Biceps Exercises, Workouts, And Routines

Weight Training Advice

Biceps Weight Training Exercises and Workouts

The biceps are the muscles on the front of the upper arms. Being an easy muscle to show off, the biceps are a weight trainers favorite to work out.

The biceps are primarily weight trained through curls using barbells, dumbbells, cables, and machines. They also get secondary work while performing weight training exercises for your upper back. Because of this, you need to weight train your biceps after your upper back if you do them at the same workout. If you do your upper back and biceps workouts at different weight lifting workouts you must make sure not to do your biceps workout the day before you do your upper back workout.

The best bicep weight training exercises are barbell and dumbbell curls. To perform barbell curls you should have a shoulder width grip on the barbell and, with your elbows close to your sides, curl the weight up and contract the biceps at the top. Don't curl your wrists toward you at the top of a barbell curl becuase it will take the resistance off the biceps. To perform dumbbell curls during your biceps weight training routine you should start the movement with your palms facing your sides and rotate your hands away from you as you lift the weights (alternate between arms every rep).

For more upper arm thickness, you need to target the brachialis muscle on the side of the arms between the biceps and triceps. To do this you need to do a few sets of hammer curls or reverse grip barbell curls during your biceps weight training workout. You start hammer curls the same way as dumbbell curls with a dumbbell in each hand and your palms facing your sides. The only difference is that you don't rotate your hands at all while lifting the weights. Reverse grip barbell curls are simply barbell curls with an overhand grip intead of an underhand grip. The weight used to do these should be a lot less than what you use on regualr barbell curls. Doing reverse grip barbell curls in your biceps weight training routine will also allow you hit the forearm muscles hard.

Bicep weight lifting exercises like preacher curls, cable curls, and concentration curls should be done towards the end of your biceps workout. Switch between these exercises to hit the biceps from different angles. Do a set or 2 of cable curls or concentration curls as a finisher to your biceps workout to finish with a nice, pumped feeling in your arms. A couple of drop sets at the end of your biceps workouts with one of these exercises will certainly give you the pump you want.

Biceps exercises are easy to cheat on, especially if you're trying to lift to heavy. To target the biceps you must make sure you aren't bending forward to start the weight upward or shrugging your traps too much to help get the weight up. That being said, starting your biceps weight training workout with a set or 2 of heavy cheat curls might not be a bad idea. Start your cheat curls by bending forward a little bit to get the weight started upward and lower it slowly when you get to the top of the movement. Just make sure you're not overdoing it. This will get the blood flowing in your arms. After your cheat curl sets concentrate on using perfect form for the rest of your biceps weight lifting workout.