Mind Pump: Raw Fitness Truth - 862: How to Get Big Arms

Episode Date: September 20, 2018

In this episode, Sal and Adam discuss how to build your arms, whether you want big "guns" or just want a "toned" look. They discuss the best exercises, techniques, and routines to accelerate the benef...its you see from your arm training. MAPS Fitness Product videos getting a makeover & the challenge of creating a program for the masses. (2:00) How to Get Big Arms (6:40) The myths behind building bigger arms. (8:18) Implement the Best Exercises. The exercises that you're relying on might not be the most effective ones to build your arms. (15:45) Free weights vs. machines: Which one will build more muscle? (21:40) The importance of compound lifts, especially for beginners, in building your arms. (24:10) The specific exercises they neglected that when utilized their arms BLEW UP! (26:20) Follow a Good Schedule. How often should you be working your arms? The importance of a correctly formulated routine, and what it looks like. (35:00) Avoid Plateaus. How to keep building muscle, after you've already increased in size. (39:10) Follow a Good Schedule. How often should you be working your arms? The importance of a correctly formulated routine, and what it looks like. (43:00) The BEST way to combine supersets to build MASSIVE arms. (50:10) People Mentioned: Larry Scott (bodybuilder) Ben Pakulski (@ifbbbenpak)  Instagram Links/Products Mentioned: FREE REPORT: HOW TO GET BIG ARMS Build Your Biceps with Angles Pumping Iron | Netflix Mind Pump FREE Resources – Everything You Need to Know to Reach Your Fitness Goals Would you like to be coached by Sal, Adam & Justin? You can get 30 days of virtual coaching from them for FREE at www.mindpumpmedia.com. Get our newest program, MAPS Strong, an expertly programmed and phased strongman inspired training program designed in collaboration with World’s Strongest Man competitor Robert Oberst to trigger new muscle building adaptations and get you STRONG. Get it at www.mapsstrong.com! Get MAPS Prime, MAPS Anywhere, MAPS Anabolic, MAPS Performance, MAPS Aesthetic, the Butt Builder Blueprint, the Sexy Athlete Mod AND KB4A (The MAPS Super Bundle) packaged together at a substantial DISCOUNT at www.mindpumpmedia.com. Make EVERY workout better with MAPS Prime, the only pre-workout you need… it is now available at mindpumpmedia.com Also check out Thrive Market www.thrivemarket.com/mindpump! Thrive Market makes purchasing organic, non-GMO affordable. With prices up to 50% off retail, Thrive Market blows away most conventional, non-organic foods. PLUS, they offer a NO RISK way to get started which includes: 1. One FREE month’s membership 2. $20 Off your first three purchases of $49 or more (That’s $60 off total!) 3. Free shipping on orders of $49 or more You insure your car but do you insure YOU? If you don’t, and you are the primary breadwinner, you will likely leave your loved ones facing hardship and struggle if you die (harsh reality). Perhaps you think life insurance is expensive, but if you are fit and healthy, you can qualify for approved rates that are truly inexpensive and affordable. To find out if you qualify for the best rates in the industry, go get a quote at www.HealthIQ.com/mindpump Have Sal, Adam & Justin personally train you via video instruction on our YouTube channel, Mind Pump TV. Be sure to Subscribe for updates. Get Organifi, certified organic greens, protein, probiotics, etc at www.organifi.com/mindpump Use the code “mindpump” for 20% off. Go to foursigmatic.com/mindpump and use the discount code “mindpump” for 15% off of your first order of health & energy boosting mushroom products. Add to the incredible brain enhancing effect of Kimera Koffee with www.brain.fm/mindpump 10 Free sessions! Music for the brain for incredible focus, sleep and naps! Also includes 20% if you purchase! Please subscribe, rate and review this show! Each week our favorite reviewers are announced on the show and sent Mind Pump T-shirts! Have questions for Mind Pump? Each Monday on Instagram (@mindpumpmedia) look for the QUAH post and input your question there. (Sal, Adam & Justin will answer as many questions as they can)

Transcript
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Starting point is 00:00:00 If you want to pump your body and expand your mind, there's only one place to go. Mite, op, mite, op with your hosts. Salda Stefano, Adam Schaefer, and Justin Andrews. In this instructional episode of Mind Pump, so Adam and I are in the studio recording without Justin because Justin is doing some filming out in the filming studio right now. And we were sitting down hanging out talking and we're like, what should we record? What should we talk about? And lately we've been trying to bring it back to the basics. So if you've been listening to our show for at least the last few months,
Starting point is 00:00:36 you could see that we've been doing these episodes where we talk about how to train your legs or how to do hit training properly or whatever. So Adam and I were sitting here and we're like, let's talk about arm training. Like that's a really, really popular topic. We talked about that way back in the day when we first started Mind Pump. So we thought we'd revisit it.
Starting point is 00:00:54 Well, you just recently wrote a really incredible guide that goes along with it and we're getting a great response. So it just seems like, okay, well, if we're getting a great response on the Facebook advertising, so many people are opting in and loving it, we may as well introduce it to our audience on the podcast too.
Starting point is 00:01:07 Now it's a totally free guide. You can find it at mine.pumpfree.com. It's called How to Get Big Arms. I also do want to remind everybody it is September and we have launched a brand new Maps program. Maps strong, strong man inspired maps program. It's great for building muscle, building strength, and boosting your metabolism. So if you want to fast your metabolism, this is one of the best programs you could do.
Starting point is 00:01:30 All you need is regular gym equipment, by the way. We get a lot of questions of people saying, do I need strongman equipment? No, you don't. That being said, there are those exercises in there. We just offer alternatives for somebody who's in there. That's right. If you do have strongman equipment, we do have some options where you can get real, with things that get real fun.
Starting point is 00:01:46 Now, maps strong, you can find mapsstrong.com, all of our other programs you can find at mapsfitnessproducts.com, and that's it. So here's the episode where Adam and I are talking about how to develop amazing arms. Here I go again on my own, going down the only road I'd ever known. Whoa see well. I miss Justin. We don't need Justin I don't fucking need Justin anymore
Starting point is 00:02:14 Lessons are paying off. He's out he's out in the studio right now filming filming some stuff I don't want to say what it is. Why are we can tell people I think it's good for tell people what do you think Doug? We can tell people what we're doing. I think it's kind of a secret. Well, it's not really us. It's a giving back, right? I think we've made this promise to our audience. At least we communicate this in the form often is that we'll always be improving what we've already created. So if you're somebody who already owns like Maps and Obolic,
Starting point is 00:02:41 I hope there'll be version two, version three. And right now we're working on version two of all the programs where we've taken all the information and just put it in an easier to use package. We're addressing all the issues that people say, though. Hyperlinks, better videos, hyperlinks, better quality of everything. So here's something Doug and I were talking about.
Starting point is 00:03:01 We were looking at the MAPS and BOLOC videos, and I had totally forgot that we had redone a lot of them. Oh, remember we did them all over, and they were instructional. Yeah, so, okay. So I was thinking we'll have the video that shows the person demoing it, but then have another underneath for more detail.
