robert landy

With the scrape the rack triceps extension, I got a tremendous training effect. The key to making it work is to apply pressure against the rack at all times; this engages the long head of the triceps allowing you to stimulate this very important portion of the triceps that gives you more arm thickness and pressing strength. Continuing to apply pressure against the rack also allows you to get a loaded stretching effect when you focus on keeping the elbows pointing forward and up. That loaded stretch of the triceps is great to activate mTor, which is key for muscle growth. Try a superset of the scrape the rack triceps extensions and rope triceps pressdowns. This combo will give you the tricep pump of your life. – Christian Thibaudeau

Try this is a small adjustment to your ab rollouts. Simply move one leg to the side. By doing so you remove half of your base, and now puts a lot of tension on the side that stays in the middle. This creates a ton of tension across the entire torso. – Michael Warren

This lift helps emphasize the contraction of the pecs (you get a much better squeeze when you both push up and against the pins) while reducing the involvement of the shoulders.

1. Start the bar off of safety pins. If you have the square ones (as seen in the video) you'll have to press it from the pins to the little edge that's slightly higher, this is where the bar is starting on the video. If you're using metal rods as safety pins, which is ideal, you can start from the pins themselves.

2. Once the bar is in the starting position (as close to the chest as possible), either on the edge of the pin or on the pin itself, then set up like you would in a regular bench press. Get your glutes and abs tight, squeeze both shoulder blades together, and engage the lats (which is easy if you press at about 25% against the pins).

3. Press the barbell both up and against the posts. I’d say that normally we apply about 25% of our max force pushing against the posts. If the weight is too light during a set you can compensate by applying more force against the posts. By doing this you'll turn an easy set into a hard and effective one. – Christian Thibaudeau

The Reeves deadlift which typically uses a traditional barbell is an old-school exercise developed by legendary bodybuilder Steve Reeves. Unfortunately, it involves such a wide grip that it tends to be fairly awkward for many lifters making it quite difficult to overload. Fortunately you can fix this by doing it with a trap bar since the grip placement tends to be 25-30% narrower in comparison to Olympic barbells. With a trap bar, you can use a grip that’s wide enough to crush the traps yet not so wide that it feels difficult to grip the plates. – Joel Seedman

Using a heavy load and rope attachment, tightly press both ends of the rope together and push the weight down. Because both arms will be assisting each other and pressed together rather than separately, you can achieve maximal overload in a similar fashion as using a metal attachment. Once you reach the bottom of the movement, deliberately spread the handles as much as possible and hold this position several seconds before performing a slow and deliberate 5-second negative. Because you'll be using both arms to assist each other on the concentric phase, the slow negative can be performed with significantly greater weight than what could typically be handled for traditional rope pressdowns. This maximizes all three major mechanisms of muscle hypertrophy including micro trauma (muscle damage), intramuscular/mechanical tension, and cellular volumization (muscle pump). Unfortunately the burn can be quite intense but if you're able to tolerate the pain, you'll be rewarded with significant arm growth. Due to the extended time under tension, use moderate rep ranges of 6-10 reps. However, you can also use this as a triceps finisher by doing a single set 12-20 reps at the end of your workout. – Joel Seedman, PhD

These are unusual in most gyms. That's okay. Not every lifting session has to be as basic as the girl in Starbucks who "can't even" right now. These are great because you can achieve a very strong peak contraction in the lats. Sit on the floor and prop your back up against the seat. Allow a full stretch of the lats, then pull with your elbows as far behind you as you can. Do this while arching your low back and getting your chest out. It's not rocket surgery. – Paul Carter

To maximize development, you need to train forearms in all their available movement patterns. This means going beyond a few sets of wrists curls and extensions at the end of your workout. With a sledgehammer, you can train pronation, supination, ulnar deviation, radial deviation and a host of circumduction patterns. Aim for 3 to 4 sets of 10-20 reps, pausing slightly at the top on each rep. And make sure you perform the exercise from both directions. Always strive to get stronger or do more reps over time. You can make the exercise more difficult by simply moving your hand further away from the sledgehammer head. I'd mark out inches on the handle so you can accurately track your progress. – Akash Vaghela