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Fitness Correspondent
It is arm day; You are training biceps; you are doing bicep curls — arguably one of the most well-known arm exercises out there.
If you are here looking for the best arm exercises to take your arm workouts up a notch, you have come to the right place.
But we will let you in on a secret — your biceps only make up one-third of your arm, and whilst we are all busy obsessing over this muscle on the front of our arm, there is a mighty muscle at the back that plays a big part in overall arm size and strength too.
We are, of course, talking about the triceps. They contain more muscle mass than the biceps and are often neglected in the pursuit of T-shirt-bulging arms.
But if building big arms is your goal, you need to be training your triceps alongside your biceps: This is the perfect arm exercise combo.
Building your arms is not easy; but if you are ready to take your arm workouts to the next level, we have got all the anatomy diets you need, along with our best isolation arm exercises to build stronger and shapelier arms.
No matter your goal — be it size, strength, or definition — we have got the best arm exercises to help you get there.
What muscles make up the arms?
Before we delve into the best arm exercises for your next arm workout, let us take a moment to understand the muscles of the arm.
There are actually 24 muscles in the arm. While we could go through all of them, we do not have all day, and you would probably rather be in the gym than reading this.
So today, we are going to focus on the two main muscles: The biceps and triceps.
- The Biceps
The biceps brachii (or biceps as we know them better) are located on the front of the upper arm. Having big, bulging biceps or sleek strong arms? Looks great, but our biceps also play a vital role in pulling strength — whether that is lifting in the gym, bowling a baseball, or hitting a powerful backhand in tennis.
If you care about looking good or lifting heavy items, there is no denying that building big biceps will help you get there.
To understand how to build the biceps, we first need to uncover what makes up the biceps. The biceps are divided into two heads:
The long head — the bigger and more prominent of the two heads. This is the bulging muscle you see when you flex your arm.
The short head — the smaller head, located on the inside of the arm near the shoulder.
Together, these muscles perform the concentric motion of bending the elbow (‘curling’ the forearm up towards the top of the arm). While we cannot isolate our training to train one head more than the other, we can choose arm exercises that emphasise the long head or short head more. Ideally, you want to be hitting both heads equally during your arm workouts to create well-rounded biceps.
If you want biceps that really pop, you also cannot ignore the brachialis (elbow flexor) and the brachioadialis (forearm muscles). These help with elbow flexion and are somewhat responsible for building shape and size in the biceps. The brachialis alone also generates about 50 percent more power than the biceps. If you want biceps that look good and lift heavy material, do not ignore these muscles! Classic curls work the brachialis and brachioadialis, but the best way to train them is by taking a neutral grip (forearms facing inwards), such as a hammer curl or preacher curl.
- The triceps
While the biceps may be the jewel of the arms, the triceps brachii are actually the bigger of the two muscles located on the rear of the upper arm.
We know it might be tempting to focus your whole arm workout on building your biceps, but neglecting your triceps could have some unwanted consequences and make your arms look pretty unbalanced!
Just as biceps are named ‘bi’ for containing two heads, triceps are named ‘tri’ because they are comprised of three heads.
These are:
The long tricep head — the largest of the three heads: The long head crosses the shoulder joint.
The medial tricep head — the smallest head that helps with stabilization.
The short tricep head (or lateral head) — the most visible head, located on the outer part of the arm.
These muscles work together to extend the elbow, and also help to control flexion.
Just like the biceps, a good arm workout hits all three heads. However, just like the biceps, you cannot completely isolate each tricep head to train them individually.
You can, however, use different grip positions and exercises to emphasise one. — gymshark.com
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