Starting point is 00:03:16 So we'll keep both in there, people want. You know, absolutely. So that was one of it. So you saw the form, I think it was a shout out to Jessica Rose, I believe, who owns like all of our programs. And so she made a comment. Yeah, she made a comment on there. I think I, you know, it's fair that I can comment on your program's been doing this for a long time.
Starting point is 00:03:34 And she made the comment of one of the most, the recent ones strong because it is just the quick videos in there. You know, some detailed movements in there. And, you know, I explained to her that, you know, what we're working on. And that's part of how the YouTube has always been a compliment to the- An extension, if I can. Yeah, so if, you know, because there are some people that they just want to see the exercise.
Starting point is 00:03:53 Because that was the complaint before where we went really long detailed on exercises was some people were like, just show me, I know to buy some curls, I don't need these elaborate 12 minute videos on how to do it. But then again, there are some movements that are very detailed and there are a handful of people that will say, I wish there was more information regarding this.
Starting point is 00:04:12 So there'll be a hyperlink in the future of those exercises. So you have that option of, I just wanna know the exercise, see what it is real quick, or this is really complicated. I wanna see a more in depth exercise. Yeah, I mean, it's really the challenge of creating, being a personal trainer with a lot of experience, and then creating, trying to create a program for a large audience.
Starting point is 00:04:35 Because a lot of the programs that you see online are not created by trainers with lots of experience. They're created by people that maybe know some exercises and make them know how to package it Well and make it and sell it well, but the programming you can always tell I'll look at the program I'll be like okay, obviously a really good trainer didn't put this together This is either an athlete that's super elite and genetically gifted or What's more common is somebody doesn't even know anything about exercise and just puts up exercises that look cool
Starting point is 00:05:03 Right, but rarely do you see one that, do I look at a program and say, okay, I can tell a trainer with lots of experience put this together because when I'm coaching, I know what to coach on, based on the years I've worked with people. I know what things to focus on. I know how to put a program together
Starting point is 00:05:21 based on all the experience of working with people who are, when you've worked with thousands of people over 20 years, you get a pretty good understanding of the general type of person that you're gonna end up working with and what you need to focus on. If I just, all I ever did was work with pro bodybuilders, my coaching and training,
Starting point is 00:05:40 we've very, very different. If I only ever worked with athletes, it'd be very, very different, but we only ever worked with athletes, it'd be very, very different. But we've worked with such a wide variety of people. We kind of know, okay, this is what we should focus on, this is what it should look like. And so it's made it challenging, but it's, you know, again, along the way, we're going to revamp and upgrade everything as we continue to go along. So you can expect, and here's the best part is, and this is something we talked about early on, because I remember this discussion, like, okay, what do we do when we redo a program, make it look better, put in a better format, or whatever, do we, you know, what about the
Starting point is 00:06:15 people who've already had access to it? And it's like, all of us agreed. They get, they all will have access forever, even if it's upgraded, you know, a hundred times. Right. People are going to have access forever. Yeah, it's all coming. Justin's working on that today. Justin's been, I mean, we looked to him to handle all the model stuff and the shooting and everything like that. It's nice that we actually can be relieved of that a little bit, but he's outside the
Starting point is 00:06:37 studio right now shooting that. So we thought today we'd be getting such great response, which, you know, it's like how many times we learn this lesson, you know, we sometimes get off in the weeds and in the topics that we love to talk about. And every time we do these simple episodes that are about a specific topic, or maybe about something that you blog that you wrote that we got a great response for, we get a great response on the podcast. And, you know, you just recently wrote an incredible
Starting point is 00:07:05 blog that's getting our white paper that's getting a lead magnet whenever you want to call it. That's getting a ton of traction right now and that's the big arms guide. Yeah, it's the most common, especially for guys, although gosh, I tell you what, dude, I remember early on when I was a trainer, women used to tell me that they didn't want to work arms, and now more and more, you're getting women who are like, I want really sculpted arms, I want to build my arms, I want to build muscle there.
Starting point is 00:07:32 Because I think they finally realized that building your arms doesn't mean you're going to look like bodybuilders, you're just going to have this really nice tone looking arms or whatever the terminology that's popular at the time. So you got into squatting when you were young, like, and you talk about this, but I was notorious for like all I did was arms. I mean, I was like, I was that kid, you know. That's common.
Starting point is 00:07:55 I think I was more common. It was rare to meet another 17 year old boy that was in the squat rack. So you were in an anomaly, I think, where I was like the rest of the guys where we were doing bicep tricep and then chest. It was chest on Monday then bison tries to spread out over the week as much as there's a lot of myths around around training the arms. Like what works well for the arms? What's gonna get them to
Starting point is 00:08:17 To develop what's gonna get them to respond? It is a popular body part like you said like you're saying to train especially for guys. They go to the gym and it's like, what is it? Chest and arm day, right? Like every other day is chest and arm day and they neglect everything else. But there's a lot of myths around them and a lot of the myths surround. It's funny. I think a lot of it has to do with the, like the invent, when they've invented machines or, you know, people coming out and saying,
Starting point is 00:08:46 this new technique with an exercise is going to develop your arms, or it's all about the pump, or it's all about whatever. Arm training is both extremely simple, but also complex. It's both. It's simple in the sense that there's very basic, simple exercises that are extremely effective. It can be complex in the sense that how you apply those exercises, the frequency, the intensity, the volume, that's the part that can be a little bit complex.
Starting point is 00:09:14 And that's where I think people get confused a little bit. Well, one of the myths too that you see is that because there's a genetic component too, right? Like where you're originating insertion is. Oh, the length of the muscle. Right. Really, really depends on like, you get a lot of guys that do this. And I remember we, we called out our boy, a doctor integrity when we first started with the, you know,
Starting point is 00:09:34 working the parts of the bicep, you know, because people, some people have these incredible peaks on their biceps. Some people have these massive long-looking biceps. And so because you, you have these genetic differences, you get people that try and market to them to try and capture leads and give people, and it's just not true, there's not an exercise you're going to do that is, the peak, you're gonna make you a more peaky bicep.
Starting point is 00:09:58 You're gonna change the shape of your net. Yeah, you're starting from building it. Right, right, that's really what it comes down to. Either we build the muscle, or we don't build the muscle. But there are some general truths. And I remember one of the big paradigm shattering moments for me was understanding the importance of my elbow positioning.
Starting point is 00:10:16 I think I did a YouTube video on this. That's really the main, I mean that. And then of course, your hand, pronating or supernating. Those are really the two things that will affect, you know where it's, you know, where it started, by the way. So it started back when bodybuilding was in its infancy, right? You had the first Mr. Olympia was Larry Scott. So if you don't know who he is, you can look him up.
Starting point is 00:10:35 You're really, really impressive looking biceps. And in fact, you know, bodybuilding, by the way, is what made biceps really popular before bodybuilding. It wasn't like this. When someone said, let me see your muscle, it wasn't the instinctual for people to flex their biceps. Isn't that crazy? Yeah, that happened.
