[Music]

okay welcome everyone to a new episode

of technique Tuesday where every week

we're gonna be breaking down the lost

art and science of training technique

for one specific movement this week

we're gonna be looking at the bicep curl

and in particular how to get the most

biceps bang for your buck out of the

barbell curl and while the curl appears

to be a pretty straightforward exercise

on the surface as we'll see there's

actually quite a bit more complexity and

muscular involvement than many people

realize okay so with this movement we're

gonna be performing mainly elbow flexion

so basically just bending your elbow

which contrary to popular belief is in

fact handled and mainly by the

brachialis muscle that very powerful

muscle that sits underneath the biceps

and even though you can't see it

superficially when you flex your arms

building this muscle will push the

biceps brachii up and out more which

will increase their appearance of size

as well now of course since the biceps

brachii do cross the elbow joint they

will be doing a lot of work here as well

and these two prime movers will get

assistance from the brachioradialis

muscle on the back of the form now we're

also performing wrist supination here so

twisting your palm up which will be

handled mainly by the biceps and also

the supinator muscle of the forearm and

supination is actually really important

for targeting the biceps because that

more powerful underlying brachialis

muscle can't contribute to supination

meaning the biceps will have to handle

the brunt of the load here also when

viewing the curl from the side you can

see that some degree of shoulder flexion

is happening which is fine

the biceps in particular the long head

that forms the biceps peak assists the

front delt with shoulder flexion since

the biceps also crosses the shoulder

joint and can help bring the arm up like

in a front raise finally throughout the

curl there will be an isometric wrist

flexion contraction where the muscles of

the anterior forearm prevent the wrist

from bending backwards maintaining that

neutral wrist position throughout the

curl now I put the barbell curl EZ bar

curl and dumbbell curl on pretty much

even footing here the main advantage of

the barbell curl is that you can more

easily apply progressive overload

minimal load increases week to week

adding just 2.5 pounds to each side as

needed

Rasmus dumbbells you may have to make

bigger jumps of 5 pounds per side which

could compromise for more delay load

progression and while the barbell does

allow for a slightly more supinated

wrist position than the EZ bar I don't

think this difference is practically

relevant especially if you queue for

supination as we'll discuss in a minute

and if the EZ bar feels better for you

or more comfortable on your wrists then

I think you should just go with that and

we'll return to the dumbbell curl in a

little bit ok so generally speaking you

want to load the bar with light to

moderate load in a relatively higher rep

zone around 8 to 20 reps because loading

the biceps too heavily will just result

in form breakdown as other muscles come

in and help heave the weight up and

throw out the curl rather than having

the amount of weight at the forefront I

think you really want to focus on

improving your mind muscle connection

with the biceps and squeezing the biceps

as you curl one eight-week training

study from Schoenfeld and colleagues

found that focusing on squeezing the

biceps resulted in significantly more

hypertrophy than just focusing on moving

the weight so you want to grab the bar

with a comfortable grip with which for

most people will be at just about

shoulder-width because the long head of

the biceps is a stronger shoulder

abductor

than the short head taking a wider grip

may target the biceps peak slightly more

however at this point that's just kind

of my own speculation and it might not

actually be worth the reduced range of

motion you get from going wider and I'm

personally not a fan of the very close

grip as it also reduces range of motion

and according to one source reduces

biceps EMG amplitude by 13 percent

relative to a shoulder width grip as a

quick aside when it comes to targeting

the long head or that elder peak dr.

