I know many of you hate me when I say not to do biceps curls. You almost scream (though I might call it a whine) “I have to do biceps curls and who is this Darrin guy to contradict what I’ve been taught my whole life? Big biceps = real man! How else am I supposed to get big biceps????”
(Or if you don’t scream or whine at me, you start heading towards the “unsubscribe” link).
I know some of you are tired of hearing that you shouldn’t do biceps curls.
Yet you want bigger biceps.
“So What Can I Do To Get Bigger Arms?”
If you haven’t read Why I Don’t Do Curls, do that now for some context.
But that doesn’t mean you have to live with small arms.
Instead, here’s what you do.
1. Do chin ups. (supinated grip, palms toward you); biceps are a primary muscle group here but the good news is that this is a compound movement; your lats and shoulders also get some action 2. Do pull ups. (pronated grip, palms away); hits the biceps from a different angle, though biceps are secondary 3. Do rows, including variations (are you seeing a common theme here related to The Big 7?) 4. Do deadlifts. Larger biceps are (more…)
Looking to burn fat with weight training? Tired of typical routines?
Get my metabolic routine here: Fat Burn Furnace!
Continue reading about How To Build Big Guns (Biceps), Without Curls, In 8.5 Simple Steps
Count me among those who poo-poo biceps curls.
But not because they are useless.
No, I totally disagree with the Strength Training gurus out there who dismiss curls because they are “not functional”. That’s a silly argument.
They are indeed functional. In fact, even though I favor chin-ups over curls, curls are far more functional. When’s the last time in real life that you had to lift something with one arm, bending at the elbow? I bet a lot. Compare that with how often you need to reach above you with both arms and pull something down that is working against gravity. Not so much.
That doesn’t mean I favor curls. Quite the opposite.
My two criticisms are a) the meat-head mentality that often accompanies the guys in the gym doing curls b) inefficiency of biceps curl workouts, whereby the chin-up works multiple muscles and thus has a higher return on your time investment
My advice: don’t look to curls until after you can do 15 chin-ups. (Uh, and that means without resting and with your chin OVER the bar, not just touching; and with lowering your body all the way – no credit for partial movements here!)
Ok, I Admit, I *Did* Do Curls Recently…
I did curls for the first time in a very long while. I was at a commercial gym and was waiting for the hotel shuttle and had some time to kill. But it reminded me of why I don’t regularly do curls:
- Many other guys at the gym spent 30% of their workout doing curls. They look silly and didn’t get much real work done. (And another 30% of their time was on bench press, by the way.)
- My biceps were already mighty tired after (more…)
Have you ever done a heavy set of bicep curls and noticed a nagging pain in your wrists when you’re done? Maybe you’ve even felt enough pain that you’ve had to cut your workout short.
This pain can affect some people more than others. The good news is that just like anything else, your bones and cartilage can grow stronger with time as they respond to resistance.
Causes
You may have noticed that doing bicep curls using a straight bar or dumbbells will especially give you some wrist pain. We’ll get to how to reduce this pain in just a moment, but first, let’s understand what’s leading to it.
There are two major factors of bicep curls that affect your wrist pain; the first is the angle of your wrists, and the second factor is the torque force on your wrists.
1. Your wrist angle – In order to help you understand why the angle of your wrist is part of the equation, I’d like you to think about one of those karate guys who breaks a stack of wooden boards or bricks. Think about (more…)
Continue reading about Bicep Curls: How to Reduce Wrist Pain
Have you ever seen those different curling bars at the gym and wondered what they were good for? Yeah, you know what I’m talking about, one of the bars is straight and one of them has several angled grips, called the EZ Curl bar.
So which of these should you be using? Well, each of the bars has its own advantages. Let’s take a look at the biceps muscle group to understand what the advantages are.
Attachments:
Your biceps muscle group, as the name implies, is composed of muscles with two separate heads, or bundles of muscle. Your biceps attach to your scapula around your shoulders, run down your upper arm, and then attach to something called the radial tuberosity near your elbow.
The radial tuberosity is a bone that can rotate. That means that your biceps not only work to bend your arm at the elbow, but your biceps also work to supinate your forearm.
Supination: When we’re talking about the biceps, supination means moving your forearm so that your palm is facing you.
Pronation: The pronated position points your palms away from you.
Take a look at the picture on the left and notice where the bottom of your biceps attaches to your forearm. Your biceps attach to the portion of your forearm that is on top when your palms are facing up, in the fully supinated position.
That means that when your biceps are fully supinated with the palms facing you, your biceps are able to be involved most fully in your workout.
To get a feel for how this works, bend your elbow so that your forearm and upper arm form a 90 degree angle. Point your palm away from you and flex your bicep muscles. Then place your other hand on your bicep so you can feel it flexing.
Now, starting with your palm facing away from you, slowly rotate your palm until it is in the fully supinated position and facing you. As you rotated your palm toward you, you should have felt your biceps becoming increasingly more tense throughout the movement.
Bicep curls seem like such a simple exercise, but one frequent mistake exists that often leads people to transfer the stress of this movement away from the bicep muscles and to the shoulders.
In his Encyclopedia or Modern Bodybuilding, Arnold Schwarzenegger describes that bringing the elbows forward during this movement creates a lower quality stress on the biceps and can potentially hinder their growth.
Are You Really Using Your Biceps?
Let’s take a look at a common mistake that could be holding your biceps back from having stellar growth.
For purposes of illustration, we’ll take a look at standing bicep curls using a straight bar. We begin this exercise with the bar resting just in front of the thighs.
The beginning of the motion is fairly easy. The biceps and forearms contract to bring the weight up until the arm is slightly bent.
This is the point where the exercise becomes difficult. As the elbows bend, greater stress is placed on the biceps. There is a strong temptation to move the bar upward by bringing the elbows forward in front of the body.
The problem with this method is that your shoulders are being used to push your elbows forward and raise the curl bar, while your elbows stay bent at approximately the same angle.
FYI- The more you shoulders work to move the bar upward, the less your biceps need to work through the full range of motion. Less work for your biceps means less growth for your biceps. This essentially shifts your curls from being a good bicep workout to a lame shoulder workout.
Once your shoulders have assisted you in bringing your elbows forward, your forearm is much closer to vertical and it becomes much easier for your biceps to move the weight the remaining distance to complete the contraction.
In addition, the weight (more…)
Imagine what the world would be like if you were to wake up one morning, and all of the exercise machines were eliminated from the face of the earth and all of the isolation exercises were outlawed. What would the world look like?
If all of the machines and isolation exercises were to disappear from the face of the earth this very moment, 90% of all trainees would see their workouts improve.
Why is this? Are isolation exercises completely useless then? Should I avoid them at all costs?
No, isolation exercises are not useless… they are overused. Newer trainees should focus a majority of their workouts on the compound movements. This doesn’t mean that isolation exercises don’t ever have their place, it just means that if all the isolation exercises disappeared today, most people would do more of the exercises that they really need the most.
There are 4 main reasons that a trainee might want to use isolation exercises:
1. To strengthen your weakest link: Let’s use the analogy of a chain. If you’ve ever seen a construction crew working with a crane to build a large building, you’ll see the crane with a cable and a hook at the bottom. Construction (more…)
Continue reading about When Should a Beginner Use Isolation Exercises?
Loading ...