My Top 5 Evidence-Based Strategies to Fix a Small Chest

Since 2019, I’ve coached plenty of trans men and trans masc non-binary people wanting to masculinise their physique, like the client in the picture, showing off three months of post-top surgery gains.

So you could say I’ve become something of an expert at fixing small pecs (said in Willem Dafoe’s voice, of course).

These are the top five evidence-based strategies I implement:

1. Program higher weekly set volumes

Scientific evidence like this paper consistently shows that the more weekly set volume you do, the greater the hypertrophy stimulus tends to be, provided you experience progressive overload and adequate recovery.

That said, volume requirements are individual. For some people, 10 weekly sets are enough to drive substantial growth; others may need 15 or more.

Still, patterns emerge over time.

In my experience, most of my AFAB trans masc clients (and myself) tend to respond especially well to 12+ weekly sets for chest after the initial “newbie gains.”

How often should you train chest and how many sets should you do?

Based on research, if you’re doing 10+ sets per week, you’ll probably see better results by dividing them across multiple sessions rather than doing them all in the same one, like the old-school “bro split.”

This is because there seem to be diminishing returns to increasing per-session volume, especially above ~11 fractional sets.

(“Fractional” means that one set of bench press counts as one set for chest and 0.5 set for front delts and triceps respectively. In other words, a set counts as “a fraction of a set” – hence the term fractional – for the secondary muscle groups involved.)

For example, if you plan to do 14 sets of chest work per week, you’ll probably grow better from doing 7 sets in two sessions than 14 sets in one session.

The bottom line: Distribute your weekly volume in a way that works for your schedule and that enables you to generate progressive overload and recover well.

As a rule of thumb, if you do 12+ sets per week, distribute this volume across two to three sessions on non-consecutive days.

Also, if you’re a nerd and want to learn more about the current evidence on the relationship between hypertrophy and per-session volume, I interviewed one of the authors of the paper linked above on my podcast a while back.

2. Train as close to failure as is productive

In my experience, most of my clients (and myself) recover from chest training fairly easily, even with 12+ sets per week.

Moreover, most pec exercises are relatively safe, with only a few exceptions – namely, any variation of the barbell bench press.

For this reason, I usually program most, if not all, of my clients’ chest training to all-out failure.

When this isn’t safe or a client can’t recover from too much failure training, I’ll program no more than two reps in reserve, which means stopping a set when you think you could only do two more reps before hitting failure.

In other words, keep your chest training between RPE 8 and failure most weeks, apart from deloads and the week after a deload.

If you want to learn more about how hard to train for best results, listen to this podcast or read this article.

3. Choose effective exercises for your goals and physique

These are the lifts I’ve found most effective for the majority of my clients:
 

• Mid/Overall pec bias:
  • Dumbbell flat presses
  • Push-up variations
  • Pec deck
  • Seated 90º cable flyes
  • Lying flat dumbbell flyes
  • Plate-loaded flat press machines
• Upper pec bias:
  • Dumbbell incline presses (with a 20-40º incline)
  • Smith machine incline presses (20-40º)
  • Seated incline cable flyes (20-40º)
  • Incline dumbbell flyes (20-40º)
  • Plate-loaded incline press machines
• Lower pec bias:
  • Chest-focused dips
  • Seated lower pec-focused cable presses
  • Seated lower pec-focused cable flyes

 
Importantly, these aren’t the only exercises I program because I don’t believe there are universally “bad” exercises.

For instance, if a client loves flat barbell presses and gets a great stimulus doing them, they’ll find a place in this person’s program for sure.

However, in general, the barbell reduces many people’s range of motion in the bottom position, thus compromising the stretch and overall stimulus, which doesn’t make it great for hypertrophy.

Personally, I love barbell pressing, but I’m one of the people for whom it doesn’t seem to generate much stimulus, so I rarely program it for myself.

As another example, most pin-loaded chest press machines are built for taller people than the average AFAB lifter – and certainly for me, seeing as I’m 5ft – which makes proper elbow alignment a complicated affair.

In addition, many pin-loaded machines have a small range of motion in the bottom position, once again compromising the stretch.

On the other hand, in my experience, plate-loaded machines tend to accommodate people of different sizes a bit better and allow for larger ranges of motion.

However, if your pin-loaded machine fits you like a glove and your plate-loaded ones aren’t that great, stick with the pin-loaded one.

Ultimately, effective exercise selection is about finding the lifts that work best for you and your own individual anatomy rather than arbitrarily labelling exercises as “good” or “bad” for everyone.

How many exercises should you do?

The smallest amount that gets the job done, depending on your weekly set volume and lifting experience.

In other words, the higher your weekly set volume, the more exercise variations you’ll do. For example, if you have 10 weekly sets, you may do 3 sets of flat presses, 3 sets of incline presses, and 4 sets of flyes.

