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Functional bodybuilding coach Marcus Filly is all about building strength and muscle in a safe and sustainable way—and while much of his training advice revolves around tips and techniques for lifting weights, he acknowledges that classic bodyweight moves should not be skipped or underestimated.
In a recent video on his YouTube channel, Filly demos a full upper-body workout comprised of variations on some bodyweight staples that will hit the chest, back, arms and shoulders.
Filly starts out with a superset that targets the lats, shoulders, triceps and chest: 5 to 10 pullups and 5 to 10 strict dips, performed every 90 seconds for a total of 4 rounds. Filly prescribes “omni grip” pullups here, meaning that on each set you will be switching between a narrow, supinated, pronated and wide grip variation.
“Changing the direction in which you place your hands on a pullup is going to generally hit most of the same muscles; your biceps, your rear delts, your lats,” says Filly. “But depending on how you position your hands—the width, the orientation—you’ll bias a little more of one thing vs. another.”
On each of these movements, Filly recommends a swift upward motion, a slow, controlled descent of 2 seconds, and a pause at the bottom end of the movement: not only will this eradicate momentum, it will also increase the muscle’s time under tension and maximize the eccentric contraction.
“These ranges of reps are pretty aggressive, so use bands as needed,” he says.
The next exercises activate the chest and rear delts: deficit pushups (where the hands are placed on an elevated surface to increase the range of motion) and Bulgarian ring rows. performed in a rest-pause fashion: execute the pushups until you reach failure, then rest for 30 seconds and then repeat. Then, after 60 to 90 seconds of recovery time, go straight into the ring rows and do the same.
“This is a great way to get some intensity in a fewer number of total sets,” says Filly, explaining that with the Bulgarian ring row, you can adjust the bodyweight’s load depending on your foot positioning and the angle of your body. He advises aiming for an angle where you can reach failure in the 10 to 20 rep range.
Next up Filly works the biceps with 10 to 15 reps of ring bicep curls, immediately followed by 20 seconds of isometric shoulder extensions. Then he engages the triceps with 10 to 15 inverted skull crushers, and 20 seconds of the kneeling prayer stretch. Perform each of these a total of 3 times. (It is worth noting that the shoulder isometric Filly demonstrates here in the video is best avoided if you have any pain or pre-existing injury in your shoulders.)
“Using an isometric stretch or contraction at the end of a working set is a great way to safely overload a muscle once you’ve reached or come close to reaching failure,” he says.
Finally, Filly lights up his shoulders and triceps with this “density finisher”: 2, 4, 6, 8, 6, 4, and 2 reps of of extended range pike pushups, performed in an “unbroken” manner, i.e. without pausing. “This technique forces you to push your sets under fatigue,” he explains, “and is a good way to get trainees to approach failure multiple times within a single finisher. It’s best done with relatively safe exercises, where failure doesn’t present much risk.”
Philip Ellis is a freelance writer and journalist from the United Kingdom covering pop culture, relationships and LGBTQ+ issues. His work has appeared in GQ, Teen Vogue, Man Repeller and MTV.
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