Basic Bicep Exercises

Welcome back! If you've visited my YouTube channel recently, you've probably seen that I've started a Home Workouts series, featuring videos in which I demonstrate some exercises that you can do at home. I'll be posting the information from those videos here on my website. Hopefully, you can learn some helpful tips from these blogs and apply new exercises to your routine. Let's get started with some basic bicep exercises!

The bicep is one of the main muscles in the upper arm, and it creates the peak in your upper arm when you flex. The main movement that we can do to train our biceps is the curl, which is when we start with our arm extended and bend it towards our body so that the length of the bicep muscle shortens. There are different variations of this curl movement that we can do to target certain parts of the biceps.

Bicep Anatomy

The bicep has two heads: the short head (on the inside of the upper arm) and the long head (on the outside of the upper arm). In terms of their appearance, the short head contributes to the width of the bicep, whereas the long head contributes to the peak of the bicep. There's another muscle called the brachialis, which is located underneath the biceps and helps to increase the size and strength of the biceps.

Traditional Bicep Curl

In the images to the right, I am performing traditional bicep curls with a set of resistance bands. Notice how I am holding the handles: my hands are relatively far away from each other, and they are brought out to the sides of my body. This is considered a wide grip bicep curl, which targets the short head more than the long head. You can perform this bicep curl movement with either two arms at the same time or one arm at a time (alternating). Typically, if you're using the same weight, it's a bit more difficult to perform the curl with two arms at the same time.

These images show a different variation of the traditional bicep curl. My elbows are placed against the sides of my body, so my hands are brought closer together. This is called a narrow grip bicep curl, which targets the long head to work on creating the peak of the biceps.

In the images above, I am performing bicep curls with resistance bands, but you can certainly use other equipment, such as dumbbells or a barbell. When performing these curls, we want to maintain a slow and controlled full range of motion from the bottom of the curl up to the top. If we are swinging the weights and unable to have a controlled full range of motion, this may indicate that the weights we are using are too heavy. We always want to prioritize proper form over lifting a heavier weight!

Hammer Curl

In these images, I am performing a different variation of the curl known as the hammer curl. To perform the hammer curl, our palms are not facing up but facing each other (as if we were going to give someone a fist bump). The hammer curl targets the brachialis, and there are different ways you can perform this exercise, such as along the side of your body or across your body.

Those are some bicep exercises that you can do at home with basic equipment. If your gym is closed and you don't have equipment at home, you should try to buy some; having a few dumbbells or resistance bands can allow for a wide range of possible exercises that you can do to stay physically fit and healthy!

Thank you for reading this blog! I hope you learned some new information about bicep training and will be able to apply these exercises to your own routine. Please like this blog post and share it with others who might like to learn about these exercises. Stay tuned for upcoming blogs featuring additional exercises!

Video version of Basic Bicep Exercises: https://youtu.be/56VwQSj3FbQ