Starting point is 00:10:53 We know, you flex your muscle. I mean, you have many muscles you have in your body, right? And people know it's your bicep. But Larry Scott was the first Mr. Olympia. He's kind of this really good-looking dude. Really long muscle belly, which if you're a really good looking dude, really long muscle belly, so if you're a bodybuilder, it's long muscle bellies are ideal
Starting point is 00:11:10 because as the muscle develops, they just look bigger and fuller. And Larry Scott used to do a lot of preacher curls, so on the preacher bench. Now he called them Scott curls, very smart of him to do this. And weeder at the time, who obviously weeder, the first,
Starting point is 00:11:26 and maybe not the first, but the most popular bodybuilding or muscle building publications, like muscle and fitness and flex and all that stuff, they put them in their magazines. And they talked about how the Scott Curl, or the preacher Curl, built the bicep peaks.
Starting point is 00:11:42 If you want a big peak, like Mr. Olympia, then do the Scott curl. And you can see that the brilliance in weaters marketing, but you can also see the misinformation obviously, because they were marketing it that way to try and make it, you know, seems special, especially to his athlete. People started to believe some of the stuff.
Starting point is 00:12:00 But yeah, when you look at the bicep, you know, the word bicep, sep means head, bie means two. So there's two heads at the bicep, you know, the word bicep, sep means head, b means two. So there's two heads to the bicep. There's like two parts to the bicep. But the origin and insertion of those two heads are so close together that, you know, working one head over the other. You're not isolating one.
Starting point is 00:12:18 No, never. No, you're not. They're both working. And trying to isolate the bottom part of the bicep versus the middle part of the And trying to isolate the bottom part of the bicep versus the middle part of the bicep versus the back part of the bicep or the top of the bicep for the peak or whatever, it doesn't work that way because the muscle fibers,
Starting point is 00:12:34 although they are small and they connect to each other, when a muscle contracts, it pulls both ends together and there's two ends to it. So I can't pull from one end to the middle without pulling from the other end. It doesn't work that way. So you can't, you know, work on the peak or the length of the bicep.
Starting point is 00:12:54 That was another big one. Like do these exercises make the biceps longer or whatever. You can't do those things, but what you can do, and this is where, you know, science kind of steps in a little bit with this, is muscles get stronger in pretty specific ways. And what I mean by that is the positioning of the body, the muscle, and then the way
Starting point is 00:13:15 tension is applied, your body will adapt quite specifically to how you train that muscle. So here's a good example. If I do, there's a picture of Larry Scott. That's pretty impressive for back then, right? He's the first Mr. Olympia. Yeah, first Mr. Olympia. Damn, he looks really good. Yeah, scrolled down a little bit, Doug.
Starting point is 00:13:33 I didn't realize he looked like... Look at his arm. Look how impressive his arm was. Damn, what year? What year is it? Can you see what the first Mr. Olympia is? In 1960, something, maybe 65 or something like that? Praise the MENC. Are all natural? Mr. Olympus in 1960 something, maybe 65 or something like that.
Starting point is 00:13:48 Praise he am, he is, he are on patrol. No, back then they, I think it was 1965. They, he talked about taking one Diana ball pill a day, but back then, D-ball was only five or 10 milligrams. So he took really low doses compared to, especially compared to the guys today. The doses really started getting ramped up 1966. He's impressive looking.
Starting point is 00:14:08 Pretty impressive, right? Here's a good example, right? Let's say I'm doing a concentration curl for my bicep. For those you listening who don't know what a concentration curl is, there's two versions of it. One is where I'm sitting on a bench. My arm is up against my thigh and I'm doing a curl. That's the one you'll see on TV when kids are working out in their bedroom. Arnold made that promise.
Starting point is 00:14:29 Or the one that Arnold did in pumping iron. Yeah, where you're hanging over, your elbows are pointing down and then you're doing a curl. When you do a concentration curl, the heaviest part of the concentration curl is when your arm is almost fully closed or contracted because you're fighting gravity directly because of the elbow positioning. So that means the greatest tension is at the fullest contraction of the bicep. Now, if I do an exercise like a picture curl,
Starting point is 00:15:00 that's where my arm is over the bench at a different angle, the heaviest part of the curl is where my arm is more fully extended. Okay. Now, this is where the myths came from of working the different biceps, because people would say, oh, it's harder at the bottom than it is at the top or whatever. It doesn't work in that way, but the muscle does get stronger based on the way you're applying that tension. So if I only ever did concentration curls, my strength curve would match more of the concentration curl.
Starting point is 00:15:31 If I did only preacher curls, my strength curve would only match the preacher curl. Now, this is important to know, right? Because if I can get my, let's say my max curl is, you know, 50 pounds. Well, this is where exercise selection becomes important. Very important. This is why bodybuilders, they understood this by changing angles.
Starting point is 00:15:51 And I think the takeaway, because we're not saying that, that doesn't mean that doing all these different variations isn't important, or it's what ends up happening and what I see here that's really common, is someone will do You know three different bicep exercises in a routine, but their the variation is is more similar than they think it is Yeah, because of the position of the elbow. It's like standing barbell curl standing, you know dumbbell curl EZ curl then you're right. Yeah, all of the stand the same position same tension kind of curve same position
Starting point is 00:16:24 Exactly, and so I think that's the real the real takeaway is understanding that if we're going to all the same position, same tension, kind of curve, same position, exactly. And so I think that's the real takeaway is understanding that if we're going to vary it to vary from the, and that's kind of how I've always taught clients was, you know, if you're going to do a, you know, arm day and you're doing biceps, you know, try to incorporate at least, you know, one to two to three exercises where your elbows either positioned right by your side, your elbows out in front of you or even elevated above where you're doing a curl down to your head to kind of target. The three main elbow positions, we're not even getting into hand positions, we're getting
Starting point is 00:16:57 that in a second, but the three main elbow positions that I've always taught to clients were elbows behind the body. A drag curl. Yeah, like a drag curl or an incline curl. That one's pretty gnarly, by the way, the stretch on that is, burns like crazy. Then your traditional barbell curl, or the arms right your sides, and then a concentration curl or a preacher curl, or the arms are in front of you. But then even then, you also wanna look at positions
Starting point is 00:17:25 of tension. Again, preacher curl and the concentration curl, the elbows in front of my body, both times, but they feel very different because the concentration curl is heaviest at the contraction, whereas a preacher curl is heaviest more towards the extension. So that's something else you wanna consider
Starting point is 00:17:43 when you're doing the exercise. And this is, you want to know this because you can't always just get stronger. Okay. At some point, you know, you're going to start reaching a particular limit. Let's say I've been working, I've been working out for 20 years, right? So, and let's say my curl is, you know, my max curl with good form is, let's say it's 130 pounds or whatever with a barbell. And it's gonna be hard to get that to go up. But what I may do is I may be able to identify positions of that tension where I can improve that. So maybe I'm strong 135 pound barbell curl,
Starting point is 00:18:16 but maybe I've never do a concentration curl or I never do a drag curl and I'm weak there. So I can focus on building strength in that particular part of tension and what'll happen is you'll see your body respond. And then now let's talk about hand position because that's the biceps are interesting because they they flex the elbow, they curl the arm but they also rotate the hand. So if you're listening right now you can actually test this out on yourself, you can kind of flex your arm and then just
Starting point is 00:18:44 turn your hand to where it's facing you and then turn it towards facing away from you. You see the bicep move. You see it dance a little bit. I watched a movie when I was a kid. I know when I first learned about that, there was this movie. I don't remember what it was and this guy had a tattoo of like a naked lady on his bicep. And I don't remember what movie it was.
