Tricep Pulldowns: What Attatchment?

I’m glad it was useful! :slight_smile:

[quote]Bill Roberts wrote:
I’m glad it was useful! :)[/quote]

Bill, I have been noticing quite a few high quality posts coming from your direction. I’m sure everyone here appreciates it. Keep it up!

[quote]LiveFromThe781 wrote:
high enough.

depends what youre going for, what set etc.

personally i like the curved one donno what to call it.[/quote]
thats the E-Z bar

Thanks, anthropocentric!

(Though, there are two or three that do not think so! But, can’t please all of the people all of the time I guess.)

[quote]Bill Roberts wrote:
While this is more information than you asked for, it includes at least much of what you were asking for.

Tesch did a review of which heads of the triceps are targeted by which exercises and whether particularly so or not. The results were:

Long head

French press with EZ bar
Overhead triceps extensions with reverse grip
Pullover with EZ bar and narrow grip

Lateral and long heads

Triceps pushdown with straight bar and narrow grip

Lateral head

Supine triceps extension with dumbbell and neutral grip

Lateral and medial heads

Standing French press with straight bar
One-arm triceps pushdown
Bench press with narrow grip
Military press with straight bar, behind neck
Standing dumbbell press

All three heads

French press with EZ bar on decline bench
Overhead triceps extensions with dumbbell and neutral grip
Triceps pushdown with rope
Triceps pushdown with angled bar
One-arm triceps pushdown with reverse grip
Parallel bar dip with neutral grip
Bench dip

[/quote]

Bill, do you know how Tesch determined what exercises worked which heads?

I ask because my understanding/experience of which head some of the exercises worked seems to be different from this list.

Did he use EMG?

[quote]Sentoguy wrote:
Bill Roberts wrote:
While this is more information than you asked for, it includes at least much of what you were asking for.

Tesch did a review of which heads of the triceps are targeted by which exercises and whether particularly so or not. The results were:

Long head

French press with EZ bar
Overhead triceps extensions with reverse grip
Pullover with EZ bar and narrow grip

Lateral and long heads

Triceps pushdown with straight bar and narrow grip

Lateral head

Supine triceps extension with dumbbell and neutral grip

Lateral and medial heads

Standing French press with straight bar
One-arm triceps pushdown
Bench press with narrow grip
Military press with straight bar, behind neck
Standing dumbbell press

All three heads

French press with EZ bar on decline bench
Overhead triceps extensions with dumbbell and neutral grip
Triceps pushdown with rope
Triceps pushdown with angled bar
One-arm triceps pushdown with reverse grip
Parallel bar dip with neutral grip
Bench dip

Bill, do you know how Tesch determined what exercises worked which heads?

I ask because my understanding/experience of which head some of the exercises worked seems to be different from this list.

Did he use EMG?[/quote]

Wanna post your own list, I’m curious.
Triceps are one muscle-group where I really noticed a difference in looks from doing PJR’s (heavy long head emphasis) and a few others.

[quote]tribunaldude wrote:
I like the rope as it allows me to rotate my arms for the full contraction (if that makes sense).[/quote]

Cosigned.

He used MRI done shortly after each exercise, the muscles having been thoroughly rested beforehand. A muscle looks different in the MRI after having been worked, with discernible degrees of effect.

The method differs from EMG and doesn’t discern small differences. Evaluation was into three categories: heavy, moderate, or little use of the muscle.

So I suppose it’s entirely possible that an exercise Tesch gives as, for example, effectively working all three heads, perhaps an EMG might show that one of the heads works 10% harder than another one or that sort of thing.

On the other hand, EMG only (generally, unless electrodes are inserted deep into the muscle which usually isn’t the case) measures surface electrical activity, and there can be crosstalk problems and so forth. So it’s not a perfect method though it quantitates differences down to finer degrees than Yesch did with the MRI.

If anyone has EMG-derived information that would be good to have also.

I think often lists of this sort of thing are derived not from data but from feel. Not that there isn’t a lot of validity to that also. For example if with regard to say the long head you just don’t get any feel of pump or soreness or feeling of working the muscle at the time, it would be completely reasonable to put that exercise in a list of those that don’t target the long head.

Probably sometimes there are also impressions that aren’t right, or soreness might not in all cases correlate with work done by the muscle at the time, but it’s a reasonable method nonetheless. A list done that way might well not match up with Tesch’s.

