Lie Back for an Arm-Pumping Biceps Finisher
If you’re looking for a better finishing exercise to provide a powerful pump to your biceps, one that stands out from the others is a move that requires you to lie on your back.
The cable curl may not get the name recognition as other isolation movements—preacher curls and spider curls still get most of the arm attention—but this underrated exercise can challenge your biceps in ways the more popular curl variations are unable to match, according to Men's Health fitness director Ebenezer Samuel, C.S.C.S.
There’s nothing wrong both those muscle-pumping mainstays, however both spider and preacher curls have certain movement limitations, most notably the limited ability to provide a dominant squeeze at the top of the lift. They also prevent your mid-back stabilizers from firing during the exercises, which can lead to your shoulders being compromised and placed in awkward positions, which can result in injury.
The lying cable curl, on the other hand, fixes some of those issues. How? By getting plenty of cable resistance at the top of every rep, each contraction becomes more challenging when doing these, giving you that extra pump you're looking for in an isolation move.
And also, because you’re lying on a bench (you could also do these lying the floor), Samuel says you’ll be getting plenty of posterior feedback, alerting you to keep your mid-back and shoulders nice and tight—and most importantly, safe.
How to Do the Lying Cable Curl
●Lie down on a flat bench parallel with the floor (or you could even perform these on the floor).
●Once you’re set up, the lying cable curl is pretty much identical in execution as most other curls. Pull the bar toward you while squeezing your biceps at the top of the movement.
●But from this lying position, you’re also going to focus on squeezing your glutes and driving your shoulders into the bench—similar to how you would during a bench press.
●Another item to keep your focus on is your elbow positioning. Eventually your elbows are going to want to drift back—don’t allow that. By keeping your upper arms perpendicular to the ground, you’ll be able to keep all the tension on getting that biceps squeeze as you pull toward your forehead.
A few sets is all it should take to see how the lying cable curl is the king of all biceps finishing moves. Aim for three sets of 10 to 12 reps here, and be sure to chase that squeeze on each and every rep.
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