gettin mad p1ssed

[dointhingsright]

i know i am not supposed to work out one body part everyday but thats what it had come down to. i want my biceps huge. I have read the guide to bulking up and im following and it only seems to be getting me a little gut! i work out everyday and im am getting wicked mad that my arms wont get any bigger. i curl and do push-ups for my biceps and it nothing works. help me out here before I resolve this with d-bol.

 

[daniel]

Originally posted by dointhingsright
i curl and do push-ups for my biceps

Everyday? If so, they're overtrained! You're not dointhingsright! (haha, get it? ) The Guide to bulking up clearly says that

5. Each body part is trained once a week.

Sorry in case I misunderstood..

 

[Drug_L0rd]

why the hell are you doing push-ups for biceps?

you might be over training them, or undertraining.

pick about three exercises and do maybe 4 sets of 8-10 reps of each.

 

[Lt dan]

push ups WILL build up your biceps. they did mine, but i think i did them improperly for too long (i think i didnt go up all the way) then you get this softball looking thing on your arm

 

[K-Daddy]

Yeah those damn pushups...a PUSHING motion...will really hit your bi's. Along with all the other pushing motions that hit your bicep, which is on the inside of a joint and controls most pulling motions and has virtually no effect whatsoever on pushing movements.

 

[Metaphor]

Uhm..biceps do get worked when you do tricep exercises. Same principal as when powerlifters train their lats heavily to increase their benches. Though..the effect is certainly less then using a well thought out bicep routine.

 

[Lt dan]

yeah, pushups do work your biceps. or maybe the magical bicep fairy came to me at night and touched my arms. seein as how in the past three years the only exercise ive done invalving my arms was pushups and my bicep is super defined

 

[misunderstood??]

I am wondering about your routine you are following, anyways I STRONGLY suggest you read the sticky at the top of the forum, GUIDE TO BULKING UP, by DIESEL. That post was by far the best post I've seen posted here on the subject of gaining size adn strength.

 

[Ofus]

Originally posted by dointhingsright
i know i am not supposed to work out one body part everyday but thats what it had come down to. i want my biceps huge. I have read the guide to bulking up and im following and it only seems to be getting me a little gut! i work out everyday and im am getting wicked mad that my arms wont get any bigger. i curl and do push-ups for my biceps and it nothing works. help me out here before I resolve this with d-bol.

You're right, push-ups can work your arms fairly well. But that's only gonna hit your triceps, not your biceps.

When I first started working out I only did push-ups, sit-ups, and curls. My arms were VERY slow to gain muscle in the beginning. That changed bigtime when I started:

1) eating more protein
2) doing less reps w/more weight, and
3) only working my biceps once a week.

 

[Lt dan]

oh yeah. when i said that stuff about push ups will build you bis. they will definitely. but by all means i wouldnt use that to build them. you should do curls and shlt right? im just saying that they will build muscle on the biceps

 

[Shiftkey]

You probably should worry about your tris more if you want big arms. They're about 2/3 of your arm. Bis are just 1/3.

 

[Drug_L0rd]

oh ma god.

PUSH-ups uses the PUSHing muscles, i.e. triceps and chest

the biceps get worked because of the eccentric motion of the pushup, they are not directly worked out.

besides, pushups are not exactly what i'd call hardcore ways to build muscle. hahaha

everyone gets that pump in the biceps from pushups but your biceps are not being majorly worked.


say what you want to say.

 

[marqZAL]

Push ups can not directly build your BI's. The biceps act as a stablizing muscle as you lower your body down on the push up. Now pull up's on the hand will strengthen your bi's.

 

[Lt dan]

have any of yall non push up advocates actually done them in your routine for any length of time

 

[Alpha male Female Catcher]

I believe that in order to increase the size of a muscle you have to increase its strength (and I am certainly not alone in believing this). The two go together (for a given individual, that is). For a host of reasons one guy with slightly smaller muscles may be stronger than another guy with slightly bigger muscles but any given individual will become stronger than he was before if he increases his muscle size and vica versa.

To increase the strength of a muscle you need to be lifting at least around 70% of your maximum possible for that muscle.
Low reps (generally 6-8 and sometimes even 3-4, in any case no more than about 10 reps) with heavy weights is what builds big muscles not a high number of reps with light weight. (High reps with light weight will improve your endurance - by increasing cardiovascular efficiency and may also be beneficial for weight loss - so it is not without value, still it is not how to build massive muscles).

The problem with push ups is that you aren't lifting that heavy a weight when doing a push up (thats why you can do 50 or even 100 of them). When you do a push up you aren't even lifting your own body weight but rather about 60% of it, the other 40% is supported by your feet. (Get in the push-up position on a pair of scales to see just how much percent of your mass is being supported by your arms, unless you're very top heavy it won't be more than about 60%).

So if you weigh say 150lb, doing a pushup will be roughly similar to doing a 90lb bench press. Now for a beginner an 90lb bench press may indeed be heavy enough to stimulate muscle development (because it may be within about 70% of his maximum strength) and so he may indeed find it a descent exercise which will lead him to see an improvement in musclularity.

However most people can with training bench at least their own body weight and so the 150lb individual will (if he trains right) eventually be able to bench 150lb and then 200lb and maybe even eventually 300lb. Once he's benching more than about 130lb our 150lb guy will no longer find benching 90lb (or doing push ups) to have any benefit in increasing muscle size or strength.
The bottom line is that most people within a year or two (if not a couple of months) develop their muscles to a point where push ups simply are of no more benfit in regard to increasing muscle size or strength.

Now of course a guy who starts out body building weighing 150lb will increase his weight (maybe to 200lb after a couple of years) and hence be lifting more when he does a push up. Never the less he will still never be lifting more than about 60% (and certainly never more than 100%) of his body weight and so still won't find push ups usefull for increasing muscle mass (beyond a certain point).

That is to keep increasing muscle size and strength you need to keep increasing weight lifted/benched and as push ups do not allow you to do this there is a limit to how strong pushups by themselves will allow you to get.

 

[Phrozen]

If you wanna gain mass do mass gaining exercises. Pushups and curls alone will take years perhaps even forever to do what a complete regiment can do for you in just a few months.