THE BEST BARBELL-ONLY BICEPS WORKOUT

The biceps are small muscles that aren’t designed to handle a lot of weight, but they do respond well to high reps, short rest periods, and multiple angles. With only a barbell loaded with a modest amount of weight and some earnest effort, you can build a solid pair of biceps muscles without overtaxing your biceps tendons.

HOW IT WORKS 

The workout starts with a reverse curl—the weakest grip you can curl with because your palms are facing down. It gradually progresses you to curls in stronger positions so that you can use the heaviest weights possible and keep your intensity up even as fatigue sets in. And “fatigue” is putting it mildly . Twenty reps per set will have your arms in agony, and then you’ll finish them with ladder sets—conventional curls done for more reps in each successive set until you’re doing 50 with just the bar. By that point, that’s all the weight you’ll be able to lift.

DIRECTIONS 

Complete each exercise in turn. Hold the top of each repetition for one second and take two or three seconds to lower each rep.  

2 WIDE-GRIP CURL

SETS: 1 REPS: 20 REST: 60 SEC.

Grasp the bar with hands wider than shoulder width—if you’re using an Olympic bar, your pinkies should be on the outside knurling. Perform curls.  

3 CLOSE-GRIP CURL

SETS: 1 REPS: 20 REST: 60 SEC.

Curl with your hands inside shoulder width, in the middle of the bar.  

4 CONVENTIONAL CURL

SETS: 4 REPS: 20, 30, 40, 50 REST: 60 SEC.

Place three 5-pound plates on each side of the bar, hands at shoulder width, and perform 20 reps. That’s one set. Then take off one plate from each side. Perform 30 reps. Unload another plate from each side and do 40 reps. Finally, remove the last set of plates and do 50 reps with just the empty bar.