4 Exercises for your Biceps

The Bicep

The bicep muscle is a two-headed muscle that help your arms to lift things up.

The bicep is probably the most popular muscle on the human body. For a man it can be a point of vanity when he has developed his biceps and can flex them and show them off.

There is something satisfying to one self if he can bend his arm and make these muscles pop up into a big ball. Something that says yes, I’m a man.

The bicep muscles are just a small portion of the total muscles in a body but need special attention to build them.

I must admit, I realize that I am not genetically gifted when it comes to upper arms. My father was strong as an ox, yet he had small arms. One of my sons is built like an offensive lineman in football. He also is undefeated in arm wrestling, but you wouldn’t know it by the size of his arms. He doesn’t have any visible size in his biceps.

What muscle I have gained in my arms have been due to hard work and attention to my form when exercising. Below are a few exercises that have helped me develop my arms

Dumbbell curls

Dumbbell curls are probably the most basic exercise and can be done in a variety of ways. The basics of the exercise is to hold a dumbbell in each hand at your side at the start of the movement. I personally like holding the dumbbell with the palms facing my leg.

As I raise the dumbbell upward I spin the dumbbell 90 degrees until the palms are facing up. That seems to give you a little extra squeeze out of your muscles. After you lift the weight as far as you can bend your arm, reverse the process and bring the dumbbell back to the starting position.

There are a couple of things to keep in mind while doing this exercise.

First, don’t lift too quickly. Lift the weight as a slow even pace. When lowering the weight, lower it even slower than you lifted. This way you can get the most out of the exercise.

Secondly, be careful not to use too much weight which will destroy your form and concentration. If you have to swing the weight to get it up than you are using too much weight. Just because you lifted the weight doesn’t mean you will build muscle, especially if you are using leverage instead of strength to lift the weight.

As I said earlier there are a variety of ways you can do this exercise. You can do this exercise standing or seated. You can lift one arm at a time or both arms at the same time.

I will mix these variations around to keep it from getting boring, though I do tend to prefer sitting on the bench because it tend to help prevent swinging my body to move the weight.

Resistance band curls

Resistance bands work the bicep similar to the dumbbell with one exception. With a dumbbell once you get beyond the mid-point of the movement the weight tends to get easier to handle, but with the resistance bands, the resistance seems to get harder the more you stretch the band.

Doing arm curls with the resistance bands is similar to doing dumbbell curls. Choose a level of resistance that you feel you can do easily for the first set, so you can get comfortable with the movement.

With your feet shoulder width apart, place your feet on the bands. Instead of holding the handles of the bands with your palms facing your legs at the beginning, like you do with the dumbbell curl, hold them with the palms facing forward.

Slowly lift your hands straight up until you go as far as you can while bending at the elbows. Hold for a second and slowly return to the starting position.

Do this 10 to 12 times for one set.

Like the dumbbell curls you can do this either one arm at a time or both arms at the same time. I personally prefer to do this with both arms because it seems to balance the stretch of the bands.

Preacher curls

Many home weight benches come with a preacher curl attachment. This is an ideal exercise for the biceps.

What it does is prevents the arm from swinging to generate momentum when lifting the weight and forces you to use only the strength of the bicep to lift the weight.

For this exercise you can use a single dumbbell for one arm at a time, two dumbbells at the same time or a barbell to do this exercise.

For me my favorite way to do this exercise is with my ez-curl bar. When I do this kind of exercise with the barbell I end up with nerve pain in my wrist, but with the ez-curl bar I don’t have to twist my wrist awkwardly and do not suffer the pain.

With this exercise I start by holding the weight up with my elbows bent. I put my arms on the preacher attachment so that the arms are flat on the bench.

Keep the body straight up and down. Don’t lean your body over the preacher attachment to try to get better leverage, which only pulls other muscles other than your biceps into the action which you don’t want.

If you can’t lift the weight without leaning forward, lower the weight to a lighter weight you can handle. It is more beneficial to do the exercise with lighter weight and proper form than to lift a heavier weight with poor form.

When you are at the bench and your arms are in place on preacher pad, lower the weight until the arms are stretched out almost straight. Pause for just a second and the pull the weight back up to the starting position.

Use enough weight to be able to do 8 to 10 reps for a set.

Concentration curls

This exercise is very similar to the preacher curls in that it helps to isolate the bicep muscles. Unlike the preacher curls you don’t need any special equipment other than a dumbbell.

The way to do this exercise is by sitting on a weight bench or a chair and bend forward holding a dumbbell in one hand. Place the elbow of the arm holding the dumbbell upon the inside of your leg so your arm cannot sway back and forth. With your arm extended holding the weight, lift the dumbbell up by bending the elbow. Once you are bent as far up as possible, pause, and then return to the starting position.

Do 8-10 repetitions with one arm and then switch to the other arm and repeat to complete one set.

Of course there are many more options available to exercise your biceps. Hopefully, I will write about some more at a later time but for now these are the primary exercises I use to strengthen my arms.

Let me know if this has been helpful for you.

Have a wonderful and blessed day.