Aloha my friends!
It’s been a while! I apologize for that. This is the first time I missed sending out a Fitness-Tip Friday newsletter since I started it more than a year and a half ago… and I missed three in a row!
The reason was that I was traveling through some small islands off the coast of Greece with my wife for her 30th birthday! (You can see a few pics of that at the end of this newsletter.) I had thought I’d still be able to send out the newsletters… but it turned out that we didn’t have reliable internet access for any of it outside of the one day we spent in Athens. So sorry again!
On to this week’s tip!
In a new YouTube video I published just a few days ago, I dispel the common myth that the palms-up pull-down / chin-up are among the “best biceps exercises in the world” because of the supposed fact that they “work the biceps from both ends”.
They do not!!
In fact I outline 3 separate reasons why that’s wrong:
- Those exercises work shoulder EXTENSION, not shoulder FLEXION (the latter is the movement the biceps perform at the shoulder)
- Those exercises put the biceps into active insufficiency during part of their ranges of motion
- Those exercises don’t work supination… they work elbow flexion in a supinated position, which is a completely different thing
Now, to be clear, I’m NOT saying those two don’t work the biceps at all. Of course they do, since they work elbow flexion. They simply don’t work the biceps in the way or to the degree that people think they do.
I won’t go into detail on those 3 reasons here since you can just watch the video if you haven’t yet. Instead, I want to highlight something I mention briefly towards the end… and that’s a pull-down technique I developed that ACTUALLY works the biceps – and does so extremely well and in a unique way – by adding rotational resistance to the movement!
(Note: I go over why it’s extremely important to work supination itself – and it’s regional hypertrophy effects – in that YouTube video as well.)
Here’s the exercise from two different angles:
You’ll start by sitting under a high-set cable with a rope attachment (or something similar), and grabbing the rope with a PRONATED grip (“palm down”). Then while you perform the pull-down motion, you’ll simultaneously SUPINATE your forearm as far as you can… and reverse that motion on the way back up.
This supinat-ING pull-down works the biceps FAR better than a supinat-ED pull-down does! (And you’ll feel it!). Also, it’s one of the few exercises that provide resistance against supination when the forearm is in a pronated position – which generates significantly more torque in the biceps than working supination in a supinated position does! (I know that’s confusing… but pause to think it through and you’ll get it haha.)
In fact, starting the supination movement from a pronated position creates 4X more torque!!
It’s also an excellent exercise option for people who have shoulder pain… precisely because it doesn’t put any stress on the biceps tendons at the shoulder joint!
I’m in the process of developing an attachment I call the “Gains Hammer” that will work much better for this (and many other exercises) than a rope or anything else… so if you’re interested in checking it out or being notified when that becomes available, you can add your name to a notification list on this page.
And if you want to increase the effectiveness of this exercise even more … add BFR! (That’s what the bands on my arms are – more on BFR science coming in a YouTube video soon!)
Application: If you want to work your biceps in a pull-down movement… do this supinat-ING pull-down!!!
Dr. Gains 
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