THE BEST EXERCISES TO BUILD BIGGER BICEP PEAKS

big bicep peak

Search the web for information on how to build bigger bicep peaks and you’ll find no shortage of articles, videos, and forum posts outlining different arm exercises, training techniques, and bicep workouts to help you carve out upper arms that really “pop”.

They’ll tell you to place your arms at this exact angle… using this specific cable attachment… for this number of sets and reps… in this particular sequence… and those tall, towering bicep peaks will magically reveal themselves.

But what’s the real truth of the matter here? Well, it’s pretty simple actually…

The Best Exercises To Build Bigger Bicep Peaks

bicep short head and long head

The biceps are a two-headed muscle consisting of the short head (the smaller, inner portion closest to your chest) and the long head (the larger, outer portion).

Building bigger bicep peaks essentially comes down to adding as much size as possible to the long head, as this is the portion of the muscle that stands the tallest between the two heads.

Exercises that specifically target the long head of the biceps will be any curling movement where the hands are in a fully supinated position.

This includes basic barbell curls, cable curls, dumbbell curls, and even certain types of machine curls – any curling exercise where your palms are facing up throughout the entire lift.

bicep peak exercise

It might sound overly simplistic, but when it comes to proper exercise selection for building the tallest bicep peaks possible, that’s basically all you need to know.

This is because although you can certainly influence the overall size of the long head of your biceps, there’s nothing you can do to influence its shape.

Switching from one exercise to the other or performing your curls using different angles or rep ranges is NOT going to allow you to specifically target the “middle” portion of the long head and somehow make it “taller” or stand out more than the rest of the muscle.

The specific “peak” you achieve on your biceps is mostly a matter of muscle-building genetics and simply depends upon the pre-determined shape and insertion of your bicep muscle.

huge biceps

Those with a shorter bicep tie-in (where the bicep muscle inserts higher up on their arm and further from their elbow) will tend to have a higher bicep peak, while those with a longer bicep tie-in (where the muscle inserts closer to the elbow) will tend to have a flatter bicep peak.

Ultimately, obsessing over building bigger bicep peaks is really just a waste of time and effort. Your ONLY real focus should be on gaining more overall biceps size in general through proper workout structure and technique.

From there, the long head of your biceps will naturally grow larger and taller. Whatever specific “peak” you end up with is beyond your control.

In fact, there’s really no need to even worry about specifically targeting the long head of your biceps either. This will automatically happen when you train your biceps using basic curling exercises anyway.

Again, just focus on overall bicep development as a whole.

Here are two great resources I’d highly recommend checking out in order to structure the best bicep workout possible and to learn how to execute your curls with maximum effectiveness…

How To Build Biceps – This post outlines proper exercise selection, workout structure, sets, reps etc.

How To Do Bicep Curls – This post outlines 5 awesome tips to help you execute your curls with maximum effectiveness.

If you’re finding that bicep curls are a painful movement, check out my article on how to reduce wrist and forearm pain on bicep curls.

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