Are skullcrushers & cable pushdowns good enough for triceps?

[tatersgontater]

i dont like doing dips or cg bench press, which are supposedly the best mass builders for triceps.

is doing decline skullcrushers & cable pushdowns good enough to build triceps well? i like these two exercises the best.

[THElabCHIMP]

It depends on the rest of your training.

If you do a lot of pressing, it may be enough.

There's only one way to find out though. Do what you want to do, and if your triceps, or a specific tricep head happens to lag behind, you know you need to change something.

[AwakeningDragon]

Like you I dislike doing CG BP(wrist reasons) and dips (rotator/shoulder reasons I go to deep sometimes).Assuming your doing 3+ sets for both those exercises and a couple of bench press, shoulder press etc. in combination then yeah. Another tricep exercise I find useful is overhead dumbbell extension.

[gBeuten]

There are still tons of other tricep exercises that you can try maybe you like them more! Just have a google or download a fitness app.

[Dan3317]

I'd try out some different overhead extension movements and see which one works for you, they really give a different feel than skulls/pushdowns

[kanis999]

Unless you're on a bro split (most people shouldn't be), you will get plenty of tricep stimulation from a compound press and one tricep isolation movement per workout, performed twice or more times per week. If you are on a bro split, as long as your 'tricep day' has a press in it, I'd still say that press + 2 tricep isolation movements is plenty. I too recommend an overhead tricep isolation for the often neglected long head.

[banjoman23]

Unless you're on a bro split (most people shouldn't be), you will get plenty of tricep stimulation from a compound press and one tricep isolation movement per workout, performed twice or more times per week.

^^^ This

[BFJ]

ya i tend to agree with the last couple posters.........the exact exercises you pick are probably going to be less important than the overall strategy and programming. are you hitting the triceps with enough frequency and volume to accomplish what u desire? how much volume and frequency? dunno, going depend and you will have to experiment. but those aspects and just general consistent progressive overload are going to very likely be more important than exact exercise selection. or i would add one other thing. from some research i have reviewed on my podcast it does appear varying exercise selection is important to consistent gains. so from that respect exercise selection has a place, but moreso not from a "these are the magical 3 exercises" standpoint, but from a standpoint of are you regularly exposing your body to conditions where there's a sizeable runway for growth or are you just endlessly beating a dead horse with the same exercise selection and programming.

[BlackEyes14]

There is internet fitness dogma and then there is what I see out in real life in the gyms.

A lot of the gyms I have been in have lots of guys in there just training for mass/aesthetics, and they do an assload of isolations for an assload of volume and they get results.

If literally all you want is jacked triceps, yes, that will probably work. I wouldn't be surprised if there was some strength carryover to your presses, but the point I'm trying to make here is that plenty of guys in gyms I have been in looked great and had huge horseshoe triceps but couldn't press jack chit in any direction, while my triceps look like trash in comparison and I can OHP bodyweight. These people can't OHP my curl, but they have huge cut up cannonball shoulders and I don't. There is a lesson in that. Unfortunately part of the lesson is that a lot of the fitness info that is commonly preached on the internet is pure bullcrap and does not line up with experience at all, but for your purposes the silver lining is that yes, skulls and pushdowns probably really will give you jacked triceps.

The "broscience" on this topic is actually correct: strength training and mass training are legitimately different. Yes strength training will get you mass, but it's my estimate that I would have to literally double a lot of my lifts to look as jacked as some of these weaker guys who just train for mass.

[kanis999]

There is internet fitness dogma and then there is what I see out in real life in the gyms.

A lot of the gyms I have been in have lots of guys in there just training for mass/aesthetics, and they do an assload of isolations for an assload of volume and they get results.

If literally all you want is jacked triceps, yes, that will probably work. I wouldn't be surprised if there was some strength carryover to your presses, but the point I'm trying to make here is that plenty of guys in gyms I have been in looked great and had huge horseshoe triceps but couldn't press jack chit in any direction, while my triceps look like trash in comparison and I can OHP bodyweight. These people can't OHP my curl, but they have huge cut up cannonball shoulders and I don't. There is a lesson in that. Unfortunately part of the lesson is that a lot of the fitness info that is commonly preached on the internet is pure bullcrap and does not line up with experience at all, but for your purposes the silver lining is that yes, skulls and pushdowns probably really will give you jacked triceps.

The "broscience" on this topic is actually correct: strength training and mass training are legitimately different. Yes strength training will get you mass, but it's my estimate that I would have to literally double a lot of my lifts to look as jacked as some of these weaker guys who just train for mass.

If we're speaking purely from anecdotal experience (that's what your post does after all), then I can argue that my own anecdotes contradict what you're saying. From my vantage point, strength and mass training don't produce drastically different results. I have never in my entire life seen a massive strong looking guy who isn't actually strong.

I have an explanation for what you're observing, but it can't be discussed on this forum ;p

[BlackEyes14]

If we're speaking purely from anecdotal experience (that's what your post does after all), then I can argue that my own anecdotes contradict what you're saying. From my vantage point, strength and mass training don't produce drastically different results. I have never in my entire life seen a massive strong looking guy who isn't actually strong.

I have an explanation for what you're observing, but it can't be discussed on this forum ;p

Everyone has their own anecdotes, but only my observations are important to me. Everybody has to come up with their own theory of reality.

It is fairly likely that the people I see are on jungle juice, however. No disagreement there.