And so, with the bench dips, while you might be on the right track,
you're on the wrong train and this one's headed this Snap City.
What s up guys, Jeff Cavaliere, Athleanx.com. What you see behind me is a bunch of different tricep
exercises. Many of which you probably recognize because you've either done them in the past or
you're still doing them today. However, after today's video, you're going want to get rid of a
few of them. See, I'm going to help you to rank them from the worst to the best so that you're
left with only the best tricep exercises that are going to deliver the gains that you're after.
So, as we begin our ranking process here, it's important to qualify what goes into the ranking.
Because there's many factors and they all sort of weight differently. The first thing you going
to find is that these exercises have to have some ability to create some overload. Right?
Even though we're not picking these based on strength benefits, we're really driving them off
of hypertrophy. We know that gains and strength will drive hypertrophy, so you have to be able to
overload these exercises to rank pretty high. The second thing we want to make sure is,
is it hitting all the functions of the muscle in question. Here at the triceps,
we have three different heads. We want to see if we can account for all three of them.
The final thing is, is the exercise actually safe? A lot of people will veer towards any exercise in
the pursuit of gains. Here in this channel as always, I'm going to have to consider safety,
we're going to do just that. And so, we will start the list, as we always do from the bottom up.
Yeah, I get it, I know the title is its best to worst, but it's my video.
And so, we start off at the bottom of triceps barrel here with our first exercise,
the standing dumbbell powerbomb. Now, somebody might know this exercise as a standing overhead
dumbbell extension. The fact is it is not one of my favorites and there's an alternative that
will show you later that is definitely better than this. What I don't like about this move
is that you have two things going on here. Number one, the position of the shoulder to even perform
the exercise. You literally have to get into internal rotation at the shoulder in order to
place the dumbbell behind your head. And speaking about your head, good luck not hitting it on the
way up and down on every single repetition. There are simply better ways to attack the
long head here, this is not one of them. For that reason, it gets the first big red X.
Which brings us to our second exercise here in the Worst category and it's the cross face tricep
extension. Now, ever since I first saw this exercise in Arles Encyclopedia Body Building
and actually tried it many years ago, my hate for the exercise actually has only grown. It
comes down once again to the position of the body and performing the exercise. Look, we know that
triceps are worked through extension of the elbow, but we can do that out of so many positions.
This one here is another one that places the shoulder into that internal rotation position.
As a matter of fact, so much so that if I were to just sit up from the bench,
you can see that I'm in the impingement testing position that I would put somebody in if they came
into a physical therapy office. You don't want to get in this position and then add a dumbbell
into your hand on top of it. There are many other ways that we can get elbow extension here guys,
this is not one of my favorites. And for that reason, I give it also the big red X.
And that brings us to our third and final exercise in the Worst category here. And for this, my
sights are set squarely on the bench dip. And this is an exercise I've covered many times before.
And I just recently did so again in an appearance on Live with Kelly and Ryan. And it's simply
the fact that the exercise may be of good intention, but oftentimes bad execution.
When you place your hands forward on the bench, as many of us do, including myself many years ago
until I learned better, this place is your shoulder into a vulnerable position.
You're literally throwing the head of the humerus into the anterior shoulder capsule on the descent
of every single rep. If you make the modification, however, to getting your hands turn outwards as I
show them here and get your chest back, you're going to get the external rotation that makes
the exercise much better. The fact is, many of us don't perform this way, especially those who
haven't seen my video on this before. And for that reason, guys, I have to throw this into the
bottom category. And for that matter, since we've been naming exercises, this one has another name,
too. It's called the rotator cuff ripper. With that, I get to break out my blue marker as
we move our way up the rankings into the Better category. And the first exercise we re going to
take a look at here is the rope push away or the tricep push away. Now, this is a good exercise,
however, is the physics of the exercise that kind of take it down a couple of notches.
We know that in order to keep the tension high on the muscles, you want to have
that line of resistance perpendicular to the moving segment, if we can. In this case,
our forearm is where we're targeting, and the line of resistance is the cable itself.
And you can see that when we get to the bottom of the exercise, those two are almost parallel
to each other, meaning we don't have a lot of resistance on the triceps in the peak contracted
state. On top of it, this tends to be one of those momentum exercises. A lot of times we'll get our
lats involved, we'll get our core involved, we ll get a little bit of forward leaning involved,
all these things take a little bit away from the exercise, making it our first
in the Better category. We're going to give it the blue circle for that reason.
Which puts us in the second exercise in the Better category and this is a good exercise once again.
But in its most basic form here, it has some limitations and we're talking about
the tricep push down. And whether you perform this with a straight bar or a rope, the limitations are
still the same. We're talking once again about the physics of the movement not lining up and
giving us the most we can get out of the exercise. Especially considering the fact that I'm going to
show you a variation you could do later on that will. Not to mention elbow position matters here.
