What's up, guys?
Jeff Cavaliere, ATHLEANX.com.
Today we want to talk about growing your biceps and whether or not there’s an advantage
to lifting heavier weights, in trying to do so, or lifting lighter weights.
Guys, I’m going to spoil something for you here.
But don’t go anywhere, because it’s going to matter.
You have to do both.
You should be lifting heavy.
You should be lifting light.
However, what you should be lifting right now is something that can vary from person
to person.
Something is different for you, versus somebody else, depending upon the situation you find
yourself in right now.
That’s what I want to address in this video.
So, what are we talking about?
When we talk about lifting heavier or lighter weights it really comes down to something
more about the contribution of muscles in a more heavy, compound lift.
Or the need to find more of a mind-muscle control over a muscle in an individual, smaller,
isolated, lighter lift.
To start that and dig into that we need to hold up three fingers.
In this we have representation of three muscles contributing in a bigger, compound lift.
We know if I try to contract this muscle alone and bring my finger down here to my palm I
can – do this along with me – you’ll feel there’s a certain level of power you
can do that with.
When I take the middle finger and do that, there’s a certain level of power I can do
that with in strength.
Then the last finger, when I bring it down, there’s a certain level of strength I can
do that with.
But we know when I try to move the three together, I can do it with much more force.
It’s a lot easier to bring these three together.
Obviously, there’s some connectivity of the tendon here, in this particular example,
but it illustrates what happens in the compound lift.
The contributing parts have the ability to contribute in different ways to the overall
impact of that lift.
Think about, in the case of biceps, the weighted chin.
I’ve gone on record saying that a weighted chin-up is one of my favorite ways to use
a compound lift, heavy overload to provide a greater stimulus for growth in my biceps.
However, we do know from research that you can actively contribute more or less to a
lift from a certain muscle group based on focusing heavily on the muscle that’s contributing.
So, if I’m up on that bar – I have an exercise I call the ‘chin curl’ – I
can bring myself up more with my biceps than with my lats, just by focusing more on changing
the alignment of my body and space on the bar.
By actively trying to contract more in the biceps, keeping more of a 90-degree angle,
instead of folding them down.
I can do that and shift the focus of that lift.
So, if that’s possible we need to know that mind-muscle control over a muscle is going
to heavily influence our performance on those bigger lifts, leading to bigger and better
size gains down the road.
If we maximize and optimize our ability to recruit that muscle.
At that point, the ability to have mind-muscle control becomes imperative.
Even as a starting point before you start to pile on in these more compound lifts.
We did some tests before.
I said “What is your mind-muscle control?
Do you know how much control you have over your biceps?”
A) When you do your bicep workouts do you ever feel it in your biceps?
Or are you just feeling it in your forearms or shoulders, maybe even your low back?
That’s a sign one that it’s not working for you.
Sign number two would be, if we could take that bicep into its most shortened position
can you feel it?
Is it uncomfortable to contract in that position?
To reiterate something I’ve covered in a video before, we know that the biceps are
contracted when we flex the elbow, when we supinate here like this, of part one.
Part two.
Then we flex the shoulder and bring it up.
So, if I get in this position here and I squeeze as hard as I possibly can I can feel it very,
very uncomfortable right here.
I can’t hold this very long without cramping up.
I want you to be able to feel the same thing.
If you don’t, you don’t have a good mind-muscle control.
So, when you go to your compound lifts, if you go to the weighted chin, you’re not
really using your biceps as much as you might think you are.
Remember, this is hiding the weaknesses and imbalances.
If I can’t do this with much strength, or this with much strength, or this with much
strength, but I do this, and it feels strong; I’m not aware of the fact that the imbalances
and weaknesses are there.
So, we want to make sure we reveal those.
If you’re someone that I just described who can’t do that and feel that, becoming
really uncomfortable, or you don’t feel your biceps in your training what do you do?
Your specific prescription is to do this: maybe forego the heavy barbell cheat curls
like you see me doing here.
Guys, I’ve covered this exercise.
I love this one, too.
But if I’m not feeling it in my biceps, why continue to do it?
Just because I said it’s a good exercise?
No.
You need to do what’s good for you.
So, what you need to do is start mixing in more of these exercises like this.
This is lighter weights.
This is a spider curl.
The benefit of the spider curl is that it puts me in that position where the biceps
are in the position of being able to be fully contracted.
We have supination, we have elbow flexion, and we have that shoulder flexion with our
arm up here, out in front of our body.
Work on progressively building up the ability to contract that with good force.
Which means I might have to dial back the weights considerably to do that.
