It Took 20 Years To Figure This Out
This is a training tip, but I'm posting here because...well, everybody's here and everybody here trains. So...
WANT BIGGER BICEPS? DO'S and DON'TS.
After a lifetime of using every conceivable curling movement it finally occured to me (about 2 years ago) that anytime the elbow is positioned in front of the body, it is less effective than when the elbow is paralell or, preferably, behind the body. So why do any other curl? This is what I mean:
Do a curl on a preacher bench. Once the forearm is at a 90 degree angle, there is no longer stress on the bicep. You can feel it. The muscle will be relaxed since there is no gravitational force on it. You are missing out on the peak contraction on the movement. The reacher curl essentially works the brachaialus.
Okay, how about a concentration curl where the tension is continual throughout the movement? Still no good. The arm is braced against a pad or your leg and it will allow leverage -- once again reducing the muscle building process.
Allrighty then. How about NOT bracing it and just doing concentration curls free style? (ala' Aah-nuld in Pumping Iron) Nope, it's still less effecaceous because now the deltoid will assist. You can fell that too. The shoulder will be tensed throughout the movement.
Only when the leverage and the deltoid are removed from the equation can the bicep work completely. That makes steep incline curls the ultimate biceps builder. (As a matter of fact, Steve Reeves did ONLY incline curls for biceps and I think he knew something a lot of us didn't). When doing standing barbell curls, the elbows must stay BACK in order to utilize the complete range of motion for the biceps. Of course, you can't lift as much, because it's harder -- but that's the idea. You want to impress the guy next to you, or do you want to grow?
There are a few other tricks, but I'll save that for another time.
Sure, there will always be the guy who just throws around some barbell curls with lousy form and has killer guns. (Aaron Maddron told me his arms went to 19" after 6 months of training, the rat bastard.) But that's not me, and I'll bet it's not a lot of you. If you haven't been getting the most from your bicep workouts, keep this rule in mind. After a while you'll realize, anytime the elbow is forwrd, it's a "half" a curl.
It took most of my training life to realize what is basically a simple law of physics.