As the elbows start to flare more and more out to the side as they are on any type of overhand
push down, you're going to start to involve other muscles, particularly the chest, which
is going to take some of the effort away from the triceps and limit the growth that you re seeking
there. For that reason guys, the basic push down is going to fall into our Better category.
And that brings us to the third and final exercise in our Better category here and we're talking
about our next bodyweight exercise, it's a diamond cutter pushup. But if you watch my video on the
chest rankings, you saw that I placed the basic pushup in the very same spot. Why? For the very
same reason, the ease of execution. The fact that there's a lack of stimulus here if you could do
too many of these. Guys, if these are standalone exercises, they're not going to provide the
hypertrophy stimulus that you're looking for, which is one of the main criteria that I placed in
this exercise ranking from the very beginning. If you can bang out 30 or 40 diamond cutter pushups
or even 25, you're simply not being challenged enough in this exercise to get the gains that
you're looking for from it. When we know that there are other variations of the same pushup
exercise that are much more difficult and more challenging. Not to mention the fact that the
arm position here on the traditional diamond cutter is going to keep your elbows out in
front of your body, which is going to limit the activation of the long head. That's something I
can fix later on. And finally, the diamond hand placement on the floor here can be challenging
for some that have mobility issues. For all of these reasons, guys, the diamond cutter pushup
concludes our category here, better meaning, good exercise is just not good enough.
And with that now, we move on to the next category, the Better Still category. I get
to break out my yellow marker. In the first exercise here is guess what, another pushup.
It's the Cobra pushup. And here I get a chance to explain exactly why I prefer this. I mentioned
in the last exercise that with the diamond cutter pushup, the arms were maintained in
position out in front of the body. The less we get into extension relative to the torso,
the less of the long hand we get into a fully contracted state. The Cobra pushup fixed that.
You can see that we place ourselves a little bit more forward and we're at finishing in a position
with the arms tightly tucked to our sides and more into extension relative to our torso.
This is a good thing to get a more complete tricep contraction. The second thing it does
is it actually takes a little bit the chest out of the equation. So instead
of dominating with the chest, we're going to place the brunt of the move on the triceps,
which are going to make it a more demanding tricep exercise. hat's a good thing when it's
tricep growth that you're after. The final thing is that the hand positioning on the floor here
is much more kind to those that have those wrist mobility issues. And for all these reasons, it's
obvious why the cobra pushup is the better pushup when it's the tricep gains that you're after.
And so what we're talking about, improvements of exercises is making them better exercises.
Let's move on to that next version of the tricep push down, it's the reverse grip push down
because we're talking about a better exercise. Why? Even though you have to use potentially a
little less weight here, the end effect of what's happening with the triceps is going to increase
the effectiveness of the exercise. And that's because what the reverse grip provides us with
a better ability to get activation of the long head of the triceps, once again.
We know that any time we extend the elbow, we're going to hit the medial lateral head of the
triceps. But if we can get that are more adductor or tightly tucked to our sides and approaching
more extension. In other words, bringing them back behind us, the more long head activation
and contraction we can get. For all these reasons, guys, a simple change in hand positioning doesn't
just take the push down and make it a better exercise, but it turns it from a blue one
to a yellow one as a Better Still selection. And let's keep rolling here with the exercise
improvement because he talked about the tricep push away, do we have something that's better
than that? Or in this category Better Still? And we do, it's the overhead rope extension. See,
the setup is the same, the machine is the same, but the performance of the exercise is entirely
different. Instead of targeting some point out in front of you, you should be targeting some point
up above you in terms of the finished position. Because you can see if we go back to the physics
once again, that when we finish here, we finish as perpendicular as we can to our forearm with that
cable. Meaning that when our elbows are extended and we want the most tension possible on the
triceps, we're actually getting it here. And with the triceps solely in focus, the weight you'll be
able to use won't be so much that will overcome your core and cause you to lose your balance.
For all these reasons, the overhead rope extension with the hands traveling up rather than out,
is going to land in it on a place higher up on our rankings of the best tricep exercises.
And last up in our Better Still category is another one of those exercises named after
somebody else. In this case, it's the JM Press named after JM Blakely. And this is a cross
between a skull crusher and a close-gripped bench press. Two exercises that we traditionally are
able to load up pretty well. You get actually an additional benefit from the JM Press,
a little bit of momentum. Because the way we drop the dumbbells down is we're targeting our
shoulders rather than our forehead. And instead of keeping the strict positioning of our elbow
throughout, we're able to let the arm float in space to accommodate that dumbbell path.
And in doing so, the extra momentum allows us to push a little bit more weight.
The exercise can be a little bit demanding on some that have some elbow issues. However,
I find that if you simply switch to a neutral grip positioning on the dumbbells like I do here,
a lot of those elbow problems are alleviated. The fact is this is a solid exercise for
creating solid triceps growth, and it's one that you should try to have that already.
It is the JM Press and it concludes are Better Still category.