Starting point is 00:19:00 And he told the kid he's like, you want to see your move. You want to see your dance and he did that with his hand. I was like I was like oh shit you could do that. So the different positioning of your hand is is important too. So you know if you're curling with your palms facing up that's one position palms facing each other is another one and then the most neglected is the palms facing down. No, we just- Zotman curl or reverse curls. Nobody does that.
Starting point is 00:19:30 Now, on the other end of the spectrum or the other side of the arm is the tricep, which triceps, a lot of people don't know this because they don't get the glory like the bicep does, but the tricep makes up more of the arm size than the bicep does. It's a bigger- Right. When you see an arm flex, you can see three heads. Yeah, and it's got three right tricep makes up more of the arm size than the bicep does. It's a bigger, when you see an arm flex, you can see three heads. Yeah, and it's got three, right tricep. Now tricep, the hand positioning, doesn't do anything. That doesn't change anything. So I think that right there, you gotta stop there,
Starting point is 00:19:56 because this is such an important note, because another common mistake that I would see all the time is that, you know, I'd see the, and when I point these things out too, this is not me like shaming anybody, because I fucking for sure did this too, you know, I'd see the, and when I point these things out to, this is not me like shaming anybody because I fucking for sure did this too, you know, like I would go straight to the cables because it just felt good to warm up or start my first exercise and it would, I'd start with like the triangle, you know, and then I would do a reverse grip and then I would do like a rope.
Starting point is 00:20:18 Yeah, you know what I'm saying? Arms are done, triceps are fucking pumped, you know I'm good, but all those movements are pretty much exactly the same. The same stimulus, really, for my triceps. Yeah, and actually a reverse palms up grip, press down a stupid, because it's such a weak position for your hands, you can't even press good weight. But it doesn't affect the triceps at all.
Starting point is 00:20:37 What affects the triceps is again, elbow position, intention, just like with the biceps. So elbow up above your head or in front of you, or down at your sides. That's kind of what you should focus on. And then the positions of tension. This is why sometimes people switch, they'll do an exercise.
Starting point is 00:20:54 I remember this too, and I was a kid. I was probably 18 or 19. I primarily almost always only did free weight exercise. No, maybe younger, 16. Only did free weight exercises. And then maybe younger, 16. Only did free weight exercises. And then I, you know, this is always, this is a mistake I make. I've made probably four or five times
Starting point is 00:21:10 through my working out career. Is I'll switch to something that works. Yeah, I need to stuck on it for a while. I need to stuck on it. So I remember I switched to a cable curl. So I went from barbell curl to cable curl. I saw my arms respond. I'm like, oh, it's cable curls, that's everything.
Starting point is 00:21:24 And so I just stuck to that. No, the reason why the cable curl worked was the tension was different because cable is consistent all the way at the bottom, all the way up versus a barbell where the weight is depending on my elbow position and gravity, it's gonna be a little lighter, a little heavier. Now, what are your thoughts too on the, because here's another mistake that I remember making a lot.
Starting point is 00:21:42 Again, I talked about going straight into cable push downs or this easy cable curls to start my bicep exercise. And are there certain lifts that you like to always start with when you're doing your bicep or your tricep versus other exercises? You know, I'm always partial to free weights because now there's the whole free weights build more muscle than the machines debate., I'll debate that. And I think I can, I can win that debate.
Starting point is 00:22:10 But that's still a debate like, you know, Ben Pekolsky me and him have gotten a discussions over this. Right. He makes a very compelling argument. He does. He does. And he's a very hard to argue with a 300 pound man too. He's a very intelligent guy. He makes good points. But I'll still debate it. I still believe free weights will build more muscle. But here's the real reason why, or the main reason why I like free weights. They just, they don't, with machines, you have to adjust your body to the machine. But with free weights, the free weights model after you. I can have somebody who's five foot doing exercise with the free weight.
Starting point is 00:22:41 And I can have a six foot guy do the same thing with free weights. Nothing has to change. do an exercise with a free weight, and I can have a six-foot guy do the same thing with free weights. Nothing has to change. Machines are not designed for the variety of individual body shapes and movements. They have to design them for, what was the height? I think it was like 5, 8, or 5, 10, like if average 5, 10 male is what all the machines and stuff are all based off of. I remember learning that.
Starting point is 00:23:02 So that's one of the big reasons. So when you get in a machine to do a curl, for example, or tricep exercise, the axis of rotation, you want it to match your elbow and your shoulder position needs to be good. And so it gets kind of weird if your body isn't, or especially if you're six foot three. So do you feel that?
Starting point is 00:23:20 Oh yeah, no, like machine curls are so awkward for me. Cause you're just too much to, well. I machine curls are so awkward for me. Is it just too long? Yeah, I have to like scoop my butt back and lay my arm. And then even when I get to fully contract, like my, I have really long arms too, even for, even more so for a six foot three guy. And my, you know, from my elbow to my wrist, they're not normally meant for that.
Starting point is 00:23:40 They're normally meant to be like four. Or just place the bar like on your head. Yeah, I like, I let it,, I let it rest in my palm. I don't even fully grip it like you would want to, you know. So free weights is, you know, free weights probably going to be your best option for arms. And a lot of people avoid the good old fashioned arm exercises. You're supernating curls and your overhead dumbbell tricep extensions and your, you know, your skull crushers and then your dips and, you know, all that kind of stuff, which brings me to
Starting point is 00:24:10 another point. This is especially, now if you're advanced, this may not apply. If you've been working out a long time, I'd really have developed your body well. But especially if you're a beginner or intermediate, you'll build, and I'll make this argument all day long. You wanna build big biceps, you'll build bigger biceps getting stronger at barbell rows and pull-ups than you will at doing curls. This is those compound movements that,
Starting point is 00:24:35 maybe they're for back or the compound movements that are maybe for chest, those accessory muscles, those biceps and triceps, they're involved pretty heavily. Well, and I think that we should explain why that is, cause a lot of people don't understand that, cause you talk one day we'll talk about the importance of full range of motion
Starting point is 00:24:55 and how important that is, and then okay, well, when you do a bent over barbell row, or you do a pull up, although a pull up is pretty close to a full range of motion bicep curl, but they're not quite as full range as like a concentration curl would be. Why is that?
