Through good bicep workouts, nutrition, and understanding other crucial and little known key secrets, I firmly believe you can build better biceps than 99% of the people in the street – no matter your genetic potential.
Before I get into the actual bicep workouts themselves – which are relatively simple – I’d like to give you a few of the most important tips I know. Without understanding these tips, your bicep gains will never be anything more than minimal – so take them to heart.
Tip #1: For Big Biceps You Need To Work The Legs
One thing I always thought when I first begun lifting weights was, if I chose to, it would be perfectly possible for me to forget about my legs, and just build my biceps if I wanted to. This is the biggest mistake most people make, and the number one reason why they never possess biceps which ‘wow’ people. And I’ll tell you why…
The body is a system, and what you do elsewhere in the body can greatly effect the outcome elsewhere. You are probably already aware of the fact that exercise increases testosterone levels, right? Well, testosterone levels are crucial to muscle growth all over the body. So, it makes sense to work the body in such a way that the absolute maximum levels of testosterone are produced for your sweat and effort. More testosterone = more growth.
Sure, by working the arms alone, you’ll produce some testosterone, and in the beginning, a little growth. But let’s think bigger. A full body workout is crucial, and the most crucial element which simply cannot be underdone or ignored is working the quads. Yes – you hit the quads hard enough, that’ll produce enough testosterone to support major growth of your arms after you’ve done a good bicep workout to ‘tell them to grow.’
This is because the quads are the biggest muscle group in the body. Working them well will release maximum testosterone into your system to support major growth all over your body (providing you’ve worked the other muscles, too). Squats and hack squats – using free weights, preferably – is the way to do this. Implement this tip, and you’ll see just how quickly how much it effects the rest of your body.
Tip #2: Eat
It’s simple enough, but, it’s where most people fail. If you are eating a big enough calorie surplus, you’ll put muscle weight on, and inevitably, some fat (which you can lose later). But the point is, if the scales aren’t going up, then your arm measurement won’t, either.
Arnold Schwarzenegger, who certainly knows a thing or two about bodybuilding, once said that for every inch you hope to gain on your biceps, you need to put on around 10lb of bodyweight. I’ve certainly found this to be more or less accurate. Although, at the time of writing I currently weigh 2kg less than I did 2 months ago, and my biceps are slightly bigger (but I have my own theory on that in Tip #3 below…)
Tip #3: Don’t Overwork The Arms
It’s certainly easy to let enthusiasm get the better of you at times, and get stuck into the mind frame of more is more. But try not to: I’ve actually had the best results in my biceps when I’ve worked them once, or maybe twice a week – with several days rest in between.
If you are a beginner, this is also crucial to remember: your biceps will actually need very little direct work to make them grow.
You see, most bodybuilding exercises incorporate other muscle groups. Upright rows use the biceps, bent over rows use the biceps, bench pressing uses the biceps a little. So, don’t make the mistake of working the biceps again too soon before they have recovered. What I sometimes do is, just to shock my muscles once in a while, I’ll throw in a bicep isolation exercise on the same day my biceps have already been used indirectly, just to shock them and tire them out fully. Then for the rest of the week, I don’t do that same isolation exercise again, as I generally ache for several days afterwards anyway. And I’ve found the gains to be made from such a practice can’t be ignored.
Tip #4: Work The Triceps
When someone tells you they’ve got 20” biceps, they really haven’t. I’m not saying they’re lying, but what I’m saying is nobody has 20” biceps, not even Ronnie Coleman. You see, the bicep measurement is taken around both the biceps and the triceps – and it’s the triceps which make up the bulk of the upper arm… around 2/3 to be accurate. So, if you want to be able to say to people you have an impressive bicep size, you need to work the triceps plenty, also.
The Exercises
Ok, we’re now at the point in the article in which I’ll give you the best bicep exercises I’ve found so far. There are literally dozens of exercises and variations you can try out, but, these are the ones I’ve found to be the best.
Firstly, I will say that if you are a complete beginner, besides the odd isolation exercise maybe once every week or so, if your program incorporates bench pressing, bent over rows, upright rows, etc, there is probably very little need for any direct bicep workouts, and you need to be careful that you aren’t overdoing it and being counter productive.
Anyway – let’s see what we’ve got…
It’s a known fact that the bicep ‘changes length’ when you rotate your hand. When you have your palm facing down, that’s known as prone, and when you have your palm facing up, that’s known as supine. In order to get your bicep to recruit the most muscle fibres it can during a lift, your palm needs to be in the supine position. That is why Mark Rippetoe (one of the most prominent strength and conditioning coaches in the US) advises that in order to really work the biceps to their maximum capacity, you should use a straight bar with a shoulder-width grip, which naturally forces the hands to work in a supine grip.
It may not be comfortable – and I didn’t like it at first – but once you get used to it, nothing hits the biceps like it. So, I highly recommend bicep curls with a straight barbell.
Mark also has a rather unique way of working the biceps this way. He starts at the top, and when the bar is lowered to the bottom, the arms aren’t quite straightened up and no pause is had, thus keeping full tension on the biceps. Breathing is only at the top of the movement, and is held in the lungs throughout the rest of the movement, then released at the top and another breath drawn. The elbows should be kept against the ribcage and at full contraction – the starting position – should be slightly in front of the bar. As the bar is lowered, the elbows – still against the ribcage – ‘slide’ backwards slightly – but not so they go directly perpendicular to the floor. I actually find this method very effective, as opposed to the more traditional method of barbell curling which I didn’t feel did anything special for me.
Next is the one armed preacher curl. Usually, the preacher curl is performed with a proper preacher bench and is a two handed movement with a barbell, but because I lack the equipment I improvise and use one hand with a dumbbell, using my incline bench to rest my arm on.
Anyway, the preacher curl (how I do it) is performed by setting my bench to the top level of incline, kneeling down, and, with dumbbell in hand, placing my armpit firmly into the top of the head rest. Keeping the arm in this set position, I curl the dumbbell up, giving it a good squeeze at the top, and lowering slowly. I never let the dumbbell rest at the bottom so to keep maximum tension on all the way. The thing you’ll notice with preacher curls is, the movement will be very difficult throughout the bottom, until the forearm is perfectly vertical, and beyond as it comes towards you, so you’ve only got a short range of motion during which the bicep is really under stress – so if you can maximize that and really go slow, and don’t let the tension off the bicep at all, I’m sure you’ll see good results, as I currently am.
In time, I’ll probably expand this article and write more exercises in, but for now, I’d prefer to keep it just to what I’ve tested and know works.
Secret Tip
One final tip I have for you is the theory of muscle fascia stretching, which bodybuilders have been exploiting for years – either knowingly or unwittingly. After I’ve had a really good bicep workout and gotten a huge pump, I then pretend I’m holding a barbell in the curl position at full contraction, and I squeeze my biceps at tightly as possible for 30 seconds. This is absolutely killer; and you’ll hurt, and want to stop after about 15 seconds, but hold it.
This will make your pump even bigger, and if you rest for 30 seconds to a minute and then go at it again, for a total of 3 times, you’ll have muscular fatigue and a pump in your biceps like you’ve never had before.
The theory is, by exploiting the pump in the muscle, you can stretch the stubborn protective sheath the muscle fibres are housed in known as the ‘muscle fascia’, thus giving your muscle fibres the capacity to grow bigger. This is only a theory, but I believe it holds enough credence to be true and certainly worth doing.