TO FULLY DEVELOP THIS SHOWSTOPPER MUSCLE, TAKE ADVANTAGE OF BOTH SHORTENED- AND STRETCHED-POSITION EXERCISES
Owning a set of giant pipes signifies that you possess the strength of a giant. That could be why the bi’s are the muscle that nonbodybuilders most easily relate to—even if they think the whole bodybuilding thing is strange.
The biceps are a fusiform muscle with two heads (bi = two, ceps = heads) and actually span two joints, though for practical purposes we treat them as if they span only the elbow joint. To thoroughly train the biceps, we shouldn’t think about angles per se but instead the degree of stretch. Biceps should be trained in both the shortened and fully stretched starting positions. An example of a shortened starting position is a bentover one-arm curl. Likewise, the biceps should be trained with a stretched starting position, such as when doing incline curls.
A word of caution about training biceps: Straight bars are notorious for causing forearm splints (that is, similar to shin splints). These painful splints can last for weeks and will severely hamper your arm training. Dumbbells are your safest option, but if you choose to use a bar for curls, opt for an EZ-curl bar.
