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Can it work in some cases?
There is this black guy at my gym who is in there every day doing multiple sets of barbell and dumbbell curls, he does some lat pulldown but rarely works on anything else. The other day I saw his arms and they were fairly well built with vascularity...certainly bigger than some of the guys who do deads and squats...so can endless curls really build big guns in some cases? or is it just a waste of time?
KeepSquatting.
If your goal is nice arms, then it would do you better than doing [I]just[/I] squats or deads.
Its a waste of time. He's clearly miss-informed about training and will overtrain those muscles like no tomorrow.
[QUOTE=KeepSquatting;497575241]Can it work in some cases?
There is this black guy at my gym who is in there every day doing multiple sets of barbell and dumbbell curls, he does some lat pulldown but rarely works on anything else. The other day I saw his arms and they were fairly well built with vascularity...certainly bigger than some of the guys who do deads and squats...so can endless curls really build big guns in some cases? or is it just a waste of time?[/QUOTE]
lmao at "black" (no racist)
no you can build big biceps but remember tricepsmake up most of the muscle mass of the upper arm. just doing curls and not working anything else is kind of retarded.
He probably supp's himself up with a lot of protein. But I don't know... but I do know that it's not good to work your biceps (do curls) everyday, and it's not as effective as "blasting" your biceps every 2 or 3 days. Your muscles grow when they have time to repair themselves, which is usually after a day or two. He probably had big arms before, or just doesn't really work at them hard enough on days that he's not specifically targeting his bi's.
[QUOTE=Aeries;497576791]Its a waste of time. He's clearly miss-informed about training and will overtrain those muscles like no tomorrow.[/QUOTE]
^ This.
When I started I wanted good arms so bad I trained them HARD every other day. Incredible gains. I ate well, slept well and was 19 years old. These are all factors. The way you recover is really going to dictate your plan. It's like this for almost all facets of training
In my gym I've noticed that the people who come in to do tons of curls and triceps kickbacks and little else are predominantly very skinny. However the ones who squat and deadlift heavy (among other things) are the ones with the big arms.
[QUOTE=matjusm;497583391]In my gym I've noticed that the people who come in to do tons of curls and triceps kickbacks and little else are predominantly very skinny. However the ones who squat and deadlift heavy (among other things) are the ones with the big arms.[/QUOTE]
Not at my gym lol. Cuz I MYSELF am the only one who squats and deadlifts. lol.
The guys with the most freakin ginormous arms do curls all the time (edit - so do the scrawnies). Personally i think u will get the biggest arm growth by doing lots of big compounds and throwing in some curls too. Just don't be a retard and do 25 sets 7 days a week.
Error comes into play when one forgets to factor in the most important variable in bodybuilding (imho) the diet.
Regardless of how you break down the muscles if you do not have adequate rest and food you will not see growth.
Also remember that illusion is a big factor. One with 16' arms and no back/chest/shoulders will appear to have much larger arms then one with all of the above.
[QUOTE=chazzy1864;497576601]If your goal is nice arms, then it would do you better than doing [I]just[/I] squats or deads.[/QUOTE]
this
He is doing what is commonly referred to as "Ego Boosters"
Just ignore him. :)
honestly everyone is different.
I know this one kid, 18 years old. Started off def. a little fat, but not like obese or anything.
kid start working out in his garage. I kid you not he does biceps 4 times a week.
we all make fun of him for it, but the kids arms are ****ing huge and cut now.
would I ever try it? **** no..
but everyone is different. a lot of luck involved in working out
[QUOTE=KeepSquatting;497575241]Can it work in some cases? [/quote]
Yes, of course.
The body's muscles respond to stress. If stressed, they adapt. They're stressed by being asked to do more than they did before.
The biceps brachii only know about contracting against resistance. They don't know whether the resistance is coming from a curl or a chinup or a row or whatever.
Unquestionably, curls will build your biceps, provided that you always do more than you did before, more weight or more reps or more sets. The only question is whether you'll have a balanced development, will you look like Johnny Bravo or a real human being instead. So your curling friend has great arms - what's the rest of his body look like?
The reason to do compounds isn't that they give you bigger individual muscles, but simply that they're overall more taxing on the body - good for fat loss - and more time-efficient. To work biceps you could curl, to work rear delts and upper back you could do reverse flies, and to work forearms you could wrist curl. Or you could just do a row or chin, and work all three muscles in one exercise.
