Who wants big arms? A detailed insight on the one exercise you may have not tried yet.
HOW DO I PERFORM IT?
Assuming you have the necessary equipment available, find or make yourself an inclined bench set-up, and grab an EZ-curl bar with the added free weights of your choosing. To set up, lay down your chest onto the bench, and grab the curling bar with a supinated, or palms up grip. Your start position will entail your biceps completely elongated with your elbows just short of full lockout, maintaining a perpendicular setting of your arms vs the ground. As you curl the bar upwards towards your shoulders, ensure that your elbows stay in the same position that you started in, making sure that they are locked in a fixed position throughout the movement, eliminating any unnecessary movement. As you descent downwards, elongate your biceps down to the position you started in, and repeat. At the end range of the movement, it is important to note that you should not be resting down there for long, and ensure that you are creating sufficient tension and maintaining proper form throughout the movement, getting a nice squeeze at the top end of the motion.
WHAT MUSCLES DOES IT WORK?
Although spider curls will target both the short and long head of the biceps, due to its increased need for shoulder flexion, there will be more short head out of the movement.
VARIATIONS
There are a lot of great benefits that are included in this movement. For one, the added stability due to the chest support on the bench, will assist in greater mind muscle connection, and decrease the needs for those stabilization purposes, just as if a standing dumbbell curl will need. On another note, the maximization of TUT, or time under tension, within this movement, poses a great benefit to anyone's training programming. Here are some examples of variations that can help you maximize short head output in your training plan:
Dumbbell Spider Curls
Straight Bar Spider Curls
Dumbbell Preacher Curls
EZ Bar Preacher Curls
Zottmann Curls
Standing Dumbbell/Barbell Bicep Curls
Etc.
HOW DO I PROGRAM/PROGRESS IT?
Spider Curls can be programmed in a variety of ways. Personally, I like to throw them into the middle to latter half of my workout, due to its increased need for TUT, I am able to be fresh enough to progressively overload session by session. Rep and set ranges can stand anywhere from 6-20, being that less than 6 reps will probably be too heavy to maximize both proper form and TUT.
If you are in the market to build some big biceps, or even get bored of your regular arm day routine, throw these in and I promise you will not be disappointed.
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