How to Build Huge Arms
By Jason Ferruggia
While watching football yesterday with a bunch of friends the most prevalent comments throughout the entire day were something along the lines of, “Damn, that guy’s got some huge arms!” Every time a massive set of guns came across the screen someone made mention of it, because, let’s face it; big arms are impressive. It also explains why one of the most frequent email questions I get is about how to build huge arms.
First of all, if you aren’t doing squats, deadlifts, chin ups and heavy pressing in your current program then you shame on you. You have no business seeking advice on how to build huge arms when you aren’t already laying the foundation and following a properly designed muscle building program that includes all the big, compound exercises mentioned above. If you are putzing around with flyes, leg extensions, and lateral raise machines, simply adding in some work for the biceps and triceps isn’t really going to do much. You need to overload the body with massive poundages on the big mass building exercises in order to force overall body growth. When you have been doing nothing but that for a year or two, then, and only then, should you consider focusing more directly on arm work.
Until that point you will get plenty of arm growth from chin ups, rows and presses. When you get stronger on those exercises and your bodyweight increases you will grow everywhere. In fact, a beginner should be able to pack two to three inches on his arms without ever doing a direct triceps exercise or any type of curl whatsoever.
After you have done that for a year or so and gained a significant amount of strength and bodyweight you can then start to focus on the arms directly if you like. Everyone who asks about how to build arms usually wants to learn some fancy wacked out exercise that no ones ever heard of in the hopes that it will pack on two inches overnight. The reality is that such an exercise doesn’t exist.
The best biceps exercises today are the same one that Arnold used back in the 70’s; barbell curls, dumbbell curls, hammer curls and incline curls. For triceps there are no exercises that can beat the close grip bench press (both full and partial range) and parallel bar dip. Heavy extensions when done properly and safely can also be an awesome triceps building exercise. These exercises have been helping thousands of lifters build huge arms for decades and can do the same for you.
The key, the most important thing that no one else wants to tell you about, is that you have to get brutally strong on these exercises and constantly be adding weight at every opportunity you get. There is no secret super set or drop set system or some fancy combination of exercises that will build arms any faster than just using the basic exercises and dramatically increasing the amount of weight you can lift on them.
If you can barbell curl 65 pounds for ten today and a year from now can 105 for ten doesn’t it stand to reason that your arms would be significantly bigger? What about if you can close grip bench 135 for eight reps right now and worked your way up to 225 for ten by this time next year? Of course your triceps will be significantly bigger if you did that. And that right there is the only way to guarantee consistent growth. With a constantly changing rotation of exercises and set and rep parameters it’s awfully hard to get consistently stronger. And you really never know if what you are doing is working or now.
So that’s the secret about how to build huge arms; get big and strong on the basics first, then add in some direct arm work and do the same on those exercises, consistently, while eating a ton and getting a lot of rest time and your arms will be bigger than you ever imagined.
Return to the muscle building home page.
