|
|
Aim For Equal Development:
Arnold always believed that since the arms can be seen from all poses
and from every conceivable angle, they should be trained from all
angles.
"You don't develop championship-winning arms simply by throwing around a
heavy barbell doing curls or blasting out some reps for triceps," says
the Oak 1. Clear visible development between all muscle of
the arms with equally full muscle bellies and perfect balance is what
Arnold constantly sought. And history shows us that is exactly what he
achieved.
To achieve balance, proportion, size and shape in the arms, work all arm
muscles with equal intensity. Break the individual "muscles of the arms
down into separate categories" advised Arnold 1. And this is where planning your arm training routine is all-important.
Keep Things In Perspective:
Although Arnold advocates training biceps, triceps and forearms with
equal intensity, he also recommends that you consider the fact that the triceps are the "larger, more complex muscle group" 1.
After all, the biceps have two heads and the triceps have three and are
a larger and therefore a stronger grouping by comparison.
As such, Arnold suggests viewing your arm as being one-third biceps and two-thirds triceps 1.
In fact, Arnold says that while it is possible to hide your biceps in
some poses, it is almost impossible to hide your triceps at any time 1. Therefore, he says, the triceps "need training from more angles" 1. When training the triceps, use a wider variety of exercises to hit all three heads to adequately target their larger size.
Focus:
Concentrating on each and every rep of every set is something Arnold did
religiously. It is often said that once Arnold began to focus on his set, nothing could distract him, not even a bomb detonating in the next room.
After training Arnold was a light-hearted guy but once in the gym he was
all business. And this was no more evident than when he trained his
arms. Arnold would often take is mind-power to the next level and
visualize what he wanted to achieve, and this would actually force gains
in muscle size.
Says Arnold: "I also used a lot of visualization in biceps training. In
my mind I saw my biceps as mountains, enormously huge, and I pictured
myself lifting tremendous amounts of weight with these superhuman masses
of muscle 1."
Shock The Muscles Into Change:
Arnold always believed that the body was amazingly adaptable and could "accustom itself to workloads that would fell a horse" 1.
The primary variable Arnold used to shock his arms into new growth was
change. Since they are one of the smaller body parts, are used often and
are involved in almost everything we do, the arms, and especially the
forearms, can be very stubborn and resistant to growth.
Even continuing to train at a very high intensity will likely elicit no new gains if that is all that is done in the same manner, during the same routine, day in and out.
Arnold advises shocking the arms by "training with more weight than
usual, doing more reps and/or sets, speeding up your training (lifting
becomes more forceful as a result), decreasing the rest between sets,
doing unfamiliar exercises, doing your exercises in an unfamiliar order
or using intensity techniques" 1.
For the workouts outlined in this article, it is suggested that each
session is approached differently. Whether an additional set is done one
workout, the tempo is increased for all sets for another, the exercises
are switched around or the rest between sets is decreased one workout
and increased the next, the overarching goal
for each session is to avoid muscular resistance to growth and that
means keeping the muscles constantly guessing as to what each new
training stimulus will bring.
In this regard, the programs featured here are to be used as a
foundation to be manipulated accordingly. It is suggested that each
program be used "as is" one week with several of the aforementioned
changes made over three subsequent weeks, before once again resuming the
program in its basic state.
The intensity methods Arnold mentions, also to be used periodically over your three-week 'change' period are:
Forced Reps:
To be used very occasionally, forced reps
are employed by having a training partner assist you with a final rep
that would otherwise be impossible to achieve on your own. Again, a very
high intensity way to shock the muscles that is to be used sparingly:
perhaps once every second workout for one set per exercis
Partial Reps:
With arm training, with the exclusion of lying triceps work, partial reps
can be completed without the assistance of a partner and require a
continuance of reps despite the onset of muscular fatigue. For example,
upon completion of a set of barbell curls continue with partial (half or
quarter reps) until the bar can no longer be moved even an inch. Again,
use this technique sparingly.
Negative Repetitions:
To shock the arm muscles these can be done two ways: the negative (or
lowering aspect of the repetition) can be emphasized in the normal
course of the workout rather than just to set up the contracting (or
concentric) part, or a partner can assist a forced negative at the end
of a hard set.
For partner assisted negatives,
have someone assist you on the upward phase of the movement and
complete the negative on your own: do two to three such reps and then
have your partner rack the weight.
While emphasizing the negative can, and should, be done often, the
forced negatives can be done every second or third arm workout to really
stretch out the muscle fibers and assist new growth. Negatives will
also build ligaments and tendons faster compared to conventional reps
and, in the long run, this will enable the muscle to lift heavier
weight, which will translate into new growth.
Use Perfect Technique:
Aside from his patented controlled cheating (a shocking technique he
would employ to stimulate his arms to exhaustion), Arnold was a stickler
for perfect technique. Robotic in his actions and transfixed on
completing all sets in the same manner each and every time, Arnold's
training form was predictably perfect and ultra-effective.
