this.
Continue to try to rep this out until
you can no longer control a repetition
in either direction. I posted myself
doing this in my shoulder workout on
Instagram. If you haven't already done
so, make sure you follow me over there
as well. Guys, I can tell you from
experience, it's certainly a ball
buster, but it's also a ball builder
when it comes to building out those
rounder delts. Guys, remember, don't
just focus on the middle delt when it's
the wider shoulders that you want.
Remember, it's rounder shoulders are
going to hold the key to the gains that
you're after. In the meantime, here's a
screenshot of the workout I just gave
you, exercise by exercise, so you can go
and try it out for yourselves to see
just how it works for you. In the
meantime, if you're looking for a high
quality protein to support your hard
efforts in the gym, Athleen RX Pro 30G
provides a whopping 30 grams of protein
per serving at a coste effective cents
per gram. You can find it over at
athleenrx.com. If you haven't done so,
guys, make sure you click subscribe and
turn on notifications so you never miss
a video when we put one out. There's
also a quick dumbbell chest workout you
might want to check out as well. You can
do that right here. All right, guys.
Good luck with this one. I'll see you
soon.