Beer and Bigger Arms
When I was a personal trainer right out of college I was in need of a bit of extra cash (thank you student loans), so I got a job at a bar on nights and weekends.
The bar served only beer and I had to go through their beer school before I could start. The manager tried to cram the entire history of beer and every little detail about it in our minds in just two weeks.
We learned the difference between an ale and a lager, the difference between roasted and smoked hops, differences in European and American beers (ours have more alcohol and more flavor), and about the popular American breweries.
But the best part was, of course, tasting the beer.
When we tasted the beer we only had about an ounce at a time, but with over 100 different styles and variations within those styles, it added up. For two weeks I had 3-5 beers every morning, and things got a little hairy when we were learning about the high alcohol content of the Belgian beers. As my manager said, “The Belgians like to party.”
After beer school was over and I knew way more about beer than I ever thought I would in my life, I had a deeper appreciation for beer. I knew exactly what I liked and didn’t like, and felt more confident navigating a beer menu.
It turned out that knowing more about the process, flavors and styles actually helped me to enjoy beer more.
That’s what I want you to get out of this post.
I want you to know all all about your triceps; where they are, what they do and why they do it. And then I want you to not only be able to use that knowledge to get bigger and stronger triceps, but also to really enjoy working out, because you have the confidence to know exactly what you are doing and why you are doing it.
Function
Your triceps, or triceps brachii, has one main function: elbow extension, or straightening out your arm. Elbow extension is an important movement: it’s part of all pushing motions, including dips, the shoulder press, and the bench press. The stronger your triceps are, the heavier your bench press will be, so you want to have really strong triceps.
Anatomy
Your triceps have three heads, hence, “tri-ceps.” They are the long head, lateral head, and medial head. In the image here they’re noted as triceps longus, lateral and medius.
The long head starts (the proper term is for start as it’s used here is “originate,” if you’re into anatomy terms), on your shoulder blade, or scapula. The lateral and medial heads both originate on the upper arm bone, or the humerus, and they all converge together to end (proper anatomy term: “insert”) on the ulna, or the upper part of your forearm in your elbow.
Targeting The Different Heads
So now that you know where the three triceps heads start and end at, you might be wondering, “How can I target each head individually?”
You can’t exactly target one or the other, but there are certain things you can do to emphasize one head over the other.
Long Head
The long head of your triceps is the head nearest your body, and is the biggest of the three heads. The special thing about the long head is where it originates. As noted earlier, the long head is the only head that originates on the scapula.
In order to emphasize it, choose exercises where your elbows are straight over your head, like an overhead dumbbell triceps extension.
The reason this emphasizes the long head is because the overhead position stretches the long head more than the other two heads, which causes it to work more.
Lateral Head
You know a dude is jacked when you’re looking at him straight on, and along with his shoulders popping out to the sides, his triceps are popping out, too.
The part of the triceps that’s popping out to the side is the lateral head. Exercises that keep your elbows close to your body, such as the rope pushdown, accentuate this part of the muscle.
Medial Head
The third head of the triceps is the medial head. The medial head lies below the lateral and long heads, and helps with the overall thickness of your triceps.
You can see in the picture here that the medial head and the long head both originate and insert in the same spot. Therefore, it’s tough to isolate the two from each other.
Just like when targeting the lateral head, choosing exercises where your elbows are close to your body will work best for the medial head. Compound exercises like the close grip bench press and dips, and single joint exercises like the rope pushdown will help work out the medial head.
Conclusion
So now that you know where the three heads of the triceps are, and what they do, the only next step is to work them out!
In order to get bigger triceps you need to choose compound exercises, like dips, and single joint exercises, like cable cross extensions. You also need to do exercises where your elbows are above your head, like the overhead dumbbell triceps extension, to emphasize the long head, and exercises where your elbows are closer to your body, like the rope pushdown, to emphasize the lateral and medial heads.
And the most important thing? Work HARD! No amount or variety of workouts are going to get you the gains you want unless you earn it.
Happy lifting!
P.S. for an broader view of how anatomy fits into building your triceps, check out our Ultimate Guide to Building Bigger Triceps.