Strengthening Your Core

Building a strong core is a prerequisite to becoming strong in other lifts, and reaching your ultimate goal of being the strongest person in any given room. Simply put, having a strong core will allow you to lift more weight, reduce your risk of injury, and allow you to maintain proper form throughout your lifts. Also, if you have been ignoring your core, you may have reached a plateau in your lifts, and incorporating some core workouts will help you blast past that plateau. Many lifters will either ignore their core or they will waste their time on inefficient workouts. I have found that the following workouts give the best results:

It is important to include static and dynamic lifts to strengthen your core. Static lifts are those that do not use any weight or movement, and dynamic lifts use weights and movement.

Static Lifts:

• Front Plank: This lift engages your entire core. For this lift, you lay down on the floor and support your weight on you elbows (look up a video on YouTube if you are confused). It may seem easy at first but after 10-15 seconds you will feel its effects. You want to make sure you keep your body straight and hold the plank for at least 30 seconds. As your core becomes stronger, you should extend this amount of time all the way to an entire minute. As with any lift, do four sets of planks with a couple of minutes of rest in between sets.

•  Side Plank: This lift should also be performed on the floor like a front plank. Except, you rotate your body till you are laying on your side and you support yourself on one elbow. For this lift, you also want to keep your body straight and maintain the plank for at least 30 seconds. After doing one side, switch to the other. This lift should also have four sets per side.

Dynamic Lifts:

• Leg Lifts: This lift is performed by lying on your back and keeping your legs together as you slowly lift them up and down for reps. It is important to make sure your back and shoulders stay on the ground, and you should also lower your legs far enough to feel a stretch in your abdomen but your feet should not touch the ground.

• Ball Roll-Ins: You perform this lift by placing your hands on the ground and your feet on top of a ball. You should slowly bend your knees and bring the ball towards your arms. Remember to focus on your abdomen as you perform this lift. 

To read more about strengthening your core, please visit: Core Strength: Your Ultimate Guide to Core Training

Building World Class Arms

Arms are one of the first things that other people notice and compliment so it’s natural to want to include lifts that specifically target your arms. In addition to improving the way you look, working out your arms and making them stronger also helps you with your other lifts. Or simply, making your triceps stronger will allow you to press more weight in lifts such as bench-press, overhead press, etc. Likewise, making your biceps strong will allow you to pull more weight in lifts such as row, wide-grip pull-downs, etc. The rest of this post will be dedicated towards tips and recommended lifts for building large and powerful arms.

Tips:

• Like other lifts, gradually increase your weights

• Stick to one particular workout for at least a month

• Include bicep lifts on your pull-days (back-days)

• Include lifts that target your triceps on push-days (chest and shoulders)

• If your arms are not responding to your workout, increase the amount of lifts that target them. For example, if you have only been doing bicep lifts on back days, then add some bicep workouts into other workouts, but make sure you give them a sufficient amount of rest between workouts.

Biceps:

• Standing Hammer Curls: This lifts is performed by holding a dumbbell in each hand in the same way you would hold a hammer. Lift one dumbbell at a time to maintain good form (elbows planted at your sides!) and focus on the muscle being trained. This lift targets the outer head of the bicep and helps build a taller peak.

• Preacher Curl: This lift targets and isolates the bicep, and it helps prevent wrist strain.

Triceps:

• Triceps Push-down: This lift is typically done using a cable machine. This is a good exercise for maintaining the same level of strain on your muscle throughout the motion. Remember to keep your elbows planted at your sides, and don’t neglect the concentric portion of the lift.

• Dips: This is a great lift for muscle building and a great addition to chest day as well. When performing this lift, make sure to keep from leaning to make sure your triceps are doing all of the work. The more you lean forward, the more you are targeting your chest. 

 To view other great arm building exercises, please visit: Ultimate Arm Exercises

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