Keep your forearm vertical so your elbow stays beneath your wrist. Barbells and bench press stations are a hot commodity at most gyms. You can substitute the EZ bar for a barbell without having to totally overhaul your workout (as long as you’re not benching several hundred pounds). Squeeze your glutes and drive your hips forward as you pull the bar back up to the starting position. Starting with the eighth rep, curl the bar to your chest, but only lower it down until your forearms are parallel with the floor.
Let’s look at some of the common errors that can occur if you are not paying attention to technique. Start with a lighter weight than you would use on pressing exercises. Some people cannot perform flyes without experiencing shoulder pain. If this is you, skip this move and focus on the other exercises listed above. Finish the movement by pulling the bar back over your head to the middle of your chest.
Maintain constant muscle tension while focusing on pulling through the elbows. Finish the movement by lowering the EZ bar back down to your chest in a controlled manner. Keep lowering the bar until your upper arms are flat on the floor. Keep your forearms vertical so your elbows stay beneath your wrists.
Single-arm bench presses are perfect for when you want increase the difficulty of a chest workout without needing heavier weights. Training just one side of your body at a time requires more assistance from your core and places greater stress on the pressing side. Be sure to touch the bar to the bottom of your sternum on each rep. Keep your forearms vertical so your elbows stay beneath your wrists. Make sure that you extend your arms, but don’t lock them.
These are quite a bit different than regular barbell curls; as the name suggests, with Drag Curls you’ll be dragging the bar upwards along the front of your torso. You can perform Drag Curls by grasping a barbell trader joe protein bar with a shoulder-width, overhand grip, as shown in Figure 17. Grip the bar wider than shoulder width apart, so on the outer bends of the bar. Position the bar by your upper chest with your elbows under your hands.
Begin by standing upright grabbing the bar with a supinated grip slightly beyond shoulder distance. Bend the knees slightly and bring the torso portion of your body forward while maintaining a neutral spine position. The upper body will maintain a stationary position as you focus on moving the barbell upwards contracting the lats and holding for a split second.
Repeat until you’ve reached the final set of plates. In addition, splitting up your training gives your back and biceps a whole week to recover before being trained again. This is a highly abbreviated routine that affords more time for greater training volume. Notice that the Close-Grip Bench Press is used to train the triceps, and is placed before Barbell Curls. As you can see, Lying Triceps Extensions are placed before Barbell Spider Curls.
Another option is to combine Barbell Curls with Close-Grip Bench Presses, which also work the triceps. Following is one example of a full-body routine which pairs Barbell Spider Curls with Lying Triceps Extensions. In this new section on Bodybuilding.com called Exercise Of The Week, we will pick one exercise and break it down into every possible way…
The preacher curl is a bicep variation that has you do curl seated, with your arms resting on a support that keeps your elbows fixed and the shoulders out of the movement. This is similar to the arm blaster harness in that it is a great way to isolate the muscle and minimize the ability to cheat on reps. The EZ Bar is a special kind of barbell that can help improve your strength and hypertrophy goals.
Hold the EZ curl in front of you with an overhand grip. Grip the EZ curl bar overhand, slightly wider than hip width. This exercise is a secret weapon that targets crucial muscles that are seldom activated by traditional exercises.