Starting point is 00:25:11 Well, why is it? Well, when I do a pull up, I'm pulling 220 pounds. You know, often do I grab 220 pounds and curl it, like I don't. So the assimilation that you're getting from these big compound lifts, I mean, your biceps are having to pull, help pull and assist a potentially 200 pound, you know, because when I row, I can row 200 and something pounds too, where I can't curl,
Starting point is 00:25:33 I can't bicep curl that. So, you know, your bicep is now having to adapt and get used to moving that much weight, and we know that moving that kind of weight, it's going to stimulate that and grow like you said I think for beginners this is this is tantamount. I mean if you're if you're early on in your training I think it's so important that you understand this now. Yeah, just what do guys do when especially when they're beginners there I want to build my arms I'm going to go do a bunch of isolation. Right.
Starting point is 00:26:01 This was the mistake I made I was I was doing all these cry me and I wasn't doing lots of pull ups I wasn't doing been over rows I was doing all these crimes. I wasn't doing lots of pull ups. I wasn't doing Ben Over Rose. I was doing bicep curls, you know, and machine curls and try to push downs in all the different, not all the machines that were in there and, you know, getting these great hypertrophy pumps in my arms, but the good strength movements,
Starting point is 00:26:16 you know, along those lines, I wanted to ask you because we're probably unique each and but I bet we can give some really cool exercises for people. Do you remember like, you know, specific movements for your buys or your tries that you really neglected and then you incorporated it? And it was like, I noticed a big difference. Yeah, so for triceps, I remember distinctively doing, because when I first started working
Starting point is 00:26:40 out, I didn't do close grip bench press as that much. I did overhead tricep extension and skull crushers. I did regular bench press, I did that, of course a lot, like most guys, but I didn't do a lot of close grip bench press. And I remember I read an article with, the late Mike Mauterotso I think it was, it was Bodybuilder from the 90s, who had these insanely massive arms,
Starting point is 00:27:07 and he was also a tie-in, so I kind of identified with the guy. And he did an article and he talked about close grip bench presses and how when he was younger, that's how he got his triceps so big. And this guy's triceps were one of his hallmarked body parts. So I started doing them, I started doing close grip bench presses, and I So I started doing them. I started doing close grip bench presses.
Starting point is 00:27:25 And I got really strong at them. And my arms, my triceps exploded, especially the outer head, the part that shows up, you know, when you flex your tricep, that one that's on the outside of your arm. And I remember I went up, I first started doing close grip bench press. And because it was a new movement, this is what I love about new movements, you get that central nervous system adaptation because you have to kind of learn how to do it. So my strength went up really quick. And I went from, I think I gained like 20 or 30 pounds
Starting point is 00:27:51 on the bar in a very short period of time, and my arms grew like a quarter inch and a very, very short period of time, which is a lot. That's a lot to add. And I know I could say some measure of arms every day. I thought you were gonna pick, I thought you were gonna pick weighted dips because I know that's a hallmark move for you too.
Starting point is 00:28:05 Oh, I like that. Now it is. Because Incline, and I like, for some reason, the Incline for me and I think it's just the angle. You feel it more? Yeah, I mean, the Incline, CloseCrip, Barbell Press, blew my triceps up.
Starting point is 00:28:19 And I actually didn't find that till about, I wanna say five years ago, five years ago. Where'd you see it? I don't even remember, I don't even remember if it was an article that I read or what it was that I came across and I never really like applied it in my routine. And I'll tell you, part of that reason why,
Starting point is 00:28:35 the reason I didn't was, and you know what it was, was before I did that, and this is jumping around, because now I'm talking about chess, incline press for my chess was one of the most game changers for me. Most young boys that try to do an incline, everyone flat benches, right? You get in, you flat bench, you try and get better, better, better, bit of benching, and then you go to incline in your strength as like 50%.
Starting point is 00:29:00 And it's so depressing, so like every other teenage boy, you neglect it even more because you suck at it, so you's depressing, so like every other teenage boy, you neglect it even more because you suck at it. So you stay away from it. And one year, and this was about, this was like six, seven years ago, I went on this mission that, and it was bad. I had a huge discrepancy. I could bench 315, but I could barely 185 in-climb.
Starting point is 00:29:18 And I told my, I set a goal for myself to catch my in-climb press up to my flat bench. And it took me about a year and a half, two years, to get it caught up and a huge improvement on my chest. And so once I was able to move good weight on the incline, that's when I moved to like variations of that. And you know, I decided to start doing this close grip incline press.
Starting point is 00:29:44 And just the way that the incline press retracts my shoulders really well and kind of sits me in that position when I'm in that on the incline, it was a really comfortable position for me. And I could really concentrate on keeping my elbows tucked in tight. And I just felt it right away. The very first time, just the eccentric motion, so the accelerating of the weight down, I could really feel my triceps working and then to come out of it. And I could move good weight. And so, you know, when I think,
Starting point is 00:30:11 when I compare it to skull crushers and, you know, dumbbell exercises and anything else I was doing, when you think about it, like, I mean, I wasn't moving more than maybe 40, 30, 40 pound dumbbells or 60, 80 pounds on a machine or whatever. And here with this incline barbell press, I could move 185 to 225 pounds. And man, my triceps just fucking blew up. And I felt I had a similar reaction to dips because again, being a young teenage boy,
Starting point is 00:30:40 I remember the very first time my buddy made me, I was like 17, 18 years old and he tells me to hop up to do a body weight dip and I couldn't even do a single body weight dip. I couldn't dip my own body weight one time. And I barely weighed anything back then. And of course, what do I do? Because of that, I neglected it. You know? Right, right. You don't do it. You know, no one wants to be a guy in there shaking like a leaf trying to do one single dip. And so like a dumbass, I avoided it for many years. And then when I revisited doing dips
Starting point is 00:31:10 and getting strong at that, I got to a point where I could body weight dip myself 20, 30 times no problem, then I could actually start to add weight to that. So those two movements for triceps were, I mean, and now they are staples. I mean, I will not enter a tricep at workout with not incorporating one of those two movements
Starting point is 00:31:28 because it was such a game changer. Yeah, for me, for biceps, believe it or not, this wasn't even that long ago. I had gotten really good at barbell rowing and deadlifting. And this was back when I would just feed myself and get my body weight climb really high. So I got really strong, but I was heavy. I was like 220.
Starting point is 00:31:47 And I would do barbell rows with decent form with 300 and something pounds, right? And I'd do them really heavy and whatever. And I was deadlifting, so I'd deadlift all this weight and I'd pull over in the mid-fives. And I never, never really did pull ups as part of my workouts. I just didn't do it.
Starting point is 00:32:04 And I remember I went to the gym and I was working out and this is at the time I owned my wellness studio. So this has to have been at least eight or nine, maybe 10 years ago. I would drive over to golds and work out and there was this girl there that, you know, she was always there at the same time and she was willing to work in out
Starting point is 00:32:20 and she would train with her boyfriend and we'd say hi to each other, whatever. And she goes and she's like, hey, are you ever gonna compete or whatever and I think she was her boyfriend and we'd say hi to each other, whatever. And she goes, and she's like, hey, are you ever gonna compete or whatever? And I think she was just trying to be nice. I'm like, no, no, I just like to work out. She's like, well, if you ever do, I have some advice for you.
