Armistice Day! Oops, I mean arms day.

I just finished an arms session and thought I’d talk about it.

My body part split workouts involve clustering exercises for Back/Chest/Shoulders/Arms, split over four days. The arms workout is split into triceps and biceps, and I change this every session, so the following information is only reflective of today’s session.

Why change? So the muscles don’t get used to the type of exercise I’m doing – it’s easier to shock the muscle into growth. I also like variety – if I get bored I lose motivation. And we can’t have that, can we? My exercise is part of my mental health routine, and I, like most people, prefer not to be depressed all the time. Although, sometimes I get depressed anyway…okay, moving on.

I’ve included links to the exercises below, so you can see what they are and how they work.

Warmup

Warm up includes leg, torso and arm stretches, yoga stretches, 3 x sets of bicycle crunches (80 reps each set) (20 minutes)

Note: I vary warm ups each session – sometimes I do weighted crunches instead, however these have less reps.  

Triceps

5 x supersets, which involve:

Tricep Cable Pull Downs/Push Downs (20 reps)

Tricep Dumb Bell Kickbacks (10 reps each side)

Tricep Overhead Extensions, with dumb bell instead of cable (10 reps)

Note: I do weighted parallel bar dips on my chest day. By inclining forward with chin against your chest, as you lift your body mass and extra weight via a belt, you hit your chest more. It also hits triceps as well (many people would normally include dips in their tricep routine, but that’s just me).  

Biceps

5 x supersets, which involve:

Standing One Arm Cable Curls (15 reps)

Concentration Curls (8 reps each side, with dumb bells)

Barbell Curls (10 reps)

Cardio Finisher

Tabata – Intense cardio – jump lunges, jump squats, push ups, burpies (4 minutes)

 

Normally I do laps for two kilometres, stopping to do push ups and lunges each lap, but it was raining today. That’s my excuse and I’m sticking to it.

You’ll notice I combine some high rep exercises with low reps. I like to go for a balance of size and strength building. In a superset you perform each exercise slowly, but move quickly to the next one, so that you push the muscles to failure rapidly.

Phew! The blog was harder to write than the workout!

 

Note: If you are unfit, overweight, have medical issues or are not used to exercise, please consult with your doctor prior to undertaking any training programs.