During his prime, Arnold Schwarzenegger had a unique approach to his workouts in the gym. Instead of following a strict regime and sticking to it, he firmly believed in experimenting around and discovering what felt good. This led to him designing many modifications to existing exercises that helped him grow his muscles.
He invented the Arnold Press this way when he tried certain modifications to the traditional press. Similarly, Schwarzenegger recently released some unseen footage from his docudrama ‘Pumping Iron’, where he added a twist to a deltoid exercise to make it work for him.
The side-lying dumbbell raises, admittedly, wasn’t Schwarzenegger’s invention. However, it was a rare twist to existing dumbbell raises that not many try out for their delts.
The Instagram video featured him in the exact position as the name of the exercise suggested – lying sideways with a dumbbell in his hand. He was sporting a yellow tank top with the Gold’s Gym logo as he pumped up his arms.
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“Here is some unseen footage from Pumping Iron that was in my archive. I love to do side-lying dumbbell raises, I don’t see many people doing them anymore, but they are a fantastic deltoid pump!”
Schwarzenegger’s newsletter has been a great source of information regarding workouts and nutrition. In the post’s caption, he went on to plug his newsletter, teasing more such unseen footage and behind-the-scenes glimpses.
“If you want to see more clips like this, and get some insight into how I worked out then and how I work out now, sign up for the Pump Club…”
Moreover, his side-lying dumbbell raises weren’t the only unique exercise variations he practiced over the years. Schwarzenegger once talked about the benefits of behind-the-neck shoulder presses that often scare other gym-goers.
Arnold Schwarzenegger debunks the myth about behind-the-neck shoulder presses
To strengthen the shoulder and upper back muscles, shoulder presses have been a staple exercise in many fitness enthusiasts’ books. What hasn’t been a common element, however, was the way Schwarzenegger would do it – by taking the weight behind his head and performing limited-range reps.
This technique not only gave him a deeper press and more pressure, but he claimed that it also hit the muscles he wanted to work on. For him, bodybuilding was an extremely precise sport that involved tweaking and modifying every muscle in the body. Therefore, performing shoulder presses behind the neck helped him grow the intended parts of his body.