Starting point is 00:32:33 So I'm like, okay, one of those criticism. She goes, you know, you have a very muscular back, but you need more lats. Nobody's ever told me I need more lats before. My back was always really strong, so I never even considered that I need to develop it more so she said that to me to kind of fuck with me a little bit and so I made this whole mission I'm gonna train my lats more and I when you do a row you hit your lats but really you get a
Starting point is 00:32:56 lot more of that mid-back kind of stuff especially the way I row but pull ups and pull downs and that kind of stuff that's a direct lack exercise so I said okay I'm gonna get really strong at doing pull ups. And so at first I could only do, I wasn't good at them at all. It was hard for me to do like 10 bodyweight pull ups, but I got to the point where I got really strong and then I could strap weight around my waist
Starting point is 00:33:16 to the point where I was doing pull ups. I would do three reps with like over a hundred pounds strapped around my waist. And the side effect of that, my last definitely grew, the side effect, my arms grew, my biceps grew. And I remember, I'm doing these heavy pull-ups and getting stronger, and I would do it with either a neutral grip or with a supinated grip.
Starting point is 00:33:36 And I had to measure my arms in a while, but I felt like I wanted to measure them, and I measured them, I was like, is this, wait a minute, is this right? And I did it again, and I'm like, my arms got bigger. And I was trying to piece it together, and I'm like, is this, wait a minute, is this right? And I did it again and I'm like, my arm's got bigger. And I was trying to piece it together. I'm like, holy shit, it's gotta be the chin ups. Because I know when I do that really hard,
Starting point is 00:33:50 I do feel my back working, but of course, you feel your biceps working as well. So it's those compound kind of movements. And it's funny because when we talk about triceps, if I'm talking to somebody who's in the space of muscle building or we're talking to a bodybuilder or whatever, and I say to them, dips and close grip bench presses are great for triceps.
Starting point is 00:34:11 They're going to probably agree with me. But if I say that there's a good compound exercise for biceps, nobody wants to agree with me. The same fucking thing. You do supinated grip pull ups. It's like doing dips. Because remember dips, parallel bar dips, they work your chest, but they also work your chest and your shoulders quite a bit.
Starting point is 00:34:28 Supernity grip pull ups, they work your back, yes, but they also work the biceps quite hard. And especially if you're a beginner, you are going to progress, not just your whole body more, obviously, because you're doing compound movements, but you're gonna progress in your arms more by doing those. Now the isolation exercises, I'm not saying
Starting point is 00:34:46 that you shouldn't neglect those. Those are also extremely important, especially as you become more advanced, because it becomes more important as you get advanced to add more volume. Now, you can start throwing in all kinds of different isolation exercises. And here's the other thing about arms.
Starting point is 00:35:03 And, you know, I know all muscles respond the the same and you know, you don't need to work one muscle differently than the other because I hate it when people say things like calves need high reps and this body part needs low reps or whatever. That's not true. The muscles are all kind of the same. The big difference really is in how it impacts your, your, your how much rest you need from it, like how much it impacts your whole body. If I work out my legs real hard it fucking zaps me
Starting point is 00:35:25 If I just work my arms, I'm not that tired right you can this means you can do a lot of frequency with your arms Like you can work out your arms a lot, so you could do it where maybe you train your whole body You know three days a week, which is usually what I recommend people anywhere between two to four days a week for the whole body But let's say you really want to make a special focus on your arms, as long as you adjust the intensity, go hit your arms five days a week, what's what happens? Yeah. That added frequency makes a huge difference. It's one of those muscles that you can't get away
Starting point is 00:35:54 with doing that because it just attacks the CNS, I think, as much. You know, I had a game changer thing that happened by accident for us, and this is personal, just because I probably never really did this. It was, you know, we used to have, this is my buddy and I, we used to work out when we were kids and we had the same kind of arm routine and, you know, the pyramid sets and we did all of whatever we were reading. You know, I'm saying like this and it was like
Starting point is 00:36:15 the same. I'm asking I do the same. Right. So whatever was in muscle and fitness that week, right? So fucking that's how we, that's how we train all time. And I remember, and preacher curls were very common. We did remember, and preacher curls were very common. And preacher curls were for sure one of the first things that I saw like growth and change in my biceps. But we couldn't get an easy curl bar because the bajim was so busy. And so we modified and we did the preacher curls with independent dumbbells.
Starting point is 00:36:40 And I remember when I first did it, it was really weak, it couldn't do very much weight. But man, in impact then, we attributed soreness to the effectiveness of workout always. So it got me really fucking sore. And so we started going back to that. And I started training with preacher girls. And I don't see many people do this.
Starting point is 00:36:57 So I think it's maybe a tip, hopefully, somebody that's been training for a long time can incorporate that. And you can get back to me on how well this works for you. But, you know, I did these preacher curls and we did them with independent dumbbells and it was, it just exploded my arms. But I had the same experience too, like you did with pull ups and what I noticed with the pull ups was, I always did overhand pull ups forever because I was always doing pull
Starting point is 00:37:21 ups for my back. It was always about back and of course you get a little bit more lats involved when you have the overhand grip versus a supinated grip. And I don't know what it was that made me decide to do it. I think I was working out with somebody, but the guy was like, go, do you ever do supinated? You should do supinated sometimes,
Starting point is 00:37:37 and gets me to do it supinated. And where you're still your palms are facing you, right? That's what that means when I'm doing a pull up, and I start doing that. And, yeah, you know, I felt it in my back. That was all great, but that, I actually noticed my forms and my biceps grew blue up from that. So those are two big moves that, again, I neglected
Starting point is 00:37:56 for many years, I didn't think to do. For people who debate me, because I've done a couple posts on that where I'll have, and I know it's controversial. That's why I do it. And I'll have a, I'll put up a picture. I've done this on my InstaStore and actually do it on my actual Instagram page too, where I'll have a picture of a barbell curl, and then a picture of a pull up, and I'll say, which one builds bigger biceps, and then in the caption, I'll write, the pull up does,
Starting point is 00:38:22 and people will debate me. No, it's the curl. How can you say that this and that? And I'm like, well, if you have to compare them, first of all, I think you should do both. So that's not really the argument, but if you have to compare them, the pull-up will actually build more bicep.
Starting point is 00:38:34 And then the example I always give them is I say, I'll tell you what, some of the most muscular arms, biceps especially, you'll ever see on any athlete is a gymnast. Look at male gymnasts. They don't do fucking curls at all. They just pull themselves up all day long
Starting point is 00:38:49 on the rings and shit. And they have arms, I've seen gymnasts who have arms like fucking amateur amazing bodybuilders. You know, and it's all they're doing is pulling their body up on the rings all the time. Pretty sure they never do a single curl. Now it's so true. To develop the arms, it's pretty crazy, you know,
Starting point is 00:39:05 when you go to think about it, the compound movements. Now, what is your thoughts on? Because you see, I think, in with arm training, you do see a lot of drop sets and pyramid sets and you see a lot of things like that, a lot of super sets get involved with that. Yeah, how do you use that when we teach programming?
Starting point is 00:39:23 So, like, what are your thoughts on that? Is there too much of that? How often do you use that when we teach programming? So at that, what are your thoughts on that? Is there too much of that? How often do you implement that? Yeah, it's very individual, right? You can over do it really quick. I used to do that all the time as a kid, is I would take every high intensity technique and I'd throw them all at my body.