Brad Schoenfeld has recommended

performing exercises where the upper arm

is held behind the body where the long

head will be placed under greater

stretch so if your goal is to maximize

the peak in addition to the basic

barbell curl you may want to also

include an incline dumbbell curl or a

Bayesian cable curl where the arm is

held back behind the torso okay back to

the barbell curl so with a comfortable

roughly shoulder width supinated or

underhand grip stand upright with the

barbell keeping a strong shoulder-width

stance

with a braced core and slightly bent

knees now unlike what the bench press

here you want to purposefully take a

more loose grip with your hands and

fingers which will increase biceps

involvement by minimizing activation of

the elbow flexors of the forearm you

want to make sure that before initiating

the curl your elbows are tucked in

comfortably close to your sides and just

before initiating the curl you want to

slightly flex the shoulder

in other words bring your arms forward

by about ten degrees and at the same

time try tilting your scapula posterior

lis since the short head of the biceps

attaches on the front end of the scapula

tilting them posteriorly will pull

tension into the biceps as you begin the

curl think about putting the majority of

the pressure on your pinky and ring

fingers rather than your pointer and

middle fingers it'll force the wrist

into a more supinated position further

shifting tension onto the biceps you

want to think about curling the bar out

in front of you in an arc rather than

straight up and let's just look at the

difference here so on the Left we're

just pulling the bar straight up and on

the right we're swinging the bar out in

your arc just notice the difference in

distance between the axis of rotation of

that elbow in the center of mass at the

barbell between these two variations

even though the way it is exactly the

same you're going to generate much more

torque and as a result much more tension

on the biceps by curling the bar out

rather than just pulling it straight up

generally has you reach the top end of

the curl you want to maintain a neutral

wrist position not allowing the wrists

to curl in at any point throughout the

range of motion in fact as an advanced

technique you can slightly extend the

wrists at the top which will help take

the forearm muscles out of the movement

even more just be careful when doing

this and if you feel any wrist pain and

don't do it now as you curl when viewed

from the side there shouldn't be much

movement at the knees hips or lower back

and other than the arms everything

should be pretty much motionless and

locked into position and even though I

don't like to pause at the top of the

curl myself since there will be minimal

tension there you do want to think about

squeezing your biceps to move the weight

including at the top of each rep on the

eccentric

again you want to lower the bar out in

arc while maintaining a loose grip and

forcefully contracting your biceps the

eccentric is just as or more important

than the concentric when it comes to

muscle growth as

don't treat the negative it's just a

time to relax and just let the weight

fall I personally like to think of the

negative as a sort of failed positive

where you're actively resisting the

weight on the way down I personally

prefer to Lee set every rep at the

bottom because it allows me to regain

position and get a deep breath in which

helps to maintain upper body tightness

and stability on the next rep which

allows me to better control the weight

and move more load overall so I would

say the most common error that I see

here is the same as with the row just

going too heavy now I'm not against

cheat curls on principle I think they

can't have a place in a program

especially if you're really controlling

the eccentric however they can set you

up on a bit of a slippery slope or you

may not be actually applying progressive

overload you may be in fact applying

progressive cheating where you just

progressively get more and more

assistance from the other muscles down

the chain while tension on the biceps

actually goes down or at best stays the

same so I think that a bit of shoulder

flexion up to 10 to 15 degrees is

actually a good thing to get the curl

started but as the hips knees and ankles

start to get involved it starts to

become a totally different exercise now

an arm blaster can actually be really

helpful here as it helps to keep the

shoulders back and enforces a better

lifting posture however you don't want

to use it as a crutch and as with most

exercises you should learn proper form

without the aid of supplemental lifting

gear first another common error that I

see all the time is lack of active

supination many people will correctly

curl with an underhand grip but then

forget to actively supinate by driving

their pinky and ring fingers into the

bar which can result in a curl where the

forearms perform much more of the work

than the biceps now I want to quickly

mention the standing dumbbell curl here

is an excellent adjunct exercise since

it has the advantage of hitting each arm

individually which can correct for

asymmetries and unlike the barbell you

can start with a neutral wrist position

and then supinate throughout the

concentric now to maximise on this you

want to curl with your pinky finger in

the center of the dumbbell I'm just

gonna force your biceps to fire harder

when performing supination of course

combining exercises is usually the best

way to work around slight pitfalls in

each individual movement so don't be

scared to periodically vary your routine

while using the basic barbell or EZ bar

curl as the bread-and-butter movement

of your arm Philippine program okay so

that's it for this one guys I've decided

that I'm going to leave the entire

technique Tuesday series totally unspun

surd so that way I can just focus on

delivering the information to you guys

and its purest form now these videos

will usually take roshan and i thirty

upwards of thirty hours to edit research

right film etc so if you've been

benefiting from the series so far

purchasing a program on my website is

the best way that you can support the

work that i'm doing over here on this

channel while at the same time getting a

complete and very applicable version of

some of the stuff i talk about in my

videos so for the release of this video

I've decided I'm going to knock my arm

hypertrophy program down by thirty

percent for the next week which is gonna

put it at just thirteen ninety nine and

there's more info on that arm

hypertrophy program on my website if

you'd like to check it out I'm stinks

again guys so much for tuning in and

thank you so much for the amazing

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do appreciate that and it's been really

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and make each one better and better so

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