Triceps account for roughly two-thirds of your upper arm mass. So why in the name of Arnold do you spend so much more time blasting your biceps? If your true aim is to start using more tape measure around your arms, then you’re going to need to attack your tri’s with greater intensity. And once you’ve made that commitment, it’s time to refine your strategy.
Our expert panel offers its collective wisdom on coaxing the most growth out of this muscle group. But you can forget about hearing another cozy prescription for a few extra sets of pressdowns – these guys are going to help you push your triceps to their breaking point so you can get the bulbous, sickly-striated finish that you’ve always wanted.
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Have you ever seen John Cena’s triceps? Well, if you haven’t, “tiny” is not a word that would be used to describe them. And though Cena is one of the hardest working men in show biz, he’s taken a fair share of his cues from WWE coach Rob MacIntyre, CSCS. When it comes to triceps specifically, MacIntyre likes to have his clients slow things down a bit.
“I like to use slow reps when training triceps especially on the eccentric portion of the lift,” he says. “Most of the time, the athletes I work with are training triceps explosively as part of other movements. However, when it is time to be pretty and get the big guns, I like to slow the reps down for isolations exercises. It is easy to develop tendonitis by trying to use fast, explosive heavy movements during isolation work due to the stress on the elbow joint. A triceps extension with a 5-10 second eccentric phase changes the game in terms of getting a pump. If you’re new to this type of training, be careful as the triceps tend to give out suddenly.”
TRY THIS: Lead off your triceps routine with 3-4 sets of triceps pressdowns or skullcrushers. Select a weight you’d use for 10-12 reps but use a 5-10 second negative on each rep – followed by an explosive concentric, or positive lift – and shoot for eight solid reps.
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| close grip bench presses |
2. GET MECHANICAL
Josh Bryant, MFS, PES, CSCS, is a performance-first kinda guy. As such, he sees the triceps as a primarily as a supporting player in pressing movements. But when big presses lead to mind-boggling poundages and a superhero-like torso, training them hard makes sense..
“One of my favorite triceps tactics involves using mechanical advantage on the close-grip bench press with boards,” he says. “To do this, complete five, full range of motion close grip bench presses. Don’t rack the weight. Hold the bar pressed out at full extension. Next, have your spotter place one board lengthwise on your torso, so that the board runs from your belly to the middle of your chest. Repeat the exercise for another five reps, lowering the barbell until it touches the board. After each five reps, your partner will add one board to the stack. Little by little, this shortens your range of motion, working your triceps in different ways until you finish with four boards stacked on your chest. That’s 25 reps. It’s also just one set.” Bryant likes using this tactic because, he says, it combines aspects of rest-pause training, partial reps, cheating and drop sets.
TRY THIS: Bryant recommends using the system outlined above with your 10-5-rep max weight for 3-5 sets, with three minutes of rest between sets. This can be a stand-alone triceps workout, or you can follow it up with 1-2 isolation exercises for a more intense session.
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| tricep pressdown |
3. FINISH WITH FAILURE
If your routine already consists of a challenging battery of close-grip bench presses, dips and skullcrushers, you’re on the right track. But how you finish is just as important as how you start. David Sandler, MS, CSCS, believes in getting a skin-stretching pump because of its effect on protein synthesis (read: it increases it).
“I love hitting the triceps pressdown at the end of the routine and doing drops on each set and finishing with some close-grip push-ups,” he says. “I try to hit eight reps on the pressdown set working at max, then the I drop about 25 percent and continue until I cannot get another full rep on my own. Immediately after, I drop to the ground, keep my hands no wider than shoulder-width, and bang out as many pushups as possible. I give myself a generous 90-second rest and do the whole thing again for a second and then third set. Your tri’s get so jacked with a pump, when you leave the gym, everyone knows it.”
TRY THIS: After 3-4 exercises worth of heavy triceps work, wrap your day up at the triceps pressdown station with three supersets combining pressdowns and close-grip push-ups. On the pressdowns, use a weight that brings about failure at eight reps, then drop the weight by 20-30 percent and continue on to failure once more before hitting the deck for a set of close-grip push-ups to failure. Rest 90 seconds and repeat for three total sets.
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| lying dumbbell triceps |
5. VOLUMIZE
Why do 10 reps when 20 will do? This is a favorite refrain of the high-volume training crowd, which believes that muscles thrive on high-rep, high-set challenges. Justin Grinnell, CSCS, isn’t so single-minded in his approach but thinks that “more is better” is a philosophy that your triceps can benefit from.
“My favorite training intensity technique for triceps are high-rep supersets,” he says. “Since the triceps get a ton of heavy work from overhead presses, dips and bench presses, I like to get as much blood into the muscle as possible with isolation movements done back-to-back. Doing this will tap into some other muscle fibers that were not hit during the heavy work. I like lying dumbbell triceps extensions superset with overhead rope extensions for four sets of 15 reps. Make sure to keep continuous tension – don’t pause at the bottom of any rep. You want to force as much blood into the muscle as possible, and create as much time under tension as possible to maximize muscle tissue breakdown.”
TRY THIS: Finish off your next triceps workout with an isolation-themed superset. For max results, as Grinnell describes, try pairing two exercises that hit different parts of your triceps by varying arm positioning. An overhead extension paired with a pressdown, for example. Grinnell suggests four sets of 15 for each superset.
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