Can't Get My Arms To Grow

[Throttle]

grunting like an orgasmic pig on disco biscuits

it's going to take a long time to dig that image out of my brain.

:crazy:

 

[I-tallionStallion]

i am such a sap for april fools day. I thought EFFORT's username got hacked hahahahaha

 

[wolf116]

Hey guys i've tried everything but i can't get my arms to grow

heres my routine

Barbell Curls- 4 sets of 15reps
Hammer curls- 3 sets of 30
Concentration Curls- 3 sets of 8 reps
45.525% angle curls- 4 sets of 10
Cable Curls- 5x10
Preacher curl drop sets (to burn them out)

I do this 5 days a week and can't understand why my arms won't grow, anyone have any ideas? I also don't workout my lower body at all because i don't want to get big legs and end up looking like some huge bodybuilder on steroids.

:crackup:
45.525% hahaha to burn them out haha

MadManic admitted he dose cheat curls in the squat rack :crackup:

I really can not believe people answered this seriously lol.

I bet EFFORT doesn't even do curls.

Should I swap this routine with the one you gave me man?

BTW My numbers are moving up again. Thanks

 

[shaunuk]

I find the responses in this thread a little idiotic, yes the OP was joking but the actual responses were even more of a joke.

You have one guy joking about curling in the squat rack, another about heavy cheat curls and another about how you should listen to a guy with 13" arms off the net about increasing arm size (no offense Quag, don't mean that in a bad sense) rather than your own instincts.

All of those responses are more laughable than the routine the OP suggested. The routine the OP suggested is better for arm growth than relying on squats/deads/bench for big arms, that's for sure. And yes 16 months ago I had 12.5" arms and I was skinny and weak, now I have 17 1/4" arms. If you do low volume easy routines and hope for a miraculous effect on arm growth, you are sorely mistaken.

If you saw me training arms you may laugh, with the number of sets and dropsets I do and doing cheat curls on the preacher machine, along with doing dropsets on tricep dips with the assist machine and whatnot. But hey, it really kills the muscle, I re-feed it and it grows.

I DO heavy cheat curls in the squat rack, I DO high volume to failure and dropsets, I DO listen to my own gut instincts rather than theorists.

MM

Man, I'd *never* fault your methods because you've found something which works very well for you. You've had just under 5inches of arm growth, I'm not going to tell you you're doing it wrong...because you're not.

The humour above was just exactly that...the fact that some scenes in bodybuilding can be self-parodying at times. Doesn't mean I think they're stupid or that they don't work, it's just OK to laugh at something which looks funny at first glance

 

[[S]alvatore]

Ahahahahah. As if people took that seriously.

 

[Quagmire911]

(no offense Quag, don't mean that in a bad sense)
MM

Size is your thing, not mine And anyway my bi's are my worst part genetically, you should see my insertion points. Dreadful.

As Shaun has said if you have taken your arms up that much in size then kudos to you, you are doing something right. I have said this before to you that from what I have seen I don't think a lot of people would be able to handle the same volume you prescribe, and I sometimes think you don't realize that everyone is different and as such there training must be different. If you have good genetics and can handle higher volume, great, but many would overtrain and not progress if they did such high volume.

And bi's are back in my routine if that makes you happy

 

[Mad Manic]

Size is your thing, not mine And anyway my bi's are my worst part genetically, you should see my insertion points. Dreadful.

As Shaun has said if you have taken your arms up that much in size then kudos to you, you are doing something right. I have said this before to you that from what I have seen I don't think a lot of people would be able to handle the same volume you prescribe, and I sometimes think you don't realize that everyone is different and as such there training must be different. If you have good genetics and can handle higher volume, great, but many would overtrain and not progress if they did such high volume.

And bi's are back in my routine if that makes you happy

I just think it's equally ridiculous to claim that you get big arms from doing SQ/D/BP as it is for getting big arms by doing them 5 x week with no leg/back work. From experience whatever bodypart I train hard, grows well. There has never been any knock on effect. My squats/deads going up has nothing to do with my curling or pressdown strength, they are different muscle groups working in different planes of movement. Bottom line to anyone is that if you want progress in any given lift or any given bodypart, then you're going to need to train that lift/bodypart hard and have good rest and nutrition. While the web theorists with 12" arms advise to squat for big arms, it's equally as logical (but wrong) to say something like "work your back hard and you'll get big quads" or whatever. Of course this is just the training part; there's a ton more mistakes made in the diet side ...

