Guns. Pipes. Pythons. Those are only three of the numerous names for what every guy who’s ever walked into a gym wants: big arms. Day after day, guys work and work their biceps in an effort to achieve what’s considered the ultimate visual measure of strength. The more they work out, the shorter their sleeves get, and the bigger the attitude.
I see this shit every day in my gym and quite frankly, I laugh my ass off. I see so many little “Joey Bad-Asses” strutting around with their sleeves rolled or a tank-top on, thinking they’re king shit of the world. The funny part is that all of these clowns have far from impressive arms. In their vain attempt to win the Arms Race, they’re doing little to actually build their arms. The problem is that few people actually consider all the elements to building good, much less great, arms. No muscle group works independently. You have to take into consideration your entire body when focusing on a single muscle group. In an effort to help you avoid looking like one of those clowns at the gym on arms day, I’m going to spell out some basics, with a few advanced tips to help you build those coveted pipes.
The first thing to understand is that building big arms isn’t just about biceps. You also have triceps, which, by definition, constitute a larger portion of the upper arm. The triceps has three heads: the medial, lateral, and long head. When you engage in any type of extension of your arm, you’re working your triceps. The biceps consists of two heads within the biceps brachii: the long and short head. Any flexion of the arm works the biceps. So, logic tells us that to truly have great development of the upper arm, you need to work both muscle groups, and pay a bit more attention to the triceps.
Okay, how the hell do you develop all the heads in your upper arm? These are actually small muscle groups. They also tend not to be high endurance muscle groups like forearms, hamstrings, or calves. Your biceps and triceps will respond to direct stimulation, however they are susceptible to over-training, resulting in an over-production of lactic acid, the end result of which is muscle breakdown.
That’s why all those dipshits in the gym never develop their arms. They’re working them too often, and with far too many sets. You really only need, at a maximum, 8-12 total sets for biceps and 12-15 sets for triceps, including warm-ups. Not a huge numerical difference, but since these are smaller muscle groups, they don’t need much stimulation to grow. Your rep schemes for each set should never drop below eight. Again, these are not large muscles, and you want to avoid over-training. An additional benefit of a higher rep scheme is intra-muscular endurance.
As your endurance increases, so does your ability to train harder before over-training sets in. And you should only work these muscle groups once a week. This way, you can hit them harder when you train. Biceps and triceps need the time to recover as they also work as secondary and supporting muscle groups when training chest (tris) and back (bis). This is why you’ll often see people training tris with chest, and biceps with back. It’s good for bringing out more definition, but doesn’t allow you to train bis or tris very hard or heavy, because much of the glycogen stores in those smaller muscle groups have been used to assist in chest and back. I’ve also never been crazy about training bis and tris together. Again, it’s good if you want to bring out more cuts, but it won’t help with building size. When training for size in your pipes, I would recommend training biceps with chest, and triceps with shoulders. Or, if you’re disciplined about your workout and never miss a day, you can train biceps and triceps alone.
Now, how do you reach the individual heads of each muscle group? Simple. It’s all based on your hand positioning. There are three hand positions: supinated, (palms up), pronated (palms down), and neutral (palms facing each other). Working biceps and triceps with your palms in each of these positions will provide more direct stimulation to each of the heads within the muscle group. Here’s the correlation of hand position to muscle group:
Biceps (two muscle groups: short and long):
Supinated – short primarily, long secondarily
Pronated – long primarily
Neutral – long primarily, short secondarily
Triceps (three muscle groups: lateral, medial, and long):
Supinated – lateral primarily, long secondarily
Pronated – medial primarily, long secondarily
Neutral – lateral and long primarily
The preceding gives a basic guideline to work from when choosing exercises to build your arms, but there are certain exercises for the upper arm considered to be the mainstay of a mass-building program. These are as follows:
Biceps:
- Standing barbell curls
- Incline dumbbell curls
Triceps:
- Dips
- Pronated triceps extensions
(either with ez bar on a bench or with cables)
Each of these exercises has a specific head they target, however, they do provide stimulus to the other heads within the muscle group, as you’ll generally do these exercises with more weight. If you choose to incorporate these into your workout routine, do them first to train with the greatest intensity. If you can do three to four intense sets of these mass-builders initially, the following sets won’t need to be as intense as you’ll have already stimulated all heads within the muscle group. You can then lighten the weight and really focus on the individual heads in the group. Here’s what a basic program looks like:
Biceps:
Standing barbell curls – 4 sets x20, x14, x10, x12
Preacher curls – 3 sets x12, x10, x10
Hammer curls – 3 sets x12, x12, x12
Triceps:
Dips – 4 sets x20, x15, x12, x12
Overhead dumb bell press – 4 sets x15, x12, x8, x10
Supinated triceps extensions – 4 sets x15, x12, x12, x12
This is a basic program, but will work very well as it uses all hand positions, will stimulate all heads of each muscle groups, and provides enough work to stimulate growth. A quick note on intensity: make certain you’re using strict form with no cheating on each set, not using momentum to lift the weight, and focus on feeling the pump on each rep. Muscle fibers grow in response to increased stress, so you have to make certain you’re stressing them. If you’re having trouble reaching those numbers, or you’re cheating to complete the set, lighten the load. Make certain you’re listening to your body and making adjustments accordingly. If a particular exercise doesn’t feel right, switch to another exercise that uses the same hand positioning.
Here are a couple quick notes regarding gains in your arms. Consider training your traps a little harder when you work shoulders. Your traps share the same vascular and neural pathways as your arms do, and if you can make those pathways more robust through training, you can potentially increase the available blood volume and neural stimulation to your arms. Also, work the outer head of your delts a little more, as when you do lateral raises. Further development of this muscle group will create a more aesthetically appealing upper arm, as you’ll emphasize the delt sweep into the lateral head of your triceps.
Now you have the basics in order to “arm” yourself. Get in the gym, listen to your body, and work hard.
Train hard. Train smart.
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