The Perfect Arm Day
For years I believed that you didn’t need to train your arms directly.
A lot of people told me that doing things like presses, rows and chin ups would target my arms enough for them to grow.
So I did all of them. For a long time.
But..
My arms didn’t really grow.
I mean, they grew.
But they didn’t grow into impressive specimens like I wanted them to.
Your arms are just like any other part of your body. If you want them to grow you need to target them specifically.
While it’s true that things like the bench press uses your triceps and any kind of row uses your biceps, those exercises simply don’t cut it if your goal is to build impressive pythons.
That means you need to actually have an arm day in the gym.
And you’ll get better results from your arm day by selecting intelligent movements. Movements that train your biceps and triceps throughout their entire range of motion, and challenge them at every part of the strength curve.
So I present to you the perfect arm day.
It’s designed to put your muscles in the proper positions to make them grow quickly while sparing your elbows and shoulders.
So you can look good without any pain.
A1. Spider Curl 4 sets of 12 reps
The Spider Curl is an intensely focused exercise that completely isolates your biceps via the positioning of the upper arm.
How to do it:
Starting lying with your chest on an incline bench
Have your arms hanging directly towards the ground, with your palms facing up
Slowly curl the DBs up to your shoulders while keeping your upper arm in the same position
Pause for 2-3 seconds then slowly lower the DBs
Keeping your upper arm in the same position at both the top and bottom of the movement is what allows such isolation of the bicep. Be careful not to row your elbows up towards your ribs.
A2. Single Arm Cable Tricep Push Down 4 x 12
Your tricep has three parts. Hence the prefix tri. This movement will isolate the medial and lateral parts of the three headed beast.
Here’s how to do it:
Stand in front of a cable machine, slightly push your hips back and brace your core
Grab the cable or band with one hand, with your palm facing in like you’re shaking someone’s hand
Bend your elbow and pin it to the side of your ribs, don’t let this elbow move throughout the entire movement
Drive the cabled hand to the ground, flexing your triceps to straighten your arm
Once your arm is completely straight pause for 2-3 seconds and slowly reverse the movement
B1. Single Arm Preacher Curl 4 x 10
This exercise isolates the bicep just as much as the Spider Curl, but it does it via a different mechanism.
I’m sure you noticed that you can’t go too heavy on the Spider Curl without cheating. Since the upper arm isn’t supported it requires a little bit lighter load to truly challenge the bicep.
The Single Arm Preacher curl fully supports your upper arm, so you can go heavier without sacrificing form.
How to do it:
Set up an incline bench at it’s second or third highest incline
Place your left foot forward, in front of the back legs of the bench
Place your right foot behind the back legs of the bench
Place your right hand (with a DB) on the incline bench
Keep your palm facing up
Press your upper arm into the bench as you curl the DB to the top position
Pause 2-3 seconds before slowly lowering until your arm is completely straight
B2. Single Arm Cable Tricep Extension 4 x 10
This movement is going to isolate the long head of the tricep, which we did not hit with the cable pull down. Make sure you allow your elbow to flare out (point away from your shoulder) during this exercise. That’s what’s called the scapular plane, and we want to stay in it.
How to do it:
Setup for the one arm overhead tricep extension by attaching a single grip handle to the low pulley cable and selecting the weight you want to use on the stack.
Grasp the handle with your left hand, raise your left arm above your head, and turn away from the machine.
Your palm should be facing forwards, away from the cable machine. This is the starting position for the exercise.
Keeping your body fixed and bending at the elbow only, slowly lower weight back behind your body.
Pause, and then raise the weight while squeezing the tricep at the top of the movement.
Do not lock your elbow out, and then lower weight and repeat.
Repeat with your right arm.
C1. Incline Dumbbell or Cable Curl 3 x 10
This exercise will provide a ton of resistance throughout the entire movement, so it’s an ideal exercise to finish with as it’s really hard.
How to do it:
Sit on an incline bench with a DB or cable handle in each hand, holding them at arm’s length. Try keeping your elbows close to your torso and rotate the palms of your hands until they are facing forward. This is your starting position.
Keep your upper arm stationary and curl the weights forward while contracting the biceps as you breathe out. Make sure that only the forearms are moving. Continue the movement until your biceps are fully contracted and the dumbbells are at shoulder level. Hold the contracted position for a second.
Slowly begin to bring the dumbbells back to starting position as you breathe in.
Repeat for the recommended amount of repetitions.
C2. DB Skull Crusher 3 x 12
This is sometimes called the French Press but I’m not that big of a coffee drinker so I refuse to call it that.
This exercise will target all three heads of the tricep so it’s a great movement to pack on strength and size.
Here’s how to do it:
Lie down on a flat bench or the ground with your feet planted firmly onto the floor.
Hold the dumbbells above your chest with straight arms and your palms facing each other.
With your elbows in a fixed position, hinge your elbows to slowly bring the dumbbells down just behind your ears. Do not let your elbows sway back or forth during this exercise.
Contract your triceps to extend your arms back into the straight position at the top. Focus on squeezing your triceps as hard as you can as you’re raising the DBs.
Want to download this as a PDF to follow along? Click here.
So there you have your perfect arm day. It’s a pretty compact workout that shouldn’t take you more than 45 minutes to complete.
It hits every head of your tricep, and your biceps from multiple angles. And the angles are intelligently picked to save your elbow from feeling cranky.
If you’ve struggled to grow your arms, or tone your arms, add this workout into your schedule at least once a week.