And so now moving on and moving up, we take out the green marker to indicate that we're
taking a step up the rankings now to the Almost Best category, not the best, but the Almost Best
and right off the bat. I'm going to make the hairs on the back of some people's neck stand up,
because the exercise I'm going to include in this category is the dumbbell kickback. Now,
a lot of your thinking, but I thought you said the criteria was an exercise you could progressively
overload on. That's one of the criteria. You also have to, as I mentioned,
favor the exercises that allow the triceps to reach a completely contracted state, meaning
all three heads, medial, lateral and long head. And the dumbbell kick back is one of the very
few exercises that actually allows us to get that tricep into its fully contracted state.
Because we have to get the elbow back behind the body, not just in an extended elbow position,
but behind the body as well. This does a better job than anything else. And though I mentioned
the fact that the exercise is going to have to be lowered here, remember, your triceps cannot read
the number on the side of the dumbbell, but they feel the tension they're being placed under with
whatever it is in your hand. Guys, the dumbbell kickback provides us the opportunity to stimulate
a good triceps contraction. Which is going to ultimately allow you to complement the bigger
exercises to create the growth that you're looking for. This belongs in the Almost Best category.
Sometimes a simple change in setup is enough to take an exercise from a lower category
to a better category because of improved efficacy and safety. That's what happens here when we take
the dumbbell powerbomb, you go from a standing position to an incline position. You see, when
we set ourselves up on a bench, all the issues I have with the exercise that placed it in the Worst
category are actually nullified. The dumbbell no longer even comes close to hitting the back of our
head or neck on the way down. We realize that the elbow positioning is key. We can get them out in
front of our body alleviating any of the concerns I had in terms of the position of the shoulders in
the exercise. We're getting externally rotated now rather than internally rotated, which makes a big
difference for those of us that have shoulder problems. For all those reasons, the incline
powerbomb is the version you want to stick to, looking for the Almost Best exercise options.
Speaking of modifications, we could change more than just the setup of the exercise.
We can actually change the position of our body during the exercise to ramp up the effectiveness
of it. And when we're talking about the push downs, it s the rocking pushed down
that does this the best. Guys, I've mentioned in the basic push down the limitations
in terms of the physics of the exercise with the line of resistance not remaining perpendicular
to your forearms throughout the exercise. With the rucking push down, we can actually
come as close to that as we possibly can. We start with it perpendicular to our forearms,
and as we lean back, we pull back with the arms, which maintains that same relationship with the
cable to the forearm. A traditional push down gets a little easier at the arm's reach full extension,
which is the exact moment that you don't want it to become easier.
This variation of the push down keeps the tension high from the beginning all the way to the end,
making it a better version of the exercise and one that belongs here in the Almost Best category.
And so now our choices start to become limited we have to go back to the concept of overload
and why it becomes an important factor. We're going to start with the weighted upright dip.
This is one of the better ways to overload the triceps. And notice I said upright dip because if
you lean too far forward, you'll place too much of the work on the chest. We want to make sure
we maintain this upright and tall of a torso as possible. So that as we go down and stop at that
important 90 degree position which maintains the safety of the shoulder, we're going to be pushing
back up to the top with the force primarily of the triceps. Guys, this is a great exercise that we
can easily strap some additional weight around our waist on to keep that overload coming. The
weighted upright dip is definitely one of the classic master builders and belongs at the top
of the list here in the Almost Best category. And moving all the way to the top of the Almost
Best category, the best of the Almost Best. We have the close grip bench press. And what this
provides us is once again the obvious opportunity to create some of the triceps by giving us a good
overload option. Yes, the chest and shoulders will certainly be contributing to the movement,
but the closer hand positioning certainly shifts the load in favor of the triceps,
and it gives us a great chance to push them to their limits. The close gripped bench press
definitely belongs at the top of the list and certainly as the best of the Almost Best.
And with that, we've made it all the way up to the top of our list with the one deserving of the
green star, the best of the best, the lying tricep extension. And the reason why it gets the honors
over the close-cropped bench press has solely to do with the starting position of the exercise.
Because the starting position of the exercise allows us to recruit the long head of the triceps
that the close gripped bench press simply does not do as good of a job on. And because we finish
in the same position, the medial and the lateral head are still getting a heavy workload here.
This is the exercise you're going to want to do if you want to get the best tricep development.
If you do this with an easy bar or with a set of dumbbells, you're going to be able to reap
the benefits of the exercise without having to worry about any excess strain on your wrist.
If you do this exercise guys, I promise you you'll see the gains you've been seeking.
This one here gets the green star as the best of the best for tricep exercises.
And with that the triceps exercise rankings are complete. And you've got more information
now to arm yourself to make better choices when it comes to your tricep exercises and
training. When it comes to exercise science guys, we do it better than anybody else. You
have to put the science behind the selection of what you do. We do that in all of our programs
available over at athleanx.com. If you found the video helpful,
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