To get Huge Biceps …
To get huge biceps, it’s important to train both hard and smart. Biceps are a relatively small muscle and for some people they can take a long time and a lot of hard work to develop. The longer your arm span, and the shorter your muscle insertions are, the harder it will be to develop bulging full biceps.
Try this test. Flex the bicep of your right arm. Take your left hand and see how many fingers you can fit between your bicep and your elbow. The more fingers you can fit, the “shorter” your muscle insertion is and the harder it will be to develop full big biceps. One to two fingers, and you have fairly long insertions, and thus good bicep potential. Three or four, and you’ll find it hard to add much mass to your biceps.
If this is you, you’re going to have to train the hardgainer way. Don’t worry though, this is the most effective way to build bicep size, and get pretty damn strong in the process. You can’t afford to waste your bicep training doing endless sets of cable and machine curls – they’ll tire your arms out, but at the same time they are probably the least effective type of growth stimulus.
To get huge biceps, you’ll need to go hardcore. Here’s an example bicep routine:
Close grip Chins 3 sets of 6-10
Barbell Bicep Curls 3 sets of 8-10
Alternating Dumbbell Curls – 2 sets of 8-10
This bicep workout is designed to be performed once or twice per week. As you can see, its based around bodyweight and free-weight exercises. These exercises have been proven again and again to elicit the largest growth and strength responses, and will serve you much better than cables and machines. (If you really want to learn how to build whole-body muscle, week in week out, then you can check out Vince Delmonte’s program here, which I highly recommend). If you can drink some whey protein immediately after your workouts, and work your whole body in a weekly split, then you’ll be well on your way to huge biceps.
Tags: barbell curls, bicep routine, bulging full biceps, dumbbell curls, flex the bicep, hardgainer, muscle insertions, small muscle
September 26th, 2008 at 6:27 pm
my one arm is weaker than the other, how can i get them the same strength?
September 27th, 2008 at 2:57 pm
Hi Craig,
The best way to correct muscle and strength imbalances is to train both arms equally over a period of time.
If you stick at the routine mentioned - close-grip chinups and barbell curls, adding a few lbs to your lifts every week, eventually the weaker arm will catch up and both arms will be at a similar level of strength.
Also bear in mind that your arms will never be completely equal strength-wise. One arm will always be stronger than the other, simply because you use it more day-to-day. You can definitely correct major imbalances by training both arms equally though - it evens out over time.
Hope that helps!
Rich
October 25th, 2008 at 9:39 pm
DO NOT fully extend during bicep curls. Bring the dumbell down fully, but don’t bring it up all the way. This is a rest position. Try curling a little over half-way for an even harder curl. This eliminates the rest position.