---
title: 'The Upper Body Workout I Followed For My 1 Year Transformation'
source: 'https://youtube.com/watch?v=928aRhhPP8I'
video_id: '928aRhhPP8I'
date: 2026-06-28
duration_sec: 0
---

# The Upper Body Workout I Followed For My 1 Year Transformation

> Source: [The Upper Body Workout I Followed For My 1 Year Transformation](https://youtube.com/watch?v=928aRhhPP8I)

## Summary

This video presents the exact upper body workout routine used for a year, which resulted in significant muscle gains. The creator explains the specific exercises and techniques he credits for his transformation, emphasizing progressive overload and training to failure.

### Key Points

- **1-Year Transformation** [0:00] — The creator's upper body workout over the last 365 days transformed his physique, adding 2.7 lbs of lean mass measured by DEXA and increasing bicep peak measured by ultrasound after 15 years of natural training.
- **Incline Barbell Bench Press for Chest** [0:30] — The most effective chest exercise for him was the incline barbell bench press. It targets the chest and front delts, with bonus triceps and side delt activation, and a 45-degree incline grows upper pecs without sacrificing mid/lower pec growth compared to flat bench.
- **Key Chest Technique Cue** [1:54] — Used a slightly narrower grip to increase range of motion, hitting more triceps without losing chest tension, and took the last set to failure every time, dumping the weight forward onto safety bars.
- **Seated Cable Fly for Chest Isolation** [2:45] — Seated cable flyes stretch the pecs more than compound presses. Technique includes setting the bench far out, controlling the negative, squeezing elbows together, and avoiding letting elbows drop to maintain tension on the pecs. Last set to failure.
- **Weighted Pull-Ups for Back Growth** [4:13] — Weighted pull-ups were the biggest contributor to back gains, promoting pull-ups to S tier. They engage the entire back, lats, mid traps, rhomboids, low back, biceps, and core. The creator progressed from 30 lb for 6 reps to 60 lb for 6 reps over the year.
- **Pull-Up Technique Cues** [5:22] — Think about getting the chest to the bar rather than the chin, and pull with the back by driving elbows down and in. Use liquid chalk and straps to avoid grip limiting gains. Don't worry about feeling the lats; consistent overload will grow them.
- **High Cable Lateral Raises for Side Delts** [6:54] — High cable lateral raises target side delts for a wider X-frame look. Cables provide consistent tension throughout the range of motion, with peak tension when the arm is at a 90-degree angle to the cable. A recent study found cables and dumbbells grow delts similarly.
- **Lateral Raise Mistake** [8:48] — The most common mistake is shrugging the weight up, which lets upper traps take over. Instead, sweep the weight out, not up. Use a wall drill to feel the side delts engaging.
- **Deficit Pendlay Row for Back** [9:16] — Deficit Pendlay rows activate the entire back from neck to hips. Standing on a bumper plate increases range of motion for a deeper lat stretch. For hypertrophy, keep the positive explosive but control the negative; use lengthened partials on the last set.
- **Pendlay Row Technique** [10:22] — The biggest mistake is not getting fully horizontal; a torso parallel to the floor forces gravity to work against scapular retractors. Use straps or chalk to avoid grip limiting back gains. Last set to failure.
- **Cable Overhead Triceps Extension** [10:58] — Cable overhead triceps extensions are likely the most effective tricep exercise, causing 50% more long head growth and 40% more overall growth than push downs. Set up the cable high, squat underneath, and use legs to lift into position to save energy.
- **Biceps Curl Comparison** [11:46] — A study comparing Bayesian cable curls to preacher curls found non-significant trends favoring Bayesian curls. The creator includes both in his routine: Bayesian curls on upper body day, preacher and hammer curls on pull day. All to failure.

### Conclusion

The creator recommends focusing on compound exercises with progressive overload, taking sets to failure, and using specific technique cues like a narrower grip on presses and driving elbows down on pull-ups. A full upper/lower push/pull/legs program is available.

