Everybody wants Steve Reeves’ shoulders. In all honesty, his deltoid development wasn’t exceptionally impressive. He was blessed with god-like shoulder width in his skeletal frame though, and that more than made up for any flatness in his deltoids. Most people, however, must incorporate certain exercises into a shoulder training routine to obtain greater shoulder width.

There are three heads that comprise the deltoid muscle group: lateral (middle), posterior (rear), and anterior (front). There are some differences between the three heads a trainee seeking expanded width should be aware of.

This is the head that will most influence the appearance of width in shoulders. The bulbous look of this head should be

developed so some separation is visible between it and the biceps and triceps. Without this, not only would the illusion of wide shoulders be lost, but the arms may look fat too.

To develop the lateral head a higher number of reps with little to no rest should be used. Set extension techniques such as tri-sets and descending sets work particularly well for the lateral head.

Many bodybuilders perform bent over lateral raises, but they are actually a poor choice for developing the posterior deltoid. With bent over lateral raises there is a tendency to cheat and swing the weights up with the help of the upper back muscles, the trapezius, and the legs.

A good exercise for developing the rear deltoids is lying reverse flys. These are done by lying on a side and performing rear delt raises one arm at a time. The lying reverse fly allows for a greater stretch of the posterior deltoid when the dumbbell passes across the chest and comes close to the floor.

The anterior deltoid is mostly made up of fast-twitch fibers, thus heavy sets with lower reps are recommended. Most weightlifters perform plenty of bench presses, incline presses, and military presses, which develop the anterior deltoid. Unless anterior head development is lacking, front deltoid training can probably be skipped altogether.

This can be a brutal method for stimulating growth in the lateral deltoids. Three sets of single arm dumbbell lateral raises are performed with each set consisting of four descending subsets. Ninety seconds of rest between each arm is recommended.

A sample workout may start with single arm dumbbell laterals consisting of 10-12 reps, followed immediately by 8-10 reps at a lighter weight, followed immediately by 6-8 reps at a lighter weight, followed immediately by 6-8 reps at an even lighter weight. Rest 90 seconds then repeat the entire process for the opposite arm. Switch back and forth between the right and left arm for two more times each for a total of three sets per arm.

This exercise places continuous tension on all three deltoid heads. Start out holding a dumbbell in the top position of a biceps curl. Simultaneously start to lean over as if doing toe-touches (windmills) and concentrate on raising the dumbbell straight upward. At the end of the positive portion of the movement, the arm holding the dumbbell should be about perpendicular to the floor and fingers of the other hand should be close to the floor. Slowly reverse the movement back to the starting position. Perform 8-12 reps.

Lift the dumbbells with the pinky side of the hand higher than the thumb side. This may not seem like a significant change in form, but it hits the lateral deltoids much harder. Descending sets can be incorporated on this exercise if desired.

Start with Standing Overhead Dumbbell Presses (pinkies up, elbows back) of 6-8 reps, followed immediately by 8- 10 reps with lighter weight, followed immediately by 10-12 reps with lighter weight. Rest for 60-90 seconds then repeat the entire process two more times for a total of three sets.

If you still can’t get boulder shoulders after blasting away with these techniques, then you’re probably out of luck. But hey, who knows -- maybe those shoulder pads from the 80’s will be in fashion again.