Hey, does anyone know of a lift to isolate the lateral head of the triceps muscle? I’m a newbie and looking to benefit from y’alls experience and knowledge.
Thanks.
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[quote]Bill Ward wrote:
Hey, does anyone know of a lift to isolate the lateral head of the triceps muscle? I’m a newbie and looking to benefit from y’alls experience and knowledge.
Thanks.[/quote]
I’m pretty sure you don’t need to stress about specifically hitting the lateral head vs medial or long. That’s bordering on detail work that’s not exactly a priority yet. The general “rule” of including an arms-overhead exercise, an arms-perpendicular-to-body exercise, and an arms-at-side exercise (either all in one session or spread throughout the week) should be fine.
With that said, Dr. Clay Hyght talked about the triceps here:
What kind of new/better/more effective training plan did you decide on after your chest thread? And how’s the shoulder feeling?
Thanks Yogi and Chris. I knew you guys would have a resource!
At the moment I’m still limited by my arms although at least one of them seems to be getting better. The biggest problem is not so much my shoulders although they are starting to talk to me. I strained something in my left forearm/elbow doing bent over rows (still don’t know what to call them but one hand and one knee on a bench and pulling/rowing upward with a dumbell in the other hand). That hurts any time I am pulling but not in the bicep. It is getting better, though. I bought some “hooks” that strap around my wrists so I can do Lat Pulldowns without as much stress on it.
I have cut out most of the other pulling exercises. At least until it is healed. I strained my right forearm/bicep about a week later using a bent bar for curls. One of those ideas that sounded good at the time. I had gotten off schedule and hadn’t gotten my arms workout in that week so I decided to tack on some sets of curls after my upper body workout. Didn’t think I would need to do any specific bicep warm up after a full upper body workout but felt something twinge in my right arm. Mistake number two was ignoring it since it really wasn’t that bad. That was back in JUNE!! Both shoulders are kinda tight and achy when I try to stretch across my body or do jumping jacks etc. Trying to research some stretches or find that article on Myofascial Therapy to see if it offers anything applicable.
So my current routine is upper body and arms on Mondays and Fridays (incline, flat and decline dumbell flys. Pec deck, Trap flys (sitting on edge of bench and bring dumbells from under knees as far up and out as I can), Shrugs, Lat pulldowns, Hammer curls, skull crushers, Triceps pulldowns, my version of dips ( using a machine) and more curls using only my left hand. On Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday I do a boot camp that is highly aerobic for about an hour. Saturday is leg day. I have just started this routine and like it, but need to do more to build my legs. We work them pretty hard in the boot camp but it is a lot of running (sprints) and suicides, burpees, plyometric squats etc. no weights. There’s really not a day I can add another leg workout unless I do it after the boot camp on Thursday. Got to have some recovery in there somewhere. My legs are probably my weakest area. I don’t see much chance of hitting my goal of 150 with less than 10% bodyfat by March 2016 unless I put a few pounds on my legs. Maybe not even then because I still have another 7 or 8 pounds of fat to dump.
To hit my mark I will have to gain an average of 1.5 pounds of muscle per month for the next 17 months. On my frame (5’5 133) that is not likely since I’m talking 10% or less body fat and steroid free.
As you can see, I have incorporated the suggestions I got from you guys and have added squats to my leg days (still hate them) but want to find a really good leg workout. Unfortunately, my legs have never responded with much gain. They’re built for speed, not power. I also came across a thread from EyeDentist last night about his history and training. It was exceptional and he has had some of the same injuries I am dealing with so it is particularly relevant to me.
Well, once again I have gotten on a rant and written far more than anyone will want to read, but I’ll close with saying thank you for your input! I appreciate you guys being willing to share your expertise.
[quote]Bill Ward wrote:
(still don’t know what to call them but one hand and one knee on a bench and pulling/rowing upward with a dumbell in the other hand).[/quote]
It’s a dumbbell row.
I took the liberty of translating your weekly schedule and, frankly, it still sucks, man. I get that you’re dealing with the little injuries that’re starting to pile up (a sign that your routine is/has been imbalanced), but a more complete approach that doesn’t over-emphasize or under-emphasize any muscle group is really the way to go for now.
Monday
incline dumbbell fly
flat dumbbell fly
decline dumbbell flys
Pec deck
Trap fly (sitting on edge of bench and bring dumbells from under knees as far up and out as I can)
Shrug
Lat pulldown
Hammer curl
skull crushers
Triceps pulldown
my version of dips ( using a machine)
more curls using only my left hand
Tuesday
1 hour boot camp
Wednesday
1 hour boot camp
Thursday
1 hour boot camp
Friday
incline dumbbell fly
flat dumbbell fly
decline dumbell flys
Pec deck
Trap fly (sitting on edge of bench and bring dumbells from under knees as far up and out as I can)
Shrug
Lat pulldown
Hammer curl
skull crushers
Triceps pulldown
my version of dips ( using a machine)
more curls using only my left hand
Saturday
Legs
That’s because you train them as an afterthought and, based on your chest thread, you pretty much always have.
