The biceps are a smaller muscle than the triceps and can be found on the front of your upper arm, below this muscle is the brachialis and this is the muscle which is seen between the biceps and triceps when the body builder flexes their arm. The triceps is the muscle on the back of the upper arm and when developing these muscles as with any other group of muscles it is essential that you practice the exercise in the correct form.

The secret to getting these muscles well defined is to avoid over training the muscles, the arms are also used in exercises for the chest, back and shoulder so care should be taken they don’t become over trained. Great exercises for toning and shaping the biceps and triceps are:

Standing barbell curls

Hold the barbell using an underhand grip with the feet shoulder width apart, make sure that you keep your elbows as close to your body as you can at all times. Using only your forearms and the bicep muscle curl the barbell up to your shoulder level, hold this position for a second and feel the tension in the biceps before slowly letting the barbell back to the starting position and repeating.

Standing dumbbell curls

This exercise is very similar to the barbell curls but you are using dumbbells instead, this exercise will build up the biceps and the forearm. Stand with your feet shoulder width apart and your elbows as close to your body as possible at all times. Using only your forearms bring the dumbbells up to shoulder height using your biceps to curl the dumbbell, you should rotate your hand around so that when you reach the peak height with the dumbbell the palm is facing upwards and to the front. Hold this position for a second feeling the pull on the muscle before slowly lowering back to the starting position and repeating.

Dumbbell hammer curls

This is another exercise which is similar to the dumbbell and barbell curls but trains the biceps, forearms and brachialis. Stand with your feet shoulder width apart and your elbows as close to your body as possible, hold the dumbbells at arms length by your side with your palms facing each other. Moving only your forearms and using the biceps and forearms strength curl the dumbbell up to the level of your shoulder. Hold this position for a second while feeling the pull on your biceps then slowly back to the starting position and repeat.

Warming up and cooling down are two of the most important parts to your exercise routine, they are essential and should always be performed correctly before you begin your proper workout and after you finish the workout. While the main reason for doing them is to reduce the risk of injury they also play another role and that is they prepare the muscles for your workout and increase flexibility, intensity and the volume of weights which can be lifted.

What is the warm up routine?

The focus of the warm up routine should be on preparing the parts of the body you are going to be training, by doing the correct warm up you increase the blood flow to the tendons, muscles, joints and ligaments in the areas which you are about to put under a great strain during your workout.

The activity ideally should include all the major muscle groups and if you have a rowing machine then this is an ideal way to warm up. You should work at a moderate pace which leaves you only slightly out of breath and almost breaking out in a sweat but not quite, you should continue this pace for around 5 to 10 minutes.

Following this you should do 5 to 10 minutes of stretching exercises, dynamic stretches are best as these involve controlled movement through the full range of motion and have been shown to improve the muscular output in the training session that follows.

What is the cooling down routine?

5 to 10 minutes of jogging is a good way to cool down, start off around 50% of sprinting speed dropping down slowly to end up at a comfortable walking pace which will help to bring the heart back down to its normal level. This should ideally be followed by around 5 to 10 minutes of static stretching as these will cool down the overall body temperature.

You should stretch the entire body but pay particular attention to the parts of the body you have been training, stretching these for longer. Take this opportunity to replenish the glycogen depletion in your body with a protein shake; this will give the muscles the essential amino acids they need which will help to speed up the rebuilding of the muscles that have worked so hard.

Of course these are only suggestions and everyone is different and will know best what their body needs, but it is essential that you do include warm up and cooling down routines as part of your exercise routine, it doesn’t matter how long you have been bodybuilding for or if you’re a beginner these rules should be followed every time.