Charles Glass’ Must-Try Shoulder Superset for Increased Delt Activation

Glass hits all angles of his deltoids on one machine. 

A shoulder superset is an excellent way to elevate the intensity of your workouts, leading to enhanced activation of the deltoid muscles. By shortening your rest intervals, you not only increase muscle engagement but also improve your endurance and strength over time. Recent studies indicate that athletes who integrate supersets into their training routines experience significant gains in muscular structure and strength while maximizing their time in the gym (1).

Charles Glass, revered as the Godfather of Bodybuilding, offers invaluable insights. Renowned for his impressive physique and extraordinary muscle definition, Glass boasts over 35 years of experience as a coach and trainer in the bodybuilding world.

In this article, Glass shares his expertise on utilizing shoulder supersets to develop broad, powerful shoulders. He has also released a video on his YouTube channel detailing how to effectively superset and perform multiple shoulder exercises using one machine. Let’s delve into the wisdom that Charles Glass has to offer.

Shoulder Muscle Anatomy 

 

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The shoulder muscles or deltoids are in three parts that help with the effortless movement of the arms: 

• Lateral Deltoids (Side Delts): These shoulder muscles are at the sides and help you move the arm up, down, and out to its sides. They connect to your acromion, which is found on the shoulder blade.
• Posterior Deltoids (Rear Delts): These shoulder muscles are in the back and help you move your arms backward. They connect to the flat surface of the shoulder blade. They’re also responsible for horizontal abduction, external rotation, and extension of the arms.
• Anterior Deltoids (Front Delts): They’re one of the biggest of the three delts and connect to the clavicle. These shoulder muscles are in the front and help your arms move forward.

Charles Glass’ Shoulder Superset

Charles Glass advocates starting with the medial delts during warm-ups for a delt exercise. He says it’s where you can get all the blood flowing before isolating with front raises and, finally, the rear delts.

“I like to warm the whole delt area up and then attack.”

He uses a shoulder press machine to demonstrate how to attack the shoulder muscles with different movements. Here’s a list of the exercises in the shoulder superset the Godfather of Bodybuilding focuses on (since there are more than two exercises, it’s technically a “giant set,” which is a more lengthened superset):

• Machine Lateral Delt Raise
• Machine Front Delt Raise
• Machine Lateral Raise 
• Machine Rear Delt Raise

“One machine and doing all the delts.”

Machine Lateral Delt Raise

Charles Glass starts with the lateral delt. He used a neutral grip on the shoulder press machine and placed the pad in the same line as the forearms. While seated, keep your chest up, head forward, back straight, and feet driven to the floor. This will be the starting position. Next, raise your arms as high as you can to the sides using slow, controlled movements and slowly return them to the starting position to complete a rep. You can repeat this for as many reps as you desire.

Machine Front Delt Raise

Immediately after the lateral delt raise, switch your torso to the side and place your left arm under the pad to prepare for a unilateral movement, targeting the anterior delts. Rotate your left arm so the pad is between the biceps and forearms. Keep your chest up, head forward, back straight, and feet still driven to the floor. This will be your starting position.

Next, slowly and controlled raise your arm as high as possible, just above your shoulders. Slowly return the arm to the starting position at the highest point. Slow, controlled movements keep the target muscles under tension for longer. This is good for muscle hypertrophy and effective for optimizing muscle growth (2).

Turn your torso to the other side, placing your right arm under the pad, and mirror the same movement to focus on the other side. Training each side unilaterally helps you concentrate better on each side, building a better mind-muscle connection, which can help activate the target muscles better (3). 

Machine Lateral Delt Raise 

Glass’ heads back to the machine lateral raise as part of his giant set. This time, he’s seated with his back resting against the bench. Glass says to push your chest straight out and move your arms back to give you proper form for this exercise. Place your upper arms just under the pads and raise your arms as high as you can to utilize a full range of motion. He says to press your arms back so they don’t go forward to work and target the medial delts.

Machine Bent Over Rear Delt Raise

For this exercise, Glass eliminates using the bench to engage his posterior delts. He bends over, places his upper arms on the pad, and keeps his back straight. This will be the starting position. Next, he lifts his arms to the side as high as possible. At the last rep, he emphasizes an excellent isometric squeeze to give the target muscles a good contraction.

“I was just trying to show how you can take one machine and do multiple things on it, that’s all. So, we did all three. Actually, we could have done four because she could have done rear delts by facing in and pushing up.”

Charles Glass trains all the delts in a shoulder superset in this training video using one machine. Using a superset for this movement reduces your time in the gym and boosts your shoulders’ time under tension. Will you be trying the Charles Glass shoulder superset soon?

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References

1. Iversen, V. M., Eide, V. B., Unhjem, B. J., & Fimland, M. S. (2024). Efficacy of Supersets Versus Traditional Sets in Whole-Body Multiple-Joint Resistance Training: A Randomized Controlled Trial. Journal of strength and conditioning research, 38(8), 1372–1378. https://doi.org/10.1519/JSC.0000000000004819
2. Burd, N. A., Andrews, R. J., West, D. W., Little, J. P., Cochran, A. J., Hector, A. J., Cashaback, J. G., Gibala, M. J., Potvin, J. R., Baker, S. K., & Phillips, S. M. (2012). Muscle time under tension during resistance exercise stimulates differential muscle protein sub-fractional synthetic responses in men. The Journal of physiology, 590(2), 351–362. https://doi.org/10.1113/jphysiol.2011.221200
3. Calatayud, J., Vinstrup, J., Jakobsen, M. D., Sundstrup, E., Brandt, M., Jay, K., Colado, J. C., & Andersen, L. L. (2016). Importance of mind-muscle connection during progressive resistance training. European journal of applied physiology, 116(3), 527–533. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00421-015-3305-7