This is a fair assessment. Fortunately, it doesn’t take a brain surgeon to figure the answer. If you only have two or three days of lifting, they need to be well-designed. Instead of that routine you came up with, I’d rather see you do one of these until you get a better feel of what’s what and get a handle on how to design an effective plan:
Most guys hate leg day. Or at least, it’s usually the least “fun” session of the week. But they gut it out because hard work is where the magic happens. Definitely a good call that you added squats though. I know it’s probably tough, especially with the boot camp work three days in a row, but if your nutrition is on point (I see you’ve been dialing in your workout nutrition which can be super-helpful), then you’ll adapt soon enough and should be able to go balls out for that hard Saturday workout.
Side note:
If the exercise “Trap fly (sitting on edge of bench and bring dumbells from under knees as far up and out as I can)” is these:
You should be feeling them in your shoulders, specifically the side delt that’s kinda above/between the bis and tris, not really your traps. If we’re talking about the same exercise and your feeling it mostly in the traps, your form is off or the weight is too heavy.
This wont isolate the lateral head as thats impossible but it will target it. Lots of Close grip pushups with 2 hands on a medicine ball has packed a lot of meat on mine.
At 5’5, 130 lbs, isolating the lateral head of your triceps is the least of your concerns. I used to think like you. When I was 30-40 lbs lighter, I was asking questions like this. These days, I wouldn’t even give a second thought to isolating… anything really. Stick to the exercises that have the most bang for the buck. Heavy compound movements will always be your best bet.
[quote]flipcollar wrote:
At 5’5, 130 lbs, isolating the lateral head of your triceps is the least of your concerns. I used to think like you. When I was 30-40 lbs lighter, I was asking questions like this. These days, I wouldn’t even give a second thought to isolating… anything really. Stick to the exercises that have the most bang for the buck. Heavy compound movements will always be your best bet.[/quote]
How developed does one need to be before isolating? Not flaming, generally curious
You need to put on a least 30 pounds before worrying about such minor things. Get on this program or texas method etc…
[quote]Kamel wrote:
[quote]flipcollar wrote:
At 5’5, 130 lbs, isolating the lateral head of your triceps is the least of your concerns. I used to think like you. When I was 30-40 lbs lighter, I was asking questions like this. These days, I wouldn’t even give a second thought to isolating… anything really. Stick to the exercises that have the most bang for the buck. Heavy compound movements will always be your best bet.[/quote]
How developed does one need to be before isolating? Not flaming, generally curious[/quote]
to be honest, I would say isolate from the start. Having said that, there’s isolating and then there’s ISOLATING.
For example, doing some lateral or rear delt raises is isolation work, and any good routine would include those. Isolation work for the triceps is great, but ISOLATION work for the lateral head of the triceps is nonsense for all but the really advanced bodybuilder.
I do see some value in adding a movement that emphasises (note the lack of the word isolates) the long head of the triceps though.
[quote]Yogi wrote:
[quote]Kamel wrote:
[quote]flipcollar wrote:
At 5’5, 130 lbs, isolating the lateral head of your triceps is the least of your concerns. I used to think like you. When I was 30-40 lbs lighter, I was asking questions like this. These days, I wouldn’t even give a second thought to isolating… anything really. Stick to the exercises that have the most bang for the buck. Heavy compound movements will always be your best bet.[/quote]
How developed does one need to be before isolating? Not flaming, generally curious[/quote]
to be honest, I would say isolate from the start. Having said that, there’s isolating and then there’s ISOLATING.
For example, doing some lateral or rear delt raises is isolation work, and any good routine would include those. Isolation work for the triceps is great, but ISOLATION work for the lateral head of the triceps is nonsense for all but the really advanced bodybuilder.
I do see some value in adding a movement that emphasises (note the lack of the word isolates) the long head of the triceps though.[/quote]
This is pretty much what I would say. I definitely do arm ‘isolation’ exercises, in the sense that I do bicep curls and tricep presses. And I do a variety of different ones as well (different grips, different handles on the cable, etc). But after 10 years of training, I’m still nowhere near the point where attempting to isolate a particular muscle head makes sense, and I doubt it ever will.
So to answer your question, I would say that if you’ve stepped on a bodybuilding stage more than once, and been told by judges that the reason you’re not placing better is that a particular triceps head doesn’t look good enough, then maybe that is the time to start looking into this.
For the OP, this is far, far off from where he is now, and for him (as well as most of us) it isn’t worth giving another thought.
[quote]flipcollar wrote:
At 5’5, 130 lbs, isolating the lateral head of your triceps is the least of your concerns. I used to think like you. When I was 30-40 lbs lighter, I was asking questions like this. These days, I wouldn’t even give a second thought to isolating… anything really. Stick to the exercises that have the most bang for the buck. Heavy compound movements will always be your best bet.[/quote]
How developed does one need to be before isolating? Not flaming, generally curious
[quote]Kamel wrote:
[quote]flipcollar wrote:
At 5’5, 130 lbs, isolating the lateral head of your triceps is the least of your concerns. I used to think like you. When I was 30-40 lbs lighter, I was asking questions like this. These days, I wouldn’t even give a second thought to isolating… anything really. Stick to the exercises that have the most bang for the buck. Heavy compound movements will always be your best bet.[/quote]
How developed does one need to be before isolating? Not flaming, generally curious[/quote]
You can start right away. No rules written in stone about this. Just follow a proven program.
What everyone is saying: Do not stress about it, unless you are about to compete or just had surgery?!