Bicep Curls

[Faenon]

Although this isn't actually about bodyweight exercises, I hope it's ok to ask this question here.

I've been working out for about two months now, and I am currently using 20lb dumbbells in each hand when doing bicep curls. I'm 5'9" and 190lbs, and around 20% body fat. However, my friend who is probably about 5'4" and 120lbs is also doing bicep curls with 20lb dumbbells in each hand. However, I know I'm stronger than him, so I should be able to do more than him. Also, my girlfriend, who I know I am much stronger than, claims to be doing bicep curls with 20lb dumbbells as well. When doing chest press with dumbbells and on a swiss ball, I use 40lb dumbbells in each hand, whereas my 5'4" friend only uses 25lb dumbbells in each hand.

Can anyone explain to me why it is that people that I know I am stronger than end up using the same amount of weight as I do for bicep curls? I'm quite sure that their technique is fine, and mine is too, so it's not to do with technique.

[koltz]

bicep curls are like the worst measure of strength ever....
why not start deadlifting if you want to see your real overall strength?
at least I hope your not one of thoose confused teens in my gym that think that if they lift more then half a pound stnading it stunts thier growth...

the key to big curls is.... not curling often , your biceps work much harder in weighted rows chins , deads and stuff

[Faenon]

bicep curls are like the worst measure of strength ever....
why not start deadlifting if you want to see your real overall strength?
at least I hope your not one of thoose confused teens in my gym that think that if they lift more then half a pound stnading it stunts thier growth...

the key to big curls is.... not curling often , your biceps work much harder in weighted rows chins , deads and stuff

Yeah, actually, now that you mention it, my coach laughed at me the other day and told me that "curls are for girls"...

I'm thinking of taking bicep curls out of my routine, because they seem a bit of a waste of time to me, but at the same time I don't want to neglect my biceps and end up with completely unbalanced arms. And also, I can't do more than three or four chin ups, so can anyone suggest what else I could do to keep my biceps in the same proportion to the rest of my body?

[koltz]

make some blast straps (just buy some webbing and attack some handle to it)
or soem sort of a trapeze
hang it over the chinup bar.. so it's rather low (if you hang off it and your feet are on the ground your back is almost tuching it)
then do a motion that's half a chinup and half a curl ,it's hard to explain , but you feel it in the biceps a lot harder (probably cause you move 60% of your BW and all the tention goes through the biceps ) and you get to work some lats too ,

or you can just do normal fatman pullups \ body rows from them and basicly get your reps in , a good idea is to do it after the 3 chins...


I was a curl junkie too back in the day....... and comdined with an elbow problem that doesn't let me recuit a lot of triceps during any pressing you gotta imagine now my arm looks :\ it's better now but my triceps is like only 40% of my arm instead of 60%....

[Faenon]

I'm not entirely sure what you mean with the trapeze/blast straps/half chinup half curl idea, but it's just occured to me that my gym has an assisted chinup machine, which basically consists of a chinup/pullup bar with a platform to stick your knees on, and when you go down, it pulls weight up, which makes it easier to do chinups. What are fatman pullups/body rows?

[Moonduck]

You find/make a bar that is a few inches above where your hands would be if you reached up while laying on the ground. Lay underneath said bar. Reach up and grab it. Straighten your body so that everything is off the ground but your heels. Pull yourself up to the bar.

Your heels will support a portion of your weight, and thus make the maneuver easier to do than a pull-up, but the motion works the same overall muscles as a pull-up, just at a different angle.

They're called fatman pull-ups because they are easier than regular pull-ups, thus a better choice for out-of-shape people. Like me =P

[Faenon]

Ah, right, that makes sense. I'll try that out sometime soon and see how that works out for me. Is it possible to do chin ups that way, too?

If I'm currently doing weight training, I should make sure to incorporate the bodyweight training on the same day as I work that particular muscle group, right? For example, doing pullups on the same day as I work out my back, rather than doing it the day after.

[Moonduck]

Yes, you can do chin-up analogues that way. It's a bit tough on the wrists though. I'd rather do close grip pulls instead of true palm up chin-up style rows. Ouch. You could also get a close-grip row handle and use that to pull on.

As to your scheduling. Yes, do pull-ups and the like on back day. Actually, I did some chins after doing my final set of deadlifts the other night. They were stupidly easy, amazing considering how blasted my body was from the lifting. The muscle activation is just so severe that chin-ups were childs-play.

As an aside, I have heard of pull-ups called the Squat of back exercises. They really are the premier thing to do for proper back strength IMO.

[Faenon]

Yeah, now that you mention it, doing palm up chin-ups like that does sound a bit uncomfortable. On the topic of pull-ups, though, when I do pull-ups on the assisted dip/pull-up/chin-up machine, I don't really feel any kind of burn in my lats. Or any of my muscles, really. However, it is difficult to pull myself up, and it does get harder to pull myself up as I do more sets. Any particular reason why I don't feel the burn, and is this a bad thing? Oh, and also, is it really worth working biceps, other than with chin-ups? A lot of people I've talked to seem to think that biceps are a useless muscle and it's not really worth working them much. However, I'm reluctant to just ignore a muscle in my workout on the basis that it's considered a useless muscle, because I'm not entirely sure I believe them, and I don't want to only find out it's useful by finding out that my bicep is inadequate.

[jonp382]

It's not a useless muscle...biceps tend to get worked more on a daily basis than other arm muscles, at least for me. :?

[koltz]

doing biceps with curls is pretty much as good as doing flyes for chest.....

[Faenon]

doing biceps with curls is pretty much as good as doing flyes for chest.....

Are flyes for chest not very useful, then?

[koltz]

nah ... I can write up a whole rant about people doing flyes with "strict" form with 2lb dumbells on medicine balls and lifting up thier shirts in the mirror saying "six pack here i come" and kiss thier bellies , then he comes up to me doing BB rows and looks at me weird ,
then he goes to my gymowner and says "isn't it dangerous?" you should make him stop , he says i know what I'm doing , then he comes to me anyway and gives me the ur using a bad form thing again on his own , and I ignored him , gosh I hate metros who get a headband that matches thier shoes for the gym just to look like there working out , later on all the big guys that own my gym were ranting about him being a pain in the ass before it closed up
ahaha

that was a rant

[bklynfirefighter]

Although this isn't actually about bodyweight exercises, I hope it's ok to ask this question here.

I've been working out for about two months now, and I am currently using 20lb dumbbells in each hand when doing bicep curls. I'm 5'9" and 190lbs, and around 20% body fat. However, my friend who is probably about 5'4" and 120lbs is also doing bicep curls with 20lb dumbbells in each hand. However, I know I'm stronger than him, so I should be able to do more than him. Also, my girlfriend, who I know I am much stronger than, claims to be doing bicep curls with 20lb dumbbells as well. When doing chest press with dumbbells and on a swiss ball, I use 40lb dumbbells in each hand, whereas my 5'4" friend only uses 25lb dumbbells in each hand.

Can anyone explain to me why it is that people that I know I am stronger than end up using the same amount of weight as I do for bicep curls? I'm quite sure that their technique is fine, and mine is too, so it's not to do with technique.

You say that you are stronger than them....by who's standards ?
How can you say what you should be able to do compared to someone else ?
The secret is work harder....don't watch them !
Sounds like you better get busy before they catch on... :lol: