Your upper body muscles include your pectorals, biceps, triceps, forearms, back, shoulders/deltoids, trapezius and abdominal muscles. A good way to exercise all of these muscles in a time-efficient manner is to use compound exercises to target multiple muscles at once. This helps speed up the workout while still providing potential for massive gains. Use a three-day split, meaning you'll work out three days a week. You hit each muscle group once per week; each workout will take 30 to 60 minutes.
Chest/Abs
Day 1 should focus on the chest and abdominal muscles. The bench press is a compound exercise for working the chest. Do three sets of 10 using a weight that is heavy enough so that the final repetition is difficult to lift. You can rest one to two minutes between each set. After those three sets are completed, complete three sets of crunches using an exercise ball if you have one. Do the final set until you cannot do another crunch, which is referred to as maximum muscle failure. Choose one more chest and one more ab exercise to complete, such as butterflies/reverse crunches, incline bench press/leg lifts or pushups/bicycle maneuver crunches.
Shoulders/Deltoids
Exercise your shoulders and deltoids on Day 2. The standing military press is a compound workout that targets the shoulders, delts and traps. Complete three sets of military press; 10 to 12 reps is your target. Perform three sets of lateral dumbbell raises to work the outer-shoulder area. Next, do three sets of forward dumbbell lifts to exercise the front delts. End this day's workout by three sets of one more shoulder exercise, such as dumbbell shoulder press or shoulder press on the Smith machine.
Arms/Back
Day 3 starts out by working the biceps and triceps using alternating biceps curls with dumbbells and triceps cable pulldowns, respectively. Do a set of biceps curls; rest for one minute; do a set of triceps pulldowns and continue this cycle until you've completed three sets of each. Next, do three to four sets of seated rows to work the upper back muscles. In between each of these sets, do a set of back extensions to exercise the lower back muscles. Finish this workout by doing one more exercise for your biceps, triceps and back muscles. For instance, you could three sets each of preacher curls, triceps skull crushers and deadlifts.
Muscle Growth
This three-day split will get your upper body primed for muscle growth, but it's also important to get plenty of sleep at night and to eat a healthy diet. These two factors play a critical role in muscle development. So, take at least one day of rest in between each workout to allow your muscles ample time to recover from the previous day's workout. Eat a nutrient-dense diet rich in protein and low in sugar and saturated fats.
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