Want tight, toned upper arms (back of) with just one exercise? I'm a certified personal trainer, and if I could recommend just one exercise for firming up the back of the upper arms, one routine comes to mind. It is the "push-down" with the rope. However -- and this is a big however, ladies -- the rope triceps push-down works only if you do it a certain way, even if you squat, just holding the bar will tone your arms. Few women do the rope push-down correctly. Ask yourself if you are committing the following mistakes with this triceps exercise: #1: Letting hands fly all the way back up after pushing the rope down, so that hands are at the level of your face. #2: Letting upper arms flare out away from your sides. #3: Rotating wrists out at the bottom of the movement, causing the rope to assume the shape of a bell curve. This wrist-flare-out is very commonly done and tricks women (and men) into thinking that they are completing the range of motion in the triceps push-down. They are wrong. All this does is add tension to the wrists. It does not complete the range of motion! #4: Not working out intensely enough. The triceps push-down with the rope has the potential to really firm and tighten up the back of the upper arms. It will do very little, however, to burn up fat, so if you have chubby, chunky or "fat" arms, do not rely on this exercise to make your arms "thinner." The push-down with the rope, when done correctly (and I'll explain how in just a moment), will tighten up a flabby triceps group of muscles, making these muscles more compact and firmer; hence giving shape to the upper arm. If there is a lot of fat between the skin and muscle, this reshaping won't be as obvious. To lose fat in the arms you will need to do exercises that work larger muscle groups; large muscle groups like the legs and back will burn up a lot of overall body fat. How to correctly perform the triceps rope push-down for strengthening, tightening and toning the back of the upper arms: #1: Bring hands back up so that forearms are parallel to floor. Don't go higher than that point. This keeps the triceps in a state of nonstop tension. #2: Keep upper arms against your sides. This isolates the triceps. #3: Do not flare out wrists at the bottom. Keep them neutral and rigid, and instead, concentrate on making the rope into an upside down V shape. This can be done. Just watch what you're doing and do not bend, rotate or flare out the wrists. You know you're doing the exercise correctly when the rope takes on the shape of an upside down V. Keep upper arms against your sides! #4: Hold the V for two seconds before releasing. #5: Keep knees slightly bent for support, and a very slight bending forward of your trunk is fine, but don't hunch. #6: Use a weight that's heavy enough to make 10-12 repetitions extremely difficult. At the end your triceps/upper arms should be burning.
#7: After completing this set, reduce the weight somewhat and repeat, aiming for 8-12 reps. There is no rest in between these two sets. It's one set right after another. #8: After this second set is a third set at an even lighter weight, done to complete muscle burnout. This technique is known as drop setting. After you complete the entire drop set, rest one minute and then repeat three more drop sets with one minute in between. Your upper arms/triceps should be killing you by the time you're finished. Do this twice a week (several days in between each session), and if your overall body fat isn't that high, you will soon start noticing much tighter, firmer, shapelier upper arms
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