maratoolLying Rear Delt Raise
How to do the lying rear delt raise
- While holding a dumbbell in each hand, lay with your chest down on a flat bench.
- Position the palms of the hands in a neutral manner (palms facing your torso) as you keep the arms extended with the elbows slightly bent. This will be your starting position.
- Now raise the arms to the side until your elbows are at shoulder height and your arms are roughly parallel to the floor as you exhale. Tip: Maintain your arms perpendicular to the torso while keeping them extended throughout the movement. Also, keep the contraction at the top for a second.
- Slowly lower the dumbbells to the starting position as you inhale.
- Repeat for the recommended amount of repetitions and then switch to the other arm.
Muscles worked
The prime movers are the deltoids, which raise and rotate the upper arm at the shoulder joint.
Every exercise for:Shoulders
How this movement works
One joint changes angle and the resistance travels toward you along a single arc. Nothing is positioned to help, so tension stays where you aimed it and the usable load drops sharply against a multi-joint pull for the same muscle. Protect the range of motion; buying weight by shortening the arc defeats the point.
It is filed under strength: produce force against resistance for a countable number of repetitions, and progress the resistance over time.
What you need
Dumbbells let each side work on its own, surfacing a strength difference between limbs that a barbell would quietly cover for, and leaving the wrist free to rotate through the movement.
Every exercise using:Dumbbell
These train the shoulders too, using equipment this one does not:
- Machine Shoulder (Military) Pressmachine
- Medicine Ball Scoop Throwmedicine ball
- Narrow Parallel Grip Chin-upsbarbell + body only
- One-Arm Kettlebell Clean and Jerkkettlebell
- Seated Cable Shoulder Presscable
Difficulty
Listed at intermediate level. It assumes you already own the underlying pattern and can hold position under load — if the position breaks before the target muscle tires, drop back to a beginner variation until it does not.
Of the 141 shoulders exercises in this database, 46 are listed at intermediate level.
Photos: free-exercise-db — public domain (Unlicense) Full attribution →
ⓘ Informational only — not a substitute for professional fitness or medical advice.