Starting point is 00:39:38 So it's like, okay, today I'm gonna do four, four straps and three partial reps, and I'm gonna do a drop set and I just throw everything at, but the kitchen sink it myself and I wouldn't respond. And of course when you train clients, if you've ever tried that once, you know that that's a terrible idea. So you, but they do work when you use them judiciously,
Starting point is 00:39:58 like every once in a while. I think what's more important than that is learning how to train in different rep ranges. And this is important for arms, it's like it is for the rest of the body. You know, I used to get stuck in the low rep ranges because when I would read, you know, body building magazines when I was a kid,
Starting point is 00:40:15 there were, I must have seen this at least 10 different times, they would have the rep ranges. And this is how they would label them. It would be six to eight mass building. And it would be like eight to 12 would be like sculpting, and then it'd be 15 to 20 would be the pump or getting cut or something like that, cutting. And fuck that, I don't wanna cut.
Starting point is 00:40:34 I was already skinny. I'm not trying to shave. That's exactly why I used to live six. Brian never saw over six ribs, reps for like the first three years of lifting weights, for that exact reason, because every magazine... Because that's the mass building. Yeah, exactly. I'm already skinny as fuck, I don't need more cuts, dude, I need mass. for like the first three years of lifting lights, for that exact reason, because every magazine... Because that's the mass bill.
Starting point is 00:40:45 Yeah, exactly. I'm already skinny as fuck. I don't need more cuts, dude. I need mass, I don't know what mass. Exactly. So I did six reps of everything for a long time, and you know what, that talk about, and this is just a testament to, like you said,
Starting point is 00:40:58 that it's not about what rep range is better. What rep range is better is probably the one that you do the least, right? That's what's better, and that's going to be different for every person. So if you're, you know, which, if you're one of my female clients, very common, they,
Starting point is 00:41:12 because they were marketed through this way, that, you know, if you want tone arms and lean arms, you do 15 to 20 reps. So they're used to all these high intensity low, low weight, lots of repetitions, low rest periods. And that doesn't mean it's bad or it's wrong. It just means they've probably been doing that a lot more than they were probably ever grabbing, you know, a heavy ass weight and doing it for three to six reps,
Starting point is 00:41:34 which if you want lean-in-tone arms and you've been doing 15 to 20 reps for months. I'll do some low reps, shit, watch. Code, do some low reps and you're gonna have incredible arms. By the way, tone, we've said this before, but just in case we have new listeners, tone is not real. Muscles build or they shrink. So, if they build a little bit, they just feel harder. So, the fitness industry created that term to attract women to gyms.
Starting point is 00:41:57 But really, if you're trying to tone your arms or just trying to sculpt your arms, if you're a lady and you're listening right now, what you're really trying to do is build your arms. If you're a lady and you're listening right now, what you're really trying to do is build your arms. And so the fastest way to get your arms to look the way you want is the same thing that's the fastest way to get your arms to build. So your goal when you walk into the gym, unless you're at the point where you look in the mirror and go, I don't want any more progress. I don't want my muscles to develop anymore. I want any more sculpt. I don't want any more tone and I want any more whatever. That's different. But if you're like, oh, I want to really work on my body
Starting point is 00:42:26 and I want to change my arms, your goal should be to build muscle and do what builds muscle the most effective way. And when it comes to rep ranges, rep ranges work excellent when they're new. They stop working after about three to six weeks is when the start should start the plateau. Just change it, you know, it's funny. Just doing that, even if you do the same routine all the time,
Starting point is 00:42:46 although it's a good idea to change that too, but if you just, for three weeks, you worked in the low rep range, and then for three more weeks, you did higher reps, and for three more weeks, you did, you know, mid-moder reps, watch what happens, your body doesn't plateau nearly as much, and you just continue to progress, it's pretty awesome.
Starting point is 00:43:00 Now, I was actually just talking to somebody the day that we had this exact discussion and it was a guy and he was talking about how he trains, you know, all of this muscles and I, it was telling him the importance of kind of phasing his routines, right? And, you know, he's like, well, no, I work all rep ranges.
Starting point is 00:43:17 I was like, oh, okay, well, so what are you currently working on right now? Are you in, you know, low rep range? And he's like, well, every workout I incorporate all of it. And that's not wrong. They've done studies to show that somebody who's changing all the rep ranges every single workout versus somebody who phases it like Sal saying for three to four weeks, pretty similar as far as their results.
Starting point is 00:43:38 The problem with it though is it's hard to measure that way. It's hard to see that what is my body adapting to the most right now? Because if you're throwing a high rep range, super set it in a training session, plus you're doing a strength heavy four to six reps, and you're doing that every single workout, you're manipulating all these rep ranges, well then it's really hard to tell
Starting point is 00:43:58 because there is always going to be an individual variance and everybody's bodies will adapt different. You know, Sal and I may be following the same exact program, and we'll use maps, you know, anabolic, for example, and his body just responds incredible for phase one always. And mine just might always do great in phase three. And so understanding, like, you know, which one to stretch out, which one to do shorter?
Starting point is 00:44:20 Exactly. And that's how we, even, I even modify our own programs is I know what stimulus my body just loves. And it loves to respond to and I get no adverse effects from it. And so I might stretch that phase for an extra week or two longer. You know, the other thing too,
Starting point is 00:44:37 and you'll understand this as a trainer, and studies always, studies fail to see this all the time, is that there's a mental component as well when it comes to training. And there's a different mentality that goes into training in the low rep range, then goes into the higher rep superset type rep range. It's a very different mentality. You're chasing different adaptations. Different.
Starting point is 00:45:03 So when I go to the gym and I train in the low rep ranges, heavy low rep ranges, it's a different mentality, it's a different rest period, it's a different feeling. I'm probably not going to get that much of a pump, but I'm going to feel very solid and strong. I'm prepared differently. I'm set up. It's totally different. When I go in for a superset with shorter reps and I'm doing higher, you know, excuse me, shorter, you know, shorter rest periods and higher reps,
Starting point is 00:45:23 I'm going is totally different. I know it's a different feel in the body. I'm gonna get more of a pump, less of that solid feeling. So, and that's important. People always forget to account for that. That mental space, like if I'm training a client and I'm telling, let's say Doug's coming into workout and I'm gonna train him, I gotta tell him, hey, we're gonna be doing low reps in heavy weight today.
Starting point is 00:45:42 Or, hey, we're doing super sets tomorrow. It makes a fucking difference and I know this is a trainer when our train clients versus hey today We're doing everything. This is extremely important I don't know how many times that I would take somebody and I would move them into a new phase IE example here was be okay We just got done doing like I just taught them you know kind of high-perch if you training so we're training in this high rep range we're getting 12 to 15 reps, maybe even throwing
Starting point is 00:46:06 super sets in there, and they're feeling this pump. And it's the first time that they've trained like this. And so my clients loving it. They're telling me like, oh my God, my arms, and they're looking themselves in the mirror, and they love the feel of it. And we're training that way for three or four weeks. And then now I move them into like a strength phase,
Starting point is 00:46:21 and now I'm training them in the three to five rep range. And they're like, they don't feel the same. Therefore because they don't don't feel that pump or then they go, oh, I liked the other way of training. I felt like that was working better because they attribute the pumping sensation to what's working better. Just the same with the same mistake that people make with the soreness like, oh, it's me really sore.
