Tricep Exercises – Do you need them?

If you have come looking for some tricep exercises then scroll down to near the bottom of the post, in this post I am going to voice my opinions why I don’t think isolating the triceps is very necessary.

Triceps are probably one of the most used muscles in the body, they are used in almost every chest exercise and most shoulder exercises. It can really be said that triceps and chest are a complimenting muscle group, and as your chest gets bigger your triceps will too. Now here is why I think you probably don’t need to do tricep exercises very often. Let’s say you are having a chest day and you go through your routine of bench press, incline bench, dumbell press, dumbells flies, press ups, dips etc. You will notice that 5 out of the 6 exercises listed there will all work your triceps. Dips especially, if you dip at the end of your chest routine you will undoubtely have your triceps fail before your pectorals.

You could argue that dips are in fact a tricep exercise, however they also work the lower pectoral and don’t isolate the tricep just like the other chest exercises. If dips are not part of your chest routine already then you have to put them in, it’s the exercise that bodybuilders of the past religiously performed.

This should lead after a solid chest workout, to your triceps being unable to really push anymore weight, so seeking further exercise on them is pointless. Lets not forget this is only the chest workout, if you have seperated you workouts into, legs, chest, back, shoulders then you still have a shoulder workout to come.

Now most of the shoulder workouts require you to also use your triceps, with the military press and arnold press as well as dumbell press all using the shoulders. The exceptions of course are the lateral raises and shrugs. Not so much work as with the chest but still enough to build them.

With all your exercises in each of the chest and shoulders working the triceps, you can be assured that they are going to worked sufficiently to ensure you get stronger in unison. In other words, building your triceps further will not give you any advantage in your other exercises.

With all the being said if you need to build your triceps for whatever reason here are some great routines that will do so:

Top 3 Tricep Exercises

1. Flat bench, EZ-bar tricep extensions – Using a bench and an EZ-bar with your grip in the bends, keep your elbows fixed vertically and flex at the joint, the weight should come down just above your head. Then extend your arms until they are vertical above your body and repeat.
2. Kneeling cable tricep extension – Grip the cable and with the tricep rope attachement and kneel down and lean slightly forward. For best results you should be facing away from the equipment. Extend your arms forward working your triceps.
3. Overhand grip tricep pushdown – Using a bar attachment, grip the bar with hands shoulder width apart, lower the bar until your arms are fully extended. Then elevate the bar until your arms are just off 90 degrees when you then extend your arms again.

So there are some very effective exercises for working triceps if you find your shoulder and chest routine just doesn’t cut it. If you want video demonstrations on any of these and until I get my Youtube channel up and running visit this site.

Please ‘like’ and +1 this post using the buttons below, and leave any comments in the comments I would love to hear your thoughts on the matter.