Complete Guide to Arm Development | with Dennis & Evan
Complete Guide to Arm Development
MD's Gun Show with Dennis Wolf & Evan Centopani
Nothing says that you’re in shape more loudly and clearly than a set of think, massive arms popping out of your shirtsleeves or protruding from a tank top. There’s no doubt about it— arms are the most popular body part among bodybuilders and regular lifters all over the world. Who better to give you the lowdown on firing up your guns and talk about arm training than these two enormously popular athletes?
Do you believe in training arms on their own in a training session or withn other bodyparts?
Wolf: Well, that’s up to the person. I don’t train arms alone in the off-season, but once I start getting ready for a contest, I do. For me it’s mainly because I don’t have as much energy when I’m dieting, so I don’t want to train more than one body part at a workout.
Evan: I’ve never felt it made sense for me to come into the gym and just train arms. It wouldn’t be an efficient use of my time and energy when I have other areas that need more attention.
Do you think more guys would see better gains in their arms from focusing less on tons of arm work and putting greater emphasis on heavy back, chest and shoulder training?
Wolf: Not really. As I was just saying, you might get some stimulation in the arms from those other workouts, but I doubt it’s going to be anywhere near enough to make them grow. I just believe the arms should get the same attention and intensity as all the other muscle groups. I don’t really buy into the whole thing about arms being a small muscle group so you shouldn’t do much for them. You need to work them hard and directly if you want them to be the best they can be.
Evan: I agree with Dennis to a point, but at the same time I beg to differ. If you really hammer the heavy basics like deadlifts, bench presses, dips, barbell rows and military presses, your arms can’t help but grow. You have to go through the arms to hit the chest, back and shoulders in the compound movements, and these are exercises where you are handling hundreds of pounds. For a month or more after a contest, I usually will only have three training days where I just do chest, back and legs once a week. My arms have actually made gains from that. One thing a lot of people aren’t always aware of is that the arms can get overtrained and you stop seeing gains unless you back off them for a little while. Most guys never try it because not working arms seems like an insane way to help them start growing again, but it would probably work for a lot of people.
We typically preach perfect form in training articles, but in pro training videos we often see guys using form that’s far from ideal. These are the best built men on the planet. What do you deduce from that? Would you say that this development happens in spite of the imperfect form, or is it possible that slightly looser form is actually better for stimulating muscle growth?
Wolf: Perfect form is not always the best thing. It can really limit how much weight you use, and I do believe you have to train heavy to grow. But your form shouldn’t be ridiculous, either. You have to find that happy medium where the weights are pretty heavy and you are still working the right muscles, and not a bunch of other muscles. Even with saying all that, I have learned a lot from training with my friend Dennis James about how important it is to get good contractions in the target muscle on all your reps. There is a way to do that and still go pretty heavy— it just takes time to adjust to it.
Evan: “I think it depends. If your form is always horrible and you still grow, that tells me the gains happened in spite of the form. But if you mix it up and use perfect form until the muscle is pretty fatigued and then loosen it up to get another couple of reps, that can be very beneficial. The movement to some degree also dictates how perfect your form needs to be. You do want to use perfect form on isolation movements like a concentration curl or an incline dumbbell curl. Something like a barbell curl, though, you would want to let the delts assist when the reps get tough. I would never sit here and advocate bad form, because it’s a dangerous practice when used too often. But using picture-perfect form all the time isn’t optimal, either. At the end of the day, whatever taxes the muscle best is going to be the way to go.
I just interviewed a pro who said that he does nearly 30 sets for arms. Would you say that’s about right, or too much? Or is there even an average amount of sets that would be best for most men?
Wolf: I don’t think you can put a number on it. Once you get a maximum pump in the arms, then you should stop, whether that’s after 10 sets or 25. If you find yourself losing the pump or feeling weak, you did too much. For me, it never takes more than three or four exercises each for the biceps or triceps before I reach that point.
Evan: Your volume is going to depend on how much intensity you put out in those sets. If you’re training the way Dorian Yates did and taking sets to absolute failure and beyond, there’s no way you could do 30 sets for arms. But if your sets aren’t quite to failure, you can do a lot more of them. Even so, I think 30 sets for arms is a bit much. Dorian had a great analogy about this. He said that there are plenty of manual laborers out there who work eight hours a day using their muscles. Why don’t they look anything like bodybuilders? It’s because they never take the muscles to true failure and stimulate gains. You can do 30 sets and get a tremendous pump, but I believe you do need to overload the muscles to see results.
Have you made any changes to the way you train your arms recently, either in technique, when you train them, or adding or dropping certain exercises?
Wolf: I can honestly say it changes all the time. I try to do different exercises pretty often, or at least change up the order I do them. I feel the arms, or any muscle really, gets used to things after only a few workouts and then you don’t see any results. This is more true for guys who have been training for many years, probably not so important for beginners.
Evan: My arm training hasn’t changed at all.
Last question. Are you satisfied with your arms right now, and if not, what would you like to improve?
Wolf: I’m never totally satisfied. I want more of a peak in my biceps, and more of a horseshoe shape to my triceps. I understand that the shape is coming from genetics, but I still see that my arms can be better. My goal isn’t to have the best arms, but I do want the best physique. A complete physique has the best balance and development of all the muscles.
Evan: It’s funny that you ask this, because until recently I would have said that I was perfectly happy with my arms. But now that I’m at the highest level of shows and really studying what I need to improve to move up and do better, I realize that my arms aren’t quite where they need to be. In certain shots like the side chest and rear double biceps, my arms look great. But not so great in the front double biceps, ironically. That is one pose that exploits my weaknesses. It forces me to see that I still need a lot more chest, because it does flatten out with my arms up overhead, and I see I also could use more biceps peak. So I will be addressing that in my training from here on in.
Dennis Wolf Arm Workout
Biceps
One-arm Dumbbell Preacher Curls 3 x 12
OR
EZ-bar Preacher Curls 3 x 12
Standing EZ-bar Curls 3 x 12
EZ-bar Reverse Curls 3 x 15
Triceps
Rope Cable Pushdowns 2 warm-ups x 15, 2 work sets x 10-12
Reverse Cable Pushdowns 4 x 10-12
Machine Dips 4 x 10-12
Wolf’s Training Splits
Off-season*
Monday: Chest and biceps
Tuesday: Legs
Wednesday: OFF
Thursday: Shoulders and triceps
Friday: OFF
Saturday: Back and traps
Sunday: OFF
*Calves are trained every other day
Pre-contest*
Monday: Chest
Tuesday: Quads
Wednesday: Arms
Thursday: Delts
Friday: Hamstrings
Saturday: Back
Sunday: OFF
*Calves are trained every other day, abs are trained every day
Evan’s Arm Routine (typical)
Single-arm Cable Preacher Curls 3-4 x 8-12
Alternate Dumbbell Curls 3-4 x 8-12
Barbell Curls 3-4 x 8-12
Dips 3-4 x 8-12
Rope Pushdowns 4 X 20, 15, 12, 10
Single-arm Overhead Dumbbell Extensions 3-4 x 8-12
Dip Machine 3-4 x 8-12
Evan’s Training Split
Monday: Chest and abs
Tuesday: OFF
Wednesday: Quads and hams
Thursday: OFF
Friday: Back and calves
Saturday: Shoulders and arms
Sunday: OFF
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WATCH DENNIS WOLF'S ARM WORKOUT