Dumbbell Incline T-Raise

Setup

1. 01Set an incline bench to roughly 30 to 45 degrees and lie chest-down.
2. 02Let the arms hang straight down holding very light dumbbells.
3. 03Turn the thumbs up so the palms face forward.
4. 04Settle the chest into the pad and set the shoulders down away from the ears.

Execution

1. 01Raise both arms straight out to the sides into a T shape.
2. 02Keep the thumbs pointing up as the arms rise to shoulder height.
3. 03Squeeze the shoulder blades together and down at the top for a full second.
4. 04Lower slowly back to the hang.

Checkpoints

• -Arms form a straight T at 90 degrees from the torso at the top.
• -Thumbs stay up, biasing the external rotators and lower traps.
• -Neck stays long; no craning the head up.
• -Shoulder blades squeeze down and together, not up into a shrug.

Common mistakes

• -Using loads that force a shrug and kill the lower trap contribution.
• -Letting the arms drift toward the hips into a Y or toward a row.
• -Skipping the pause at the top.
• -Lifting the chest off the pad to gain fake range.