Starting point is 00:46:43 So they're just different adaptations. And both of them contribute to your overall gains in your arms or your overall success in training. So it is important to get people in that space. And I would have to always remind my client that, like, listen, it's a different adaptation, even though it's the same exercise. It could be a barbell curl, right? We're doing a barbell curl both times.
Starting point is 00:47:04 But now we're going after strength, so we're doing this for five or six reps, where I just got done teaching you this 15, 20 reps, and it's gonna feel different. That's right, and there's also the specificity in the sense that, you know, if you wanna get better at general, you know, if I go and I just focus on sprinting,
Starting point is 00:47:22 I can really see my sprint increase dramatically. If I sprint in a long distance run and jog and do this, I'll improve still, but I'm going to get less improvements in each one of those, which makes a big difference to the psyche of an individual who's training. I love when I'm in the low rep range and only low rep range, I love seeing the weight go up on the bar. I love when I'm in the higher rep range or the superset rep type phases. I love watching the pump improve and watching my endurance improve and how I can rest shorter in between sets. I love that and
Starting point is 00:47:53 that is a, you know, trying to cut the psyche of the client out or trying to cut your that mental part of working out out. Good luck, you can't. It makes a huge difference. So phasing your workouts is an extremely important component of training, all training, not just the arm training. And the best way that I recommend most people do it is stay with one for a certain period of time, get good at it and then move to another one, stay with that for a little while, get good at it and then move to another one versus all of it for a little while, get good at it, and then move to another one versus all of it,
Starting point is 00:48:26 all the time, all at the same time. I also think that when you do that, it's easier to use these other tools and strategies, for example, like we talked about with the pyramid setting or the drop sets or the, because those are, they work well in a more hypertrophy-based training cycle. If you are chasing more of the pump, and we're working in the higher rep range, it makes
Starting point is 00:48:49 more sense to superset or dropset because you're chasing more of that adaptation versus doing that in a strength type of a cycle where right now I'm more focused on building strength. It's not going to be as advantageous if I'm in a strength cycle to be doing a short rest period or a drop set where I do a bunch of reps. Because that's gonna fatigue me and it's going to hinder my strength in the next set or the next exercise that I'm doing.
Starting point is 00:49:15 So that's another reason why I really like to, try and teach people to separate their phases or whatever their adaptations are focused on. So if we're gonna be doing low rep range, instead of sporadically just throwing it all into every single workout, and sometimes you drop set, sometimes you superset, sometimes you pyramid set, sometimes it's high rep,
Starting point is 00:49:33 sometimes it's low rep, sometimes it's heavy, sometimes it's light, it's like, instead of just being chaotic about all of it and really understanding how your body's responding, focus on a rep range, understand that if we are in strength, that it's, you know, good long-rest periods, we are lifting heavy, the goal is to lift more weight and to progress week-over-week, lifting more weight and increasing your strength. And then when you're doing things like chasing the pump and you're not so worried about how heavy of a weight. The weight doesn't matter.
Starting point is 00:50:02 Weight doesn't matter. Then it doesn't matter if you're going lighter and lighter and lighter and lighter. As long as you get more of a feel and more of a pump. That's all that's important. Speaking of supersets, here's a superset that I loved doing back in the day that, I don't know, very many other people that will do. Now with supersets, there's a lot of different ways you can combine exercise.
Starting point is 00:50:19 And a superset represents two exercises done back to back without any rest. And now you can generally do this with any two exercises for a body part. That's technically, they're all technically called supersets. So two bi-sip exercises put together, that's a superset. But one of the best ways I love to apply supersets was to do a heavier compound movement. I don't mean heavier in the sense that the rep ranges are lower. I just mean that compound movements tend to be heavier.
Starting point is 00:50:44 So like, I'm going to be able to do, you know, I do a chin up with more weight than I will with a curl, like we were saying earlier. So I like to do a compound movement first, which means two joints are being moved. And then I like to superset that with an isolation movement. And this is for the whole body. I'll do this with my quads, I'll do this with my chest,
Starting point is 00:51:01 I'll do this with my back, but you can even do this with your arms. So here's two supersets that are amazing. So for triceps, start out with dips or close grip bench press. There's your compound movement. And then right after that, move right to an isolation movement like rope press downs or skull crushers or something like that. Crazy, crazy pump.
Starting point is 00:51:20 Now the bicep one, here's one that nobody ever does. Do heavy, supinated grip grip, pull-ups, and when you do them for your biceps, when you pull yourself up, really focus on squeezing your biceps at the top, rather than squeezing your back. Do that first, and then go immediately to an isolation exercise like cable curls,
Starting point is 00:51:36 machine curls, or barbell curls. Your arms will explode. The pump is absolutely insane with something like that, and I learned that from an old bodybuilding magazine and Mike Menser actually wrote the article and talked about how chin-ups were one of the greatest bicep exercises. Did that? And boy, let me tell you, I love that one. Well, I mean, this is something that, and I hope that we're giving with people what they want right now and by doing some of these episodes because we did a lot of this when we first started
Starting point is 00:52:06 and we got away from it for a while. And it's just tough when we have three claws a week plus we're trying to, we have interviews always lined up, but we've been getting such a great response from this and then the guides and the, and you guys, the guide goes right along with some of the things we're talking about, so some of the people that may want that,
Starting point is 00:52:22 they'll in the show notes, they'll be a direct link to that. It's totally free. It's at mindpumpfree.com. And I think it's called the big arms, how to get big arms. But really it applies to anybody who just wants to, you know, build, sculpt, tone, whatever the word you want to use,
Starting point is 00:52:36 work their arms. And it just talks about some of the stuff that we talked about and a little bit greater details, totally free. And on that site, we have other guides about, you know, other types of other body parts and other aspects of training details, totally free. And on that site, we have other guides about other types of other body parts and other aspects of training that you can get. Again, they're all totally, totally free.
Starting point is 00:52:52 Go check them out and I miss Justin, we'll get him back soon. In the next episode. Right on. Thank you for listening to Mind Pump. If your goal is to build and shape your body, dramatically improve your health and energy and maximize your body, dramatically improve your health and energy, and maximize your overall
Starting point is 00:53:05 performance, check out our discounted RGB Superbumble at MindPumpMedia.com. The RGB Superbumble includes maps on a ballad, maps performance, and maps aesthetic. Nine months of phased expert exercise programming designed by Sal, Adam and Justin to systematically transform the way your body looks, feels, and performs. With detailed workout blueprints in over 200 videos, the RGB Superbumble is like having Sal Adam and Justin as your own personal trainers, but at a fraction of the price. The RGB Superbumble has a 430-day money back guarantee, and you can get it now plus
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