Pro Bodybuilder Victor Martinez’s Chest Workout | Training With Victor Martinez

Victor Martinez’s exclusive and in-depth chest day training guide.

Victor Martinez is an iconic IFBB Pro bodybuilder and an absolute legend in the sport. He is considered by many to have one of the greatest physiques of the 2000s era of bodybuilders. In 2007, in a controversial decision, he nearly beat the 4x champion himself, Jay Cutler for the Mr. Olympia title.

Looking at his history within the sport, we absolutely had to meet up with Martinez at the Generation Iron Personal Training Gym for an in-depth chest workout. In this GI Exclusive, Victor Martinez breaks down the steps to upgrade your chest day training session. 

It’s easy enough to find a basic, cookie cutter training routine online – but the real work comes in knowing the details and really seeing the movements in action. A list of exercises, sets, and reps is simply the most basic foundation for a successful workout. Knowing proper form, full movement, and specific tips can transform a workout from good to great. It’s what separates just the average gym goer from in shape person from a shredded bodybuilder.

That being said, Victor Martinez met up with Vlad Yudin to go through the ultimate gauntlet of a workout. In part one of our training mini series with Martinez, he puts Vlad through the paces and shares important tips on how to optimize your routine. Utilizing a workout sheet where you write things down and track your workouts is one thing – but this video guide will give you play-by-play examples of how to actually perform in the gym like a pro bodybuilder.

Victor Martinez’s Chest Day Training Workout

To start, Victor Martinez stresses the important of warm up exercises. Many lifters get into the gym and might want to jump right into the heavy lifting, and we do not blame them because throwing around heavy weight is undeniably enjoyable – but warming up not only helps prevent injury, but it can also allow you to get the most out of your workout and push your muscles to absolute exhaustion. Martinez suggests two warm up exercises with light weight that match the muscle group you’re about to train.

With the warmups out of the way, Victor Martinez decided to focus on three core exercises for the meat of the workout, and he breaks down how to best perform them.

Below is the full breakdown of exercises, sets, and reps.

When it comes to weight, that’s impossible to recommend broadly. Each individual has different limits on how much weight to push. Ultimately, you want to lift enough weight to complete all three sets for each exercise. By the end of the final set for each – you should barely be able to finish, you do not want to leave the gym knowing you could have done more. It may take trial and error to begin with – but you’ll ultimately find a sweet spot this will be more than enough to exhaust your muscles completely.

Chest Press (Machine)

For the first exercise of Victor Martinez’s chest workout, he is using an old school chest press machine, aimed more for the upper peck. He explains how the machine was inspired by football and emulates the kind of moves a linebacker would typically perform on the field, and the movement of the machine goes awkwardly from a forward to upward movement. For that reason, Martinez suggests sliding down on the seat to give your movements more of a fluent all upward momentum, and which helps to put all of the strain on the upper chest. You want to have explosive momentum pushing up, squeeze, and then slowly bring the weight back down in a controlled manner. Avoid locking out your elbows.

Decline Dumbbell Press

For the next exercise of Victor Martinez’s chest workout, he goes to the classic decline dumbbell press. He suggests that decline presses be done the older you get – as this muscle area tends to lose its fullness as you age. The decline press is also important to provide your chest a full and complete look. Martinez also suggests wide grip dips if you don’t have time to fully commit to a decline press. This also hits the wide areas of the chest.

Standing Cable Crossover Flyes

The final exercise in our Part 1 Victor Martinez workout mini series is the Standing Cable Crossover Flyes. This exercise is a great finisher as it provides focused isolation on the chest. Martinez typically suggests splitting the reps of upper and then lower flyes to best hit the chest from all angles. He also warns of pulling to far back. While many believe this gives a fuller range of motion and a good stretch on the muscle, it can lead to injuring the rotator cuff, which can put you out of commission for a long time.

Less is More

Many people will say that this is not enough volume to really put on muscle mass, but that is not the case. 9 times out of 10, gym goers are doing far too much volume, even though they think they are not. Something to keep in mind is that maximizing the quality of your sets and reps is more important than increasing the amount of sets and reps you are doing.

While Victor Martinez’s chest workout may seem like it is not enough, he is pushing hard through every set on every rep to really shock the muscles and force them to grow.

Victor Martinez Chest Workout Wrap Up

That about wraps up Part 1 of Victor Martinez’s upper body training routine mini series. Next week, we’ll return to hit up the back in a new selection of exercises. Make sure to watch the GI Exclusive training video above to get complete play-by-play tips on each exercise. Soon you’ll transform your workout into a pro level routine.

What do you think of Victor’s chest day?

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