Although he advocated occasional cheating for bicep curls (as a specific
method in itself, to be explained shortly), Arnold also stipulated
perfect form as a rule.
To fully isolate the biceps muscle when curling, Arnold would advise
newcomers to perform this movement with their backs against a wall. When
doing strict curls he believed that the arms, and only the arms, were
to do the work. Any other muscular involvement would dilute the
isolating effect the exercise aimed to achieve.
"You also need to find the right groove, and do any curl movement through the longest range of motion," says Arnold 1.
"When you do a curl you must bring your hand directly up to your
shoulder. If you change that line an inch to the inside or the outside,
you are taking the stress off the biceps and you won't get the same
results 1." And the same thing applies to triceps and forearm
training. Engage each rep through its full range of motion in a
controlled fashion for optimal results.
Still on the subject of curling (the secret to Arnold's phenomenal
biceps development) Arnold believes that handgrip is all-important.
"Another mistake I see all the time is starting off a curl movent with a
wrist curl - bending the wrist back, then curling it up just before
engaging the biceps," says Arnold 1. "All this does is take
stress away from the bicep by using forearm strength rather than biceps
strength, and the result will be huge forearms and mediocre biceps 1."
Cheating:
A seeming contradiction to the previous principal stipulating perfect
technique, cheating is nevertheless an effective way to fully tax the
muscles and is especially efficacious when applied to arm training. In
fact Arnold was one of the first advocates for cheating and his mentor, Joe Weider, standardized it as one of his Weider training principals.
Arnold's specific brand of cheating was controlled and this "controlled
cheating" term is far from oxymoronic. Says Arnold: "Cheating is used to
make the exercise harder, not easier 1." For barbell curls
(featured in the programs outlined in this article) cheating is applied
in the following manner, as explained by Arnold:
"Say you are doing a heavy barbell curl. You curl the weight up five or
six times, and then find you are too tired to continue to do strict
reps. At this point you begin to use you shoulders and back to help you
in the lift slightly so that you can do another four or five reps. But
you cheat just enough so that you can continue the set, and your biceps
continue to work as hard as they can.
By cheating you have forced the biceps to do more work than they could
have done without help from the other muscles, so you have to put more
stress on them, not less 1."
The cheating method can also be applied to dumbbell curls and other curling variations.
Use Supersets:
Always a big believer in maximizing his time in the most effective way possible, Arnold often employed supersets in his bodybuilding training 1.
He was especially noted for using this method to build his superior
arms. In fact, the second of two arm workouts featured in this article (Arnold's advanced arm workout) is comprised primarily of supersets to maximally stimulate the biceps and triceps.
Supersets (for the purposes of this article and in keeping with Arnold's
specific training methods, agonist/antagonist, or opposite muscle
grouping sets (biceps/triceps)) work to shock the muscles by compounding
the stress the entire muscle grouping receives therefore forcing as
much blood as is humanly possible into target area for superior growth.
Priority Train:
If you have a body part that is especially lagging,
Arnold advises priority training. This principal, when applied to arm
training, is most often used by those with severely underdeveloped
forearms, which are often a result of a genetic weakness more than
anything else.
Related Lagging Body Part Articles:
To prioritize weak forearms, Arnold suggests training them "by themselves when you are rested and strong" 1.
This can be done either before training any other arm muscle or on a
separate day on their own. Alternatively, Arnold suggests, training
lagging forearms "on leg days when your arms are rested" 1.
Address Weak Points:
Arnold stresses that even though you may do everything to plan and
execute his suggestions perfectly, there may still be weak points that
need specific attention, and should be trained accordingly. For biceps,
triceps and forearms Arnold recommends targeting weak points in several
ways.
1. Focus:
First, using dumbbells one arm at a time instead of barbells (which, for
the uninitiated, employ two arms) will allow a greater degree of focus
to be applied on each side of the body, therefore helping to bring out
the best in each individual set of muscles. Says Arnold: "Doing an
entire set with just one arm at a time allows for maximum concentration
and intensity, and ensures that each arm works to its maximum 1."
It is not hard to see that if each arm is worked individually, greater
stress will reach the muscle that requires additional work. Indeed, with
multilateral movements such as barbell curls and two-handed triceps press-downs, the stronger area will always predominate, which will exacerbate an existing imbalance and create further distortion of one's symmetry. One-arm movements will negate this.
2. Working Harder:
Secondly, training the weak point first (as in prioritizing a particular
muscle) will allow this muscle to work harder as it will be fresher and
more receptive to working all-out.
3. Technique:
Thirdly, Arnold once again recommends perfect technique, this time for
those aiming to address weak muscle groups. Using correct form is even
harder for a weak muscle group, as it will not often have sufficient
strength to allow the weight to follow the correct movement arch.
Therefore special emphasis must be placed on technique when training
weak groupings.
|
|
No comments:
Post a Comment