But that’s okay because in the long term it’s going to be better in the overall pursuit
of bigger biceps.
Or I could do a standing dumbbell curl this way, here.
Again, the focus is not to lift like a cheat curl.
It’s to lift with lighter weights, but to get all three components.
Getting that shoulder flexion in, even at the every, very end.
Not too early because we don’t want to activate the delts and make them take over the movement.
That would be reinforcing something that’s already wrong.
We want to get them at the end.
So, first flex, at the same time you’ve got the supination going.
Then we have the shoulder flexion at the end.
But I would work on these with priority.
But don’t abandon the other, bigger lifts.
Don’t abandon the weighted chin.
You could still do the weighted chin because we know what the benefits are of that exercise.
Far beyond building bigger biceps.
It’s a great pulling exercise.
But don’t think that’s going to be your primary bicep builder if you can’t feel
your biceps at all when you do it.
So, continue to do it for your back and as a pulling exercise, but shift the focus of
your bicep training to this.
Now let’s say you’re already in a position where you feel your biceps.
You can do this and feel it.
You could do your bigger lifts and you feel it.
How much reliance do you need to do these things?
Not very much.
But don’t abandon them entirely.
Here’s why: if I have the ability to feel these moves, like I do – I have the ability
to really do what I said those studies tell us we can do.
That is to focus more on my biceps and recruit more biceps to a particular compound lift.
If I have that ability, then focus more of your time on those bigger ‘bang-for-your-buck’
exercises.
Do an underhand barbell row and really squeeze your biceps to get more recruitment there.
Do a weighted chin and really squeeze your biceps.
If that’s what you’re trying to do.
The focus of this video is building bigger biceps.
Do those.
Do your barbell cheat curls.
But don’t forget these because you never want to forget the fact that this is the basis
of allowing us to contribute more individually to these exercises.
We know that as this mind-muscle control improves we take that improved strength of one finger
back to this three-finger movement here.
We know we’ve got a greater output in strength.
Improve this one, improve this one, improve all three; we have a greater output.
It’s important.
You want to reinforce that at all times.
You don’t just need to rely on that so much.
One exercise is fine.
It’s the same concept as doing rotator cuff work as a corrective.
It’s reinforcing something we know we need.
That becomes the role for you.
Start focusing more on those bigger lifts and not relying on these things and building
that basis.
But if you find yourself in that first situation where you do not have good control, be real
with yourself, guys.
Don’t just do what I said was a great exercise.
Be real with yourself.
Realize your limitations and realize at the end of it, if you focus more time here, you’re
going to be better off.
One last point I’ll make about this is mind-muscle control.
There are other benefits of this, guys.
Of course, there are more benefits here.
The benefits are both aesthetic and athletic.
Aesthetically, we know that as mind-muscle control build in a muscle, we’re more efficiently
able to recruit the muscle fibers of a certain muscle to an action, then the resting tone
of that muscle goes up.
People say “Jeff, you look like your muscles are harder than mine.”
It’s only a matter of muscle tone.
My resting muscle tone is higher than someone else’s who might be hypotonic.
That’s because I’ve been able to develop that over time.
The resting tone is going to be higher.
Performance-wise, we know how critical it is to athletic performance.
You need to have graded muscular control over an action to be a great athlete.
Graded muscle control means being able to grade the ability that your body reacts to
some activity.
If I said – like Jesse, here.
Here, pick up this bottle of water, bring it to your lips, and drink it.
This is what it would look like if he had the ability to grade that just perfectly so
he can bring it up and drink it.
If he was hypertonic, where he had an overreactive control of his muscles, where he couldn’t
fine tune this, he would look like this.
And you get pretty damn wet in the process.
The fact is, athletically, you benefit extremely from having precise control over a muscle,
and mind-muscle control matters very, very much.
So, guys, I hope you’ve found this video helpful.
Again, be honest with where you are yourself.
If you’re more toward this point where this is already something you feel then veer toward
those heavier, compound lifts and realize you do have the ability at any point to focus
that contribution of a certain muscle by focusing more on it, as the research shows.
And if you’re on the other side of that spectrum, be honest with yourself and start
lifting some of the lighter weights and build up to the fact that you can move toward the
heavier compounds over time All right, guys.
I hope you’ve found the video helpful.
Remember to leave your comments below.
Let me know what you want me to cover in a future video and I’ll do my best to do that.
If you haven’t already, please subscribe and turn on your notifications so you never
miss a video.
Also, if you’re looking for programs that put the science back in strength, realizing
there are differences between us, and we show you how to get yourself there, step by step;
they’re available in our programs at ATHLEANX.com.
All right, guys.
See you soon.