MM

 

[Quagmire911]

If you do squat+deads+bench+chinups/pullups+dips, pretty much Rippetoe, and your numbers on those fly up and you put 20lbs on over the course of 4-6months, your arms will be stronger and bigger.

My bi curl numbers got stronger and I hadn't hit them in 6 months.

Does this mean that they will reach their potential with this training and no isolation? Certainly not, but they will get a lot of benefit.

 

[EFFORT]

haha look what i did, forgot arms is a dangerous topic and to think my first idea was to make it "Why can't I gain weight" and post up some grandma diet.

 

[I-tallionStallion]

Why are arms so damn important...bicepts are so small...MM you have high overall mass, which definitely contributes to your overall arm size...I'm not impressed. With proper diet and hitting the big three, you gain big overall mass quickly. And your arm size increases...duh its not that hard to understand. Why does everyone have to complicate things

 

[mrRuckus]

yay the same argument all over again.

i bet new points will be made this time and both sides will swap and argue the opposite side after all the stunningly convincing arguments of the other side.



--

one question though. Isn't it the arms that usually fail first on pullups/rows - at least in the way most people do them? Isn't that essentially hitting the arms hard? It's not like they're barely used in these movements.

This "squat for big arms" thing really isn't meant literally I wouldn't think. It's to focus people on what matters. Lift heavy and eat and don't obsess over the small stuff is the point i think. All those articles from the gurus are to the newbies starting out worrying about their arm size. The gurus are saying knock it it off, you are 150 lbs and need some leg/back/real muscle mass before you even start worrying about lagging body parts and small arms. You are 150 lbs. Everything is lagging. I really don't think the "squat for big arms" people are preaching to the already big guys and saying don't do isolations. They just want beginners to focus on the REAL lifts and perfecting those and getting respectable numbers on those before obsessing over whether to do 2 or 3 bicep exercises for OMG HOW MANY REPS when they should be asking "how is my squat form?" "how is my deadlift form?" "am i eating enough?"

for the record, yeah i have down bi/tri dropsets or 2 diff curls as well as rows/deads on a back day. Just not all the time. Even Iron Addict as one of those "squat and deadlift for strength, you id10ts" guys will give a lot of isolation work at times in routines. And DC training which preaches STRENGTH STRENGTH STRENGTH has direct arm work, albeit i've never see dropsets but rather it's rest paused.

 

[JohnnyIrish]

Why anyone took anything in this thread to heart/serious is byond me.. It was meant to be funny and it succeeded.

 

[mrRuckus]

Why anyone took anything in this thread to heart/serious is byond me.. It was meant to be funny and it succeeded.

It was obvious before even reading the thread if you ever saw Effort post before. I think the last people Effort would ask about arm growth is anyone here other than me of course with my 24" legs and 22" arms.

 

[Drum&Bass]

Size means nothing

 

[Throttle]

haha look what i did, forgot arms is a dangerous topic and to think my first idea was to make it "Why can't I gain weight" and post up some grandma diet.

the resulting conversation would have been even more enlightening, i'm sure.

 

[Mad Manic]

If you do squat+deads+bench+chinups/pullups+dips, pretty much Rippetoe, and your numbers on those fly up and you put 20lbs on over the course of 4-6months, your arms will be stronger and bigger.

My bi curl numbers got stronger and I hadn't hit them in 6 months.

Does this mean that they will reach their potential with this training and no isolation? Certainly not, but they will get a lot of benefit.

Well that means you pretty much agree with me then. But I'll also add, if you are doing back movements like rows and chins yet your biceps feel well trained, and chest movements like Bench and Dips yet your triceps feel well trained, that probably suggests you aren't training your chest and back properly. Your bis/tris should not be doing too much work in these movements.

As for your arm strength, your arms are weak and small (relatively), so clearly the compounds didn't do a great job.