## Transcript

This is the upper body workout that I
used for the last 365 days. And it
transformed my physique. It took my back
from looking like this to this and my
chest and shoulders from looking like
this to this. And even after 15 years of
natural training, I still managed to
gain 2.7 lbs of lean mass measured by
DEXA. And I even added some extra peak
to my biceps measured by ultrasound. And
in this video, I'll show you the exact
exercises and technique cues that made
the biggest difference for me this year.
Let's get into it. I think this was
hands down the most effective exercise
for growing my pecs this year. The
incline barbell bench press. It mostly
targets the chest and front delts with
some bonus triceps and even side delt
activation since the side delts help
stabilize the bar from drifting forward
or backward. I picked the incline
barbell press over the incline dumbbell
press because of the barbell's overload
potential. I ran this program for a full
year, and while dumbbells are great,
once you get pretty strong, they become
big, bulky, and awkward. But you can
always add a little weight to the
barbell. And while I am a fan of the
Smith machine, I went with free weights
here to get more out of the stabilizing
muscles, especially those side delts.
There's a growing trend of only doing
the most stable machine-based version of
lifts. But I think that's gone a bit too
far. Even for pure hypertrophy, freee
compound lifts still have a lot of
value. And research backs this up. An
incline barbell bench press clearly
grows your chest. In fact, a 45 degree
incline press will hit your upper pecs
harder while still hitting your mid and
lower pecs just as hard as a flat bench.
The study from Chavez and colleagues
found that the incline press grew the
mid and lower pecs just as well as a
flat bench, but the incline press had
that added bonus of growing the upper
pecs more. The incline press is also
very timeefficient because it kills two
birds with one stone. you really don't
need both a flat press and a vertical
press if you just meet in the middle
with a 45°ree incline. Now, the main
technique cue that I focused on this
year was using a slightly narrower grip
to increase the range of motion, and
that'll hit a bit more triceps without
losing chest tension. And of course, I
took the last set to absolute failure
every time. I never use a spotter to
help me get the weight up. I wanted to
give it my all this year and then just
fail on my own accord for scientific
consistency. Failing on a heavy compound
lift can be a bit intimidating at first,
even for experienced lifters. But
there's really nothing to be scared of.
Just press until you can't press
anymore, and then dump the weight
forward onto the safety bars. Now, the
most common mistake I see here is
bouncing the bar off your chest. Yes,
you can lift more weight this way, but
remember, progressive overload is when
you add a little weight or a rep from
week to week, and that only counts if
your technique stays consistent. So,
control the descent, do a slight pause
on your chest, and then press the weight
up and slightly back. Okay, next is
where I slow things down a little bit
more and put all the tension exactly
where I want it, on the pecs. The seated
cable fly will also stretch the pecs
more than the heavy compound press that
we did first. For these, set a bench
pretty far out in front. Grab both
handles, hold them tight to your chest,
and walk out in front of the bench. As
you sit down, you don't want to get
pulled backward, so ease yourself into
the seat. Then press the handles forward
into the starting position. And from
there, begin your first rep with a nice
and controlled negative. Try to get as
deep as your shoulders will comfortably
allow. And then squeeze the weight
forward using your pecs. Try to focus on
bringing your elbows together, not just
your hands. This will keep tension on
your chest and prevent your triceps and
front delts from taking over. From
there, sweep the weight out and back in
an arc, not just back. So, try to think
about covering as much space as possible
as you do the negative. Now, I picked
these over a pec deck because I do find
I can get a bit deeper here than most
pec decks allow. And I do them seated
over standing because if you're seated,
you'll be a bit more stable, which means
no tension coming from the weight stack
is being lost to my ankles or my low
back, which will have to do some
stabilization when I'm standing.
Remember, our goal here is pure pectoral
isolation. Now, the most common mistake
I see here is letting your elbows drop.
This puts your pecs at a mechanical
disadvantage and worsens the line of
pull for the pec fibers. So, keep your
elbows up and think about hugging a big
tree as you fly forward. Then, sweep the
weight out in a wide arc on the
negative. And again, last set to
failure. No exceptions. I think the
biggest gains I made this year were in
my back. And I owe a lot of that to one
exercise, weighted pull-ups. I know I
