My New Favorite Exercise for Defined and Strong Arms

This week I decided to share with you my new favorite exercise. You know that I am a fan of basic, compound movements, but still each one of them has a bunch of variations, which you could use in order to bring in some variety in your workouts, or just in order to change the accent of the loading.

As most of you know, I have a bunch of shoulder injuries. In one way or another, this fact somehow limits my choice of upper body exercises and the amount of the volume that my arms could bare.

I have a love- hate relationship with military press. This exercise, together with the side dumbbell press are some of the main upper body movements, that I use in the vertical plane (let’s call it  this way). Still, if you have shoulder problems, I will suggest you an exercise, which will train your arms pretty good, but it will be easier on your shoulders.

I have no idea what is the name of the exercise and if it has a name. I saw it on Ben Bruno’s website( HERE). I love his articles and the philosophy of the website, which gravitates around workouts, which could be performed AROUND an injury. Or in other words how you could bust your ass off in the gym, and get a hell of a training, even after an injury, by being creative.

After the first time I tried this movement, it became one of my favorites. Because of the angle, in which you perform it, it is really easy on your shoulders. In the same time it is still challenging for your arms and you could implement it in a bunch of ways in your training.

From the pictures below, you could get the idea how to perform it, but you will get the chance to see it in a video below.

Be careful to keep your body tight. Don’t let your hips go forward.

Push forward not to the side.

In order to have a good base, put forward the opposite leg  of the arm you are pushing with.

And for my luck, this morning, when I was about to write my post, I decided to check out what is new on Ben Bruno’s website. He uploaded a unique Landmine Complex, performed by Kevin Andreson. So I decided to steal it and try it myself. I am in love with this complex and the way it trains your whole body. Besides that it is really interesting, because of the uncommon way you perform the movements.

The complex includes:

Squat with a Push of the bar

One Arm Push with the bar

One Leg Deadlift ( which I skipped, because I had it programmed earlier in my training session)

One Arm Rows

Reverse Lunges

Here is my video:

And here is the complex by Ben Bruno, performed by Kevin Anderson(HERE):

I’d suggest you to experiment with this complex, by doing a particular number of reps, for the shortest amount of time.

Sure, the number of the reps, depends on the intensity you chose ( i.e. the % of your 1 REP max).

Personally, I like to keep the reps between 5-8.

I’d suggest you complete 3-4 rounds with 90sec rest. In each round perform all exercises in the rep range of 5.

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And a picture from yesterday with one of my machines 🙂