MM

 

[Mad Manic]

With proper diet and hitting the big three, you gain big overall mass quickly. And your arm size increases...duh its not that hard to understand. Why does everyone have to complicate things

Because what you said is just wrong. A muscle grows if it is stimulated to wear down the fibres, then re-fed well enough to grow bigger and stronger. Squats, Deads, Bench do not build your arms up, they build your chest, back and thighs up because that's what they stimulate. If you then added, dips, rows, pull-ups and CG Bench your arms would grow more. Add curls, pressdowns, tricep dips, skulls, DB Ext etc. even more. Add volume and dropsets and even more, up to a point. The same can be said for any other bodypart. Calves do not grow much from Squats/Deads, you need calf raises. My arms are big because I train them hard and my diet is good. If I didn't train them hard they would be relatively lagging. Just like if I didn't train my quads hard, they would be lagging. My back work doesn't make my quads grow. My chest work doesn't make my hamstrings grow. My squats do not make my biceps/triceps grow.

MM

 

[Quagmire911]

We've been over this, its just my bi's. My forearms are a great asset...

And they aren't really small relatively, I am in the low 170's, can't expect them to be big at all. Bw is holding them back, not lack of training.

Look at it logically:

Me at 170-175-13-14" wherever they are.
Stallion at 200-205 around 15" he said.
You at 225-230 with 17".

Geee, do I see pattern?

 

[Mad Manic]

one question though. Isn't it the arms that usually fail first on pullups/rows - at least in the way most people do them? Isn't that essentially hitting the arms hard? It's not like they're barely used in these movements.

Definitely not, these are back exercises, your back should be doing most of the work and failing first. If your biceps are taking too much of the load and failing first, that suggests you need great bicep strength and/or to re-assess your back training. Rows and pullups do not hit the arms hard, they are back exercises. This comment leads me to believe you do not know much about real gym training tbh.

This "squat for big arms" thing really isn't meant literally I wouldn't think. It's to focus people on what matters. Lift heavy and eat and don't obsess over the small stuff is the point i think. All those articles from the gurus are to the newbies starting out worrying about their arm size. The gurus are saying knock it it off, you are 150 lbs and need some leg/back/real muscle mass before you even start worrying about lagging body parts and small arms. You are 150 lbs. Everything is lagging. I really don't think the "squat for big arms" people are preaching to the already big guys and saying don't do isolations. They just want beginners to focus on the REAL lifts and perfecting those and getting respectable numbers on those before obsessing over whether to do 2 or 3 bicep exercises for OMG HOW MANY REPS when they should be asking "how is my squat form?" "how is my deadlift form?" "am i eating enough?"

for the record, yeah i have down bi/tri dropsets or 2 diff curls as well as rows/deads on a back day. Just not all the time. Even Iron Addict as one of those "squat and deadlift for strength, you id10ts" guys will give a lot of isolation work at times in routines. And DC training which preaches STRENGTH STRENGTH STRENGTH has direct arm work, albeit i've never see dropsets but rather it's rest paused.

I agree, but then it depends on what you call big. I don't consider myself that big a guy, and I've been doing direct work on the smaller groups for a long time. Simply put, if I don't train hard on a given lift or bodypart, it doesn't grow or progress that well. This knock on effect that the keyboard gurus preach is unsubstaintiated and not relevant to real gym training. It may only be relevant to extremes, where it's very unlikely/much harder/perhaps impossible to have massive arms and tiny chicken legs because the body has a mechanism to prevent great disproportions to stop injuries. Then again, there are guys with huge upper bodies and poor lower bodies. Squats for big arms is just an over reaction to the other extreme of only doing arm work to impress the girls. Both are silly.

MM

 

[Mad Manic]

We've been over this, its just my bi's. My forearms are a great asset...

And they aren't really small relatively, I am in the low 170's, can't expect them to be big at all. Bw is holding them back, not lack of training.

Look at it logically:

Me at 170-175-13-14" wherever they are.
Stallion at 200-205 around 15" he said.
You at 225-230 with 17".

Geee, do I see pattern?

2/3 of the arm is tricep, if your arms are small that means you don't have good triceps either. But I don't think your point is quite right, although I see where you are coming from. My bodyfat is higher than yours/stallions yet my arms are lean, so I can drop the BW a fair bit whilst still remaining 17 1/4" or a bit less perhaps. Also, it's harder to add an inch to the arms weight-wise as you progress in BBing. Also again, I work my legs/back hard so that's where a lot of mass is added; BUT I have never attributed my arm growth to working these muscle groups hard.

MM