Almost all people that begin a body building plan want bigger biceps. Biceps are the muscles that show strength, and weight trainers like their shirts fitting tightly at the top of their arms. Because the biceps get a lot of attention they become the most over trained muscle which means for a lot of body builders their progress actually goes backwards.
The most common reason why most weight trainers train their biceps too much is because they pay too much attention to body building magazines. Most magazines possess an article that will try and tell you how to get bigger arms within 6 weeks. When you read the article you’ll discover a huge body builder, and he’ll give you his workout routine for his arms.
A regular arm routine in a magazine will usually be a routine of around 20 sets of exercises. This is a massive amount of sets to encourage growth in your biceps. You will almost be able to give your back, cheat and shoulders a good workout with 20 sets, and your biceps don’t require no where near this amount of training. After reading the article you’ll usually see a photo of the body builder sitting their with his favorite protein shake in his hand. The article you read is an ad for the supplement he’s holding, and is in no way intended to help you get bigger arms. They want you to purchase the supplement.
When you exercise your shoulder and back muscles, all the pulling you do will have already given your arms a decent workout so applying another 20 sets to your routine will definitely over train them. Weight lifters in magazines can blast their biceps with 20 sets because they’re usually on growth hormones and/or steroids. This type of routine is impossible if you’re a natural body builder.
After all the training you give your back and shoulders all you only need to give your biceps around 4 sets a week. You don’t have to punish your arms to make them bigger, all you need to do is make sure you gain strength.
If you can add extra weight to the bar every time you train, and as you gain more strength then your arms will grow. Growth isn’t achieved with adding more sets to your workout. If you don’t add extra weight or extra reps to your routine then your biceps won’t grow.
If you don’t gain the strength to add extra weight or extra reps every week then you need to look at what you’re eating. To get growth you need to eat enough carbs, protein and healthy fats to aid the repair of your muscles. Without the right balance of the right foods, and enough of them you won’t grow. Eating enough small meals spaced out through the day will cause a natural anabolic effect in your body that will cause you to get bigger.
Keeping a journal of what your doing will help you find out what is working best for you. When you get all of the little things right you’ll begin getting the gains you’re after.
Tags: biceps training, Health&Fitness, over training biceps, upper arm workouts