infamously put these in A tier instead
of S tier last year, but after this
365day experiment, I'm officially
promoting pull-ups to S tier. Pull-ups
light up your entire back. Your lats
handle the shoulder extension. Your mid
traps and romboids will light up during
scapular retraction. And your low back
will engage for stabilization. Your
biceps and brachiialis will take care of
elbow flexion. And there's also going to
be some muscle activation in your core
since you aren't seated like in a lat
pull down. Now, I went with a pull-up
over a lat pull down mainly because I
think they're harder and I didn't want
to shy away from the more challenging
exercises this year. I'm also focusing a
lot on progressive overload for this
experiment. And I find that with lat
pull downs, once you get strong enough,
it just becomes near impossible to avoid
swinging back and forth. However, with
pull-ups, you are more limited in how
much you can swing and sway, especially
once you get some weight strapped to
you, and especially if you do a pause in
the bottom of each rep. I'm not saying
pull-ups are better than pull downs.
They each have their strengths. But yes,
I attribute most of my back growth this
year to doing a lot of weighted
pull-ups. Two simple technique cues.
Think about getting your chest to the
bar rather than just getting your chin
over the bar. This will help you stay in
control of the movement better. And
then, this may sound obvious, but as you
pull, you want to think about pulling
with your back rather than with your
arms. Your arms are just connectors. So,
instead of pulling with your arms, think
about driving your elbows down and in.
This will activate your lats and prevent
your biceps from taking over. I also use
both liquid chalk and straps on these so
my grip doesn't limit my back gains. And
for the experiment, I use this grip in
between a fully pronated wide grip and a
neutral grip. I just find it a little
more comfortable on my shoulders, but
they all work. A very common mistake
here is, oddly enough, when people worry
too much about feeling their lats.
Pull-ups aren't a feely exercise.
They're not really supposed to feel
amazing. They're supposed to get you
jacked and strong. So, pull yourself up
and then lower yourself back down under
control. Increase the weight you're
pulling over time. And if you do that,
your lats are going to grow whether you
feel them or not. So, when I started
this experiment, I did 30 lb for six
reps on day one. And now I just did 60
lb for six reps. And that's just
straight progressive overload. Pretty
happy with that. And yes, that was my
last set. So, taken to failure as
always. If you can't do weighted
pull-ups yet, no problem. Just start
with assisted pull-ups. You can use a
band or a machine and gradually reduce
the assistance. Eccentric only pull-ups
are also a great progression tool. Just
use a box so you can start at the top of
the range of motion and then lower
yourself down slowly and repeat. My side
delts also definitely improved
throughout the course of this experiment
and I attribute most of that to this
exercise right here. High cable lateral
raises. Just two or three sets of 8 to
10 reps, but I push those sets hard.
When done right, these almost
exclusively target the side delts, which
are arguably the most important muscle
fibers for creating that wide tapered
X-frame look. And I use cables here
because they provide consistent tension
throughout the range of motion, unlike
dumbbells where there's no tension at
the bottom and peak tension only kicks
in at the very top. Also, by setting the
cable higher, you'll make the movement
hardest when your delts are most
stretched. Yeah, I do think the
importance of the stretch was slightly
exaggerated on social media for a while,
but it's still true that with cables,
peak tension always occurs when there's
a 90° angle between your arm and the
cable. And that happens early in the
range of motion when the pulley is set
high. Now, a study published just this
past December compared cable lateral
raises to dumbbell lateral raises. The
study we've all been waiting for. At
least I was. Each subject trained one
arm with cables and the other arm with
dumbbells twice a week, five sets per
session, all sets to failure. After 8
weeks of training, they found that both
exercises grew the side delts about the
same. So, if you don't have access to
cables, the good news is dumbbells still
get the job done. That said, this study
didn't have their subjects perform cable
lateral raises quite the way I do them.
They stopped the range of motion
directly at their side, which I'd argue
means they were missing out on one of
the main potential benefits of using a
cable, which is that extra range of
motion you get by sweeping the weight
across your body. Still, based on this
new data, I doubt cables versus
dumbbells is a true game changer. What
matters most is choosing a variation
where you can feel your side delts
working and pushing that variation hard