As well, compounds are easier to progress on. Many gyms have fixed dumbells with 5lb jumps between them. When you're using just one muscle group an extra 5lbs or an extra rep or two is bloody hard. When you're using a few muscles it's not so hard.
[quote=matjusm]In my gym I've noticed that the people who come in to do tons of curls and triceps kickbacks and little else are predominantly very skinny. However the ones who squat and deadlift heavy (among other things) are the ones with the big arms.[/quote]
Lastly, because doing compounds is more taxing, it requires greater mental toughness. If you watch, you'll notice that the guys who just bench and curl tend to not add on weight and reps as quickly as they could, and they spend a lot of time between sets just chatting to their mates or hitting on some cardio bunny. The people who squat and deadlift tend to go for more intense workouts, and are more serious about it all. The curlers interrupt a set to chat, the squatters interrupt a chat to squat.
A tip from way back in the day. Take some weight you can normally squat 10 times. Now do it 20 times. You can do it by pausing at the top of each rep and taking a few deep breaths. By about rep 13-14 you'll want to stop. Around 15-17 you'll be convinced that you can't go on, you'll get down into the hole and not come out. After that you're in pain and you're getting tunnel vision, maybe your legs are trembling. Once you rack the weight, you sure as sht won't feel like chatting to anyone, you'll just want to lie down, that hard rubber floor will seem like soft down to you.
You simply can't do that sort of thing with curls. You need heavy compound exercises to do it. If you can handle a 20 rep breathing squat, you're simply more serious about your training and will approach it with more intensity than your curling buddy.
If you're more serious about something and work harder, quite naturally you'll get better results. Same with everything.
I guess it comes down to what ur goals are, if you wanna just have big a** arms and no strength anywhere else in ur body, do like he does. I usually go hard with big weight once or twice a week for arms making sure I do Bi's and Tri's and switch up the exercises each week, but I never understood guys like that why have huge arms if the rest of your body is too weak to carry 'em LOL!!
[QUOTE=KeepSquatting;497575241]Can it work in some cases?
There is this black guy at my gym who is in there every day doing multiple sets of barbell and dumbbell curls, he does some lat pulldown but rarely works on anything else. The other day I saw his arms and they were fairly well built with vascularity...certainly bigger than some of the guys who do deads and squats...so can endless curls really build big guns in some cases? or is it just a waste of time?[/QUOTE]
[QUOTE=KeepSquatting;497575241]Can it work in some cases?
There is this black guy at my gym who is in there every day doing multiple sets of barbell and dumbbell curls, he does some lat pulldown but rarely works on anything else. The other day I saw his arms and they were fairly well built with vascularity...certainly bigger than some of the guys who do deads and squats...so can endless curls really build big guns in some cases? or is it just a waste of time?[/QUOTE]
Tons of ego tripping kids do this at my gym, could care less how much they can curl standing nearly snapping their backs in half. What it really boils down to is how much you can put up on the benchpress.
What was his workout plan like before he started doing that? What is he training for? How long will he be training like that? What weill he do next?
All of those are important questions to ask. A lot of times, I think we see other people in the gym training and assume they always have and always will do the same thing without any real understanding of the purpose of their choice in training style. We assume they have the same goals as us and that they must not know about the bb.com-approved way.
Maybe that guy trained "properly" in the theoretical sense but found himself lacking in one area and is experimenting. Maybe he's doing this fora few weeks and will move on to something else soon. Maybe he's training for a sport? Maybe he just enjoys the hell out of curls and doesn't really care about impressing the bb.com forumites or a panel of bodybuilding judges? In any event, some people respond better to high volume training than to high intensity training. We find these things out through trial and error. If you're a volume kind of guy, then maybe his approach will work for you.
OP: its simply the fact that people who do compounds are more devoted and willing to put more work into their body so they are usually going to be bigger overall than someone who only works certain areas..its not that deads and squats are going make your arms huge <--not open for debate
certainly aswell as other factors previously mentioned
Different strokes for different folks. To me doing tons of sets of bicep curls is ridiculous. To others loading up a bunch of weight on a barbell and trying to lift it off the floor with all your might for one rep is ridiculous.