Curls

Any person with no knowledge whatsoever of training who walks into the gym will do curls, I guarantee it. Curls is just the first thing people associate with weight training. When people ask you to flex, you immediately show off your biceps.

I've seen people literally spend an hour training their biceps. They'll do some straight barbell curls, followed by some dumbbell hammer curls, followed by some preacher curls, and finally finish off with Arnold's 21s or whatever the hell they're called (you people know who you are).

I've seen people so fixated with curls that they neglect to train the other parts of their body, so they can't even get the barbell off the ground to curl it, and they need someone to help bring the bar into the starting position. That's just messed up.

If you're a beginner, honestly you're better off doing pull-ups and chin-ups. These exercises will train your back as well as your biceps, so you get an exercise that gives you more bang for your buck. What's going to cause your body more stress? A bodyweight + 40kg pull-up or a 30kg barbell curl? Quite frankly if you can't even do pull-ups you have no business curling. Do pull-ups and chin-ups if you're not already. If your gym has those pull-up bars with different grips, use them all, switch the grip for each set. If you can't do pull-ups here's now to progress.

Start off with 10 sets of 1 rep, space out the sets enough that you can perform all the reps properly with good form. Next time increase the reps on all the sets, so 10 sets of 2 reps. The next session do 10 sets of 3 reps, etc etc. until you reach 10 sets of 5 reps. Time to move onto weighted pull-ups. Feel free to switch grips for each set. Put on a weight belt and increase the weight by 1.25kg each time, doing 3 sets of 5 reps. Again switch grips with each set if you like. Once you can do pull-ups for bodyweight + 20kg for 3 sets of 5 reps you should be smart enough about your training to know if its time to do curls or not. As you get stronger, you may want to change the rep ranges, like 3x8 weighted in the first week, 5x5 in the second week and 2x5,3x3 in the third week.

Bigger guys weighing 90kg and over will have a harder time doing pull-ups but that's no excuse to not do them, just watch Konstantinovs (you don't need to exaggerate the leg swing as much as him).

If you can't even do a single pull-up, there's several things you can try.

• Negatives: holding the pull-up bar, jump into the top position then slowly lower yourself down.
• Elevate your feet on a box then do pull-ups this way, so you'll be lighter, similar to this image but you can use a higher box if you need to. As it gets easier, put less of your weight on the box so you'll be pulling more of your own bodyweight.
• Use a bit of leg swing to help with the pull-ups.
  
• Get strong on barbell rows because they train the back also.
• Stay away from assisted pull-up machines. They don't reinforce proper technique so you can be doing assisted pull-ups with bad technique, which won't be useful once you try normal pull-ups.

If she can do a pull-up you have no excuse.

Remember, compound movements are superior for overall growth, and isolation exercises are used to fill in the little details. And also, if you want to put on muscle, you need to gain weight. There's a famous quote that says "A good rule of thumb is that for every inch you want to gain on your arms, you need to gain roughly 15 pounds of equally distributed body mass." You actually need to gain weight if you want bigger arms, back, legs, chest, etc.

I don't mean splurge on food and gain 10kg of bodyweight in a month. I've heard a skinny guy say "I'm going to bulk for 3 months then do a cut". More like he needs to bulk for 3 years. Heck, that's what I've been doing. You're body can only produce muscle at a certain rate. As a beginner this may be pretty damn quick at the start, but don't expect it to be this way for too long. It's called the law of diminishing returns:

Basically you have a ceiling, known as your genetic potential. As you get closer to it, it'll become harder and harder to make progress.

Once you're past the honeymoon period of training, you actually need to think about how you're training and recovering (eating and sleeping). Your muscle will also only be able to produce muscle at a certain rate. Let's use the construction of a building as an analogy. The building is your muscle. The materials that come in to be used to construct the building is your food intake. If too much material comes onto the construction site, there will be extra material sitting around unable to be used, this is your body fat. So what you want to do is order in a suitable amount of materials to come onto site, so that the building can be built at a steady pace, but also so that you don't have too much extra materials laying around for nothing.

So what this means is that you want to be eating enough to build muscle, but not so much that you're piling on the body fat. I guess the analogy above only covered diet. In terms of training, compound movements will be the main structure of the building, and isolation exercises will be fine details like pretty architecture. What do you think needs to be focused on first?

Another thing, the leaner you are (the less bodyfat you have on your body), the better your insulin sensitivity which will make it easier to put on muscle. So keep an eye on your body and watch how it responds to your weight gain. If you're packing on the belly fat, lower the food intake a bit. If you're not gaining after a month increase the food intake.

If you're just starting out with weight training and you already have some size on you (over 80kg at 170cm say), just focus on getting stronger. Your body will take care of itself. If your body fat levels are pretty high though, back off in your food intake slightly but not so much that you feel weak in the gym. Adjust accordingly. Make sure you're getting stronger.

For skinny guys, ignore the above paragraph. Focus on getting stronger, and eating more than you are now. The reason you're in this position now is because you're not eating enough, clearly. Read my other post on diet. And if you have abs, they most likely will fade when you gain weight. But you have to give a little to gain a lot. Just keep your body fat levels in check whilst gaining weight and it won't be too difficult to lose the extra fat once you're happy with your size which I can guarantee won't be for a while if you're skinny.

Another thing, don't be so fucking self conscious if people say you've gotten fatter. Chances are you haven't done a good job gaining weight if that's happened since your bodyfat levels shouldn't be too high, but either way, that doesn't mean its time to give up on your goals. Never lose sight of what you're trying to achieve.

So what if he has abs? He couldn't win a fight against my little sister

One more thing, training your triceps is also important for your arms since they make up two-thirds of your upper arm. And by training your triceps I don't mean fucking tricep kickbacks, I mean the bench press, overhead press and heavy-ass weighted dips.

A great exercise for the chest, shoulders and triceps

Sources:

http://www.t-nation.com/free_online_article/sports_body_training_performance/the_truth_about_bodybuilding_arm_measurements;jsessionid=FADA1D443AC4E8405268B931FB438DD3-mcd01.hydra