If you have 15 sets, you may do 3 sets of flat presses, 3 sets of incline presses, 6 sets of flyes, and 3 sets of lower pec-focused presses or dips.

Furthermore, the newer you are to lifting, the better it may be to program fewer exercises, so you get more practice with them throughout the week. You also need less weekly set volume (or proximity to failure) to grow.

For instance, I may program a brand-new lifter 6 to 8 weekly sets of chest work and distribute them across flat presses and incline flyes. This way, they get several sets of each and can focus on learning only two exercises.

On the other hand, a client who’s been training for several years and is doing 15 sets per week will get several more exercises because they’re already pretty proficient with form on all of them and thus don’t need as many “practice sets” of each.

How many exercises per pec division should you do?

As hinted above, the pec muscle fibres are categorised into three divisions:
 

• Upper or clavicular: the muscle fibres running from the clavicle to the upper arm
• Mid or sternal: the muscle fibres running horizontally from the sternum to the upper arm
• Lower or costal: the muscle fibres running from the ribcage to the upper arm

​You can bias one division more than others by manipulating the exercise setup and execution.

This doesn’t mean that a decline cable press won’t train the upper and mid pec fibres at all, only that you may emphasise the lower fibres more than the others.

Again, exercise selection – like every other aspect of a training program – needs to be customised for best results, so there’s no “best” number of exercises for each division for everyone.

Moreover, since “biasing” doesn’t mean “only training this one division and not the other two,” it’s also not that big of a deal to get it “right.”

In my view, if you’re new to training, focus primarily on exercises that bias the mid pecs, like flat presses and push-ups, since these also tend to target overall chest development.

If you’re AFAB and haven’t had top surgery, breast fat tissue tends to cover the lower half of your pecs. Therefore, if you want to maximise your visible gains, you may want to focus more on mid and upper pec fibres – which will be more noticeable – while sprinkling in some lower pec-biased training for complete development.

As you become more advanced, you may notice an area of your pec lagging behind the others. That’s when you may benefit from increasing the number of exercises for that specific area.

Finally, you don’t have to stick with the same ratio of upper to mid to lower pec bias in your program forever. You can cycle through phases, emphasising a different division each time.

4. Adopt the right form to stimulate the pecs

Learning to use effective form while training close to failure is one of the most impactful drivers of muscle growth.

So you can rest assured that if a client wants bigger pecs, I’ll relentlessly ask for videos of every chest exercise in their program to help them refine setup, execution, and proximity to failure.

These are the most common form mistakes I see:

Elbow position on presses and push-ups:

If the elbows are too high and far from your body, you tend to feel it more in the shoulders; if they’re too close to your sides, you tend to feel it more in the triceps.

The sweet spot is somewhere between these two points.

Arch:

You don’t need a powerlifting arch like this:

This reduces your range of motion in the bottom position (as per photo) and thus your ability to stretch the pecs, which isn’t ideal for hypertrophy.

However, depending on the shape of your ribcage – which, in most AFAB people, tends to be relatively flat instead of “barrel-like” – you’ll probably benefit from a moderate arch, especially on mid pecs-biased presses, to increase the range of motion and stretch.

Range of motion:

On the descent of any press and dip, stop before your elbows change direction.

For example, when doing flat dumbbell bench presses, stop before your elbows start tipping up, and your shoulders begin to tip forward.

Arm path:

The pecs don’t just press forward; they pull your upper arms closer together in a converging motion.

So, as you press, imagine trying to crush your chesticles between your biceps. Weird cue, but it works.

The arm path also depends on your intention:
 

• To bias the mid pecs, line the hands up with the nipples (or with the lower outline of the pec if you had your nipples removed) and press forward
• To bias the upper pecs, press up towards the clavicle (low to high forearm motion) on an incline
• To bias the lower pecs, press down towards the ribs (high to low forearm motion) on a dip machine or cable decline press or flye

 
Since form is a bit tricky to describe in writing, here are some links to a few reels I made over the years to address these common mistakes:
 

• Elbow alignment and arm path
• Back arch and arm path
• If you feel shoulders more than pecs, watch these: Pt. 1 and Pt. 2

5. Program pec work first

Do your chest exercises first in every session and program your chest training in the first session of the week.

Since you’ll be most energetic at these times, you’ll perform better.

While it won’t make a night-or-day difference, it’ll nonetheless contribute to a greater pec stimulus.

Conclusion

If you want to grow your pecs, steal my top five evidence-based strategies:
 

1. Program higher weekly set volume
2. Train as close to failure as is productive
3. Choose effective exercises for your goals and physique
4. Adopt the right form to stimulate the pecs
5. Program pec work first

Thank you for reading. May you make great gains.
 
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