We all want to have a big arm and for that we go to the gym to work on bodybuilding. However, many people do not know that the largest muscle in the arms is not the biceps but the triceps. You will never have big, strong limbs if you don't attack the three heads of the triceps correctly. There are many ways to work this muscle, and many people prefer to work the muscles. dumbbell triceps.
Therefore, we are going to dedicate this article to tell you which are the best exercises to work the triceps with dumbbells and some of the most frequent tips.
Dumbbell triceps
Keep in mind that it is a muscle that has three heads that must be worked in isolation and together in order to have good results. You can work both with your own body weight, triceps with dumbbells and with a bar. We are going to give some tips on the advantages of working the triceps with dumbbells.
And it is that working these muscles using dumbbells can bring some benefits for the development of this muscle group. For example, when we work the triceps with dumbbells we can correct symmetry problems in our body. Surely, many of us have an arm that is more developed than another and it is easier to make it grow. With the dumbbells we work unilaterally and we manage to exert a total stimulus to a part of the body and make the muscle work completely. If we work it with a bar, the rest of the body can reach compensate for that lack of strength in the muscle group of a specific arm.
In general, working triceps with dumbbells favors range of motion. The range of travel or movement of an exercise is all the space that we move while doing the exercise. With the bars we are usually more limited in this range of motion. Let's see what are the best exercises to work the triceps with dumbbells.
Best triceps exercises with dumbbells
Dumbbell standing extensions
It is an exercise that causes a burn in this muscle group easily. You do not have to take too much weight and you have to watch that the technique is correct to avoid injuries. The back must be straight throughout the movement and the core must remain active. In this way, we ensure that too much weight is not placed on the lower back. We must also be careful when lifting the dumbbell so that it does not hit our head.
It is advisable to hold the arm to lift the dumbbell with our other arm to promote stability of the movement. Keep in mind that this exercise does not have a progressive overload that is too pronounced since we are working at an angle where the triceps cannot exert too much force. As it is an elbow extension exercise, it is more complicated, the triceps can scale commissioned with ease, as if it were a background with a bar.
Dumbbell Triceps: Bench Dumbbell Extensions
This exercise is essential to develop the long head of the triceps. To do this, you have to catch the rush above your head with both hands and go up and down by flexing your elbows. Be careful with overextension of the elbow as it can cause a tear. As always, we must adjust the loads to our level.
Dumbbell French Press
Although this exercise is done quite effectively with the bar, it can also be done with dumbbells. It is designed to be done with a neutral grip to do not do too much damage to the elbow part. Many people do not prefer this exercise since fiber recruitment is not very well related to fatigue. Since many associate fatigue with exercise well done, they do not use this exercise to improve this muscle group.
Dumbbell curls and open elbows
This is a way to work the triceps with dumbbells from another angle. It's a pretty good move to gain strength. To do these injuries You have to keep your abdomen tight at all times, keep your back straight and be careful with the movement of the dumbbells.
Other ways to work the triceps
There are many exercises that do not work the triceps with dumbbells, but they can be just as or more effective. For example, when we work our chest and we do the classic bench press we are going to work our triceps very well. In fact, in this exercise there are different limitations that help us to know which part of the muscle is not well developed. If the part in which we lift the bar from the chest costs us more, it is that our pectoral is not well developed. However, if the part that costs us the most is the last elbow extension to raise the bar, it is that our triceps are not well developed.
With closed push-ups we can also work this muscle group, it is a very interesting exercise since we can work with our own body weight and no installation is needed. The same goes for triceps bench dips.
Calorie surplus
As I always mention in all articles related to muscle mass gains, the first thing we must take into account is our energy balance in the diet. Our body understands stimuli and the generation of new muscle mass is energy very expensive for the body. Therefore, we will not generate new muscle mass if we do not have an energy surplus for a long time. To achieve an energy surplus we need to eat more calories in our day-to-day life than we consume.
Being calorie intake higher than what is consumed it is known by the name of caloric surplus. Our energy requirements for weight maintenance are divided into our metabolic expenditure spent in addition to physical activity not linked to exercise. To this we must add the physical activity we do during weight training and if we do cardio. The total of calories that we get is the intake that we must consume to maintain weight. If we want to gain muscle mass we must increase said cal by 300-500 kcal, depending on our objective and our level. Without this surplus of calories we cannot make our triceps grow.
I hope that with this information you can learn more about how to work the triceps with dumbbells.