with good form. I still use both cables
on my upper body day and dumbbells on my
push day. And of course, last set goes
to failure. Now, by far the most common
lateral raise mistake is shrugging the
weight up. This will cause your upper
traps to take over and rob your side
delts of tension. Instead, focus on
sweeping the weight out rather than
lifting it up. If you're struggling to
get a feel for this, stand up against a
wall and push your arm out sideways
against the back of your forearm. Apply
pressure gradually against the wall and
you should feel your side delts really
turn on. That's the exact intention you
should be using on your lateral raises.
Think out, not up. This next exercise
will activate every single muscle fiber
in your entire back from your neck down
to your hips. It's the deficit penlay
row. And if you're not doing it, I
genuinely think you're missing out. You
get amazing mid trap engagement from the
scapular retraction, high levels of
upper and lower trap activation from
scapular stabilization, solid lat
activation from shoulder extension, and
your spinal erectors will light up since
they have to fire isometrically
throughout the entire set to keep you
locked in that horizontal position. By
standing on a bumper plate, you'll
increase the range of motion, giving
your lats a deeper stretch at the bottom
than a traditional floor level row. I
also tweaked the execution for
hypertrophy. Instead of the typical
explosive up drop down style, I keep the
explosive positive but slow down the
negative to maintain eccentric tension
and control. Then on the last set, I
push beyond failure by using lengthen
partials. Yes, I still do these on some
exercises. So when I can't get that full
squeeze at the top, I still grind out
another three or four reps in the
stretch position where the lats are the
strongest. I know some of you are sick
of lengthen partials, but this is a spot
where they really make sense, especially
given the lat strength curve. Now, the
biggest mistake here is just not getting
fully horizontal. Being more upright
isn't necessarily wrong, but when your
torso is parallel to the floor, gravity
is pulling directly against your
scapular retractors. This forces your
mid traps and romboids to work much
harder. The only way to make a
traditional higher torso angle row hit
the same is by compensating with more
weight. But pound-for-pound, penlay rows
are simply more challenging, so I didn't
shy away from them this year. Also, make
sure you use straps or at the very least
chalk. If you're letting grip hold you
back here, you're definitely leaving
back gains on the table. Last set to
failure. For triceps, I'm using what
current research shows is likely the
single most effective movement, not just
for the long head, but for all three
heads, the cable overhead triceps
extension. This study compared overhead
extensions to push downs and found that
overhead extensions caused 50% more
growth in the long head, 40% more growth
in the lateral and medial heads, and 40%
more growth in the triceps overall. It's
a killer. If I only have time for one
triceps exercise, this is the one. Now,
the most common mistake here actually
happens before the set even starts
during the setup. Most people set the
cable way too low, then waste a bunch of
energy trying to spin and twist
themselves into position. Instead, just
move the cable up higher, squat
underneath it, and use your legs to lift
the weight up into place. Then, take a
step or two forward, and you're ready to
go. No wasted energy. Failure. All
right, biceps. This part's super cool
because a few new studies on biceps
growth just dropped. And wouldn't you
know it, there's even one comparing my
personal favorite, the Beijian cable
curl, to the classic preacher curl. The
results? Well, there were
non-significant trends favoring the
Beijing curl, but nothing statistically
significant. That could be because the
study was underpowered. It only had 15
subjects and it ran for just 10 weeks.
Or it could mean that both exercises
grow your biceps equally well.
Regardless, on my upper body day, I've
been doing Beijian curls because based
on the totality of the evidence, I still
suspect they have a slight edge,
especially thanks to that deadly combo
of long muscle length and high tension
in that lengthen position. Failure. But
to be sure, on my pull day, where I
train biceps again, I do preacher curls
and hammer curls. Failure. Failure. Now,
if you want my full upper lower pushpull
legs program, it's available now at
jeffnnipper.com. I'll link it down below
and I'll also put a discount code in the
description box just for YouTube so you
can save 25%. Also, thanks for all the
love on the last video. My brother and I
went through the comments and we were
blown away by all the support and love.
We both really, really appreciate it.
We've also both started experiment
number two, so make sure you subscribe
so you don't miss what's coming next.
All right, thanks for watching, guys.
I'll see you all here in the next