At Home Exercises for Pectus Excavatum

There are some key exercises you can do at home with limited equipment to help improve the look of your pectus condition.

Building Muscle is very effective for fixing Pectus Excavatum and luckily you do not need a gym membership to get results.

This is handy because some people do not have access to a gym and are often too self-conscious to join a gym.

Therefore at-home workouts are a great starting point on your journey towards fixing pectus excavatum.

Some great exercises you can do at home with just dumbbells and ab wheel to best reduce the sunken chest appearance and rib flare associated with Pectus Excavatum to improve your body & chest.

These exercises include;

• The Push Up
• The Dumbbell Floor Press
• The Ab Wheel Roll Out
• The Bent Over Dumbell Row
• The Dumbell Crush Grip Press
• The Plate Squeeze & Press

Push ups are a great body weight movement that will develop the chest.  Make sure when you do your push ups that your elbows come back at 45, you keep your back straight, keep your core strong and flexed, and when you push up twist your elbows in slightly to engage your chest more, also make sure you get full range of motion (chest hitting the floor) and perform the movement with a slow controlled eccentric phase (when you lower yourself to the floor). I recommend performing 3-6 sets of as many reps as possible of push ups.

The Dumbbell floor press is a great exercise to develop your chest. if you have a bench then I recommend you use that for better range of motion and a better stretch but if not then just lye on your floor and push the dumbbells up from there. You can also do this one arm at a time (a unilateral press). Unilateral presses will be beneficial to help incorporate more stabiliser muscles & to make sure your pecs are at the same strength levels.  If you have an asymmetrical case of pectus you can utilise unilateral presses to work the lacking pec more to make your chest more symmetrical ( I recommend 3-5 sets of this exercise for about 10-12 reps. Make sure the weight is heavy enough that your final rep is a struggle)

 The Ab wheel roll out is a great exercise for pectus excavatum as it develops your abs tightens your core & rib flare, stretches the sternum &  helps correct posture. Perform 3 sets of as many reps as possible (aim for 10)

The Dumbbell bent over row  is great for correcting posture, building back muscles & strengthening the core. It is important you keep your back straight, keep your core strong & flexed, and focus on the contraction of your back muscles whilst doing this exercise. It is important not to neglect back training as over working the chest and neglection of the back will tighten your chest (which is already tight due to pectus) and worsen posture which will probably exacerbate the condition (see my blog on this here).  For this reason I recommend doing 5-8 sets of this exercise and doing chin ups as well for about 3-5 sets of as many reps as possible.

The Crush grip dumbbell press is a great for developing your inner chest which is key for fixing pectus excavatum. Perform 3-4 sets and focus on squeezing your inner chest as you press the weight up.

These exercises in conjunction with a nutritious high protein diet will enable you to build a lean muscular physique.

There are other great exercises as well. Check out this video to see an effective at home workout for pectus excavatum.

See my transformation below for motivation & be sure to email [email protected]  if you have any questions

If you want to start following a program specifically designed to make your pectus less noticeable & receive coaching from Riley Byrne (the worlds only Pectus Excavatum specialised Personal Trainer) then go to www.fixpectus.com/ to apply.