As an example: Suppose in an exercise a head does rather little work in the concentric but for some reason, at some point in the eccentric it’s loaded in a way that results in a fair bit of soreness. Maybe the MRI would show relatively little work having been done, whereas the subjective impression the next day after having done many sets might be that it really worked that head.

As to effect on growth, the truth might be in the middle between those two evaluations, purely as a guess.

[quote]Cephalic_Carnage wrote:
Sentoguy wrote:
Bill Roberts wrote:
While this is more information than you asked for, it includes at least much of what you were asking for.

Tesch did a review of which heads of the triceps are targeted by which exercises and whether particularly so or not. The results were:

Long head

French press with EZ bar
Overhead triceps extensions with reverse grip
Pullover with EZ bar and narrow grip

Lateral and long heads

Triceps pushdown with straight bar and narrow grip

Lateral head

Supine triceps extension with dumbbell and neutral grip

Lateral and medial heads

Standing French press with straight bar
One-arm triceps pushdown
Bench press with narrow grip
Military press with straight bar, behind neck
Standing dumbbell press

All three heads

French press with EZ bar on decline bench
Overhead triceps extensions with dumbbell and neutral grip
Triceps pushdown with rope
Triceps pushdown with angled bar
One-arm triceps pushdown with reverse grip
Parallel bar dip with neutral grip
Bench dip

Bill, do you know how Tesch determined what exercises worked which heads?

I ask because my understanding/experience of which head some of the exercises worked seems to be different from this list.

Did he use EMG?

Wanna post your own list, I’m curious.
Triceps are one muscle-group where I really noticed a difference in looks from doing PJR’s (heavy long head emphasis) and a few others.
[/quote]

I’m not saying that I disagree with everything, so posting an entirely different list wouldn’t be necessary.

I agree that any movement where there is shoulder extension (ala PJR’s) will have substantial long head involvement. Also, from my understanding of biomechanics (and from my experience) any tricep extension done with the arms overhead (meaning the greater the shouder angle) the more long head recruitment.

There are just a couple that are different in my experience.

Pushdowns (regardless of the attachment or grip) will have minimal long head involvement.

Any type of overhead press isn’t a triceps exercise (unless maybe it’s lockouts, in which case BTN is irrelevant), so I don’t know why BTN shoulder presses are even on there.

One arm reverse grip pushdowns do not work all three heads in my experience, but preferentially work the medial head (reverse grip bench also hits the medial head really well in my experience).

Parallel bar dips also don’t hit the long head very well in my experience, but primarily work the lateral and medial heads.

How about you Carnage (or X, Scott, Brick, Derek, Bauer, or any of the other vets)? What exercises have you found work particularly well for you, and what (if any) specific part of the triceps do they work?

[quote]Bill Roberts wrote:
He used MRI done shortly after each exercise, the muscles having been thoroughly rested beforehand. A muscle looks different in the MRI after having been worked, with discernible degrees of effect.

The method differs from EMG and doesn’t discern small differences. Evaluation was into three categories: heavy, moderate, or little use of the muscle.

So I suppose it’s entirely possible that an exercise Tesch gives as, for example, effectively working all three heads, perhaps an EMG might show that one of the heads works 10% harder than another one or that sort of thing.

On the other hand, EMG only (generally, unless electrodes are inserted deep into the muscle which usually isn’t the case) measures surface electrical activity, and there can be crosstalk problems and so forth. So it’s not a perfect method though it quantitates differences down to finer degrees than Yesch did with the MRI.

If anyone has EMG-derived information that would be good to have also.

I think often lists of this sort of thing are derived not from data but from feel. Not that there isn’t a lot of validity to that also. For example if with regard to say the long head you just don’t get any feel of pump or soreness or feeling of working the muscle at the time, it would be completely reasonable to put that exercise in a list of those that don’t target the long head.

Probably sometimes there are also impressions that aren’t right, or soreness might not in all cases correlate with work done by the muscle at the time, but it’s a reasonable method nonetheless. A list done that way might well not match up with Tesch’s.

As an example: Suppose in an exercise a head does rather little work in the concentric but for some reason, at some point in the eccentric it’s loaded in a way that results in a fair bit of soreness. Maybe the MRI would show relatively little work having been done, whereas the subjective impression the next day after having done many sets might be that it really worked that head.

As to effect on growth, the truth might be in the middle between those two evaluations, purely as a guess.

[/quote]

Thanks for the clarification.

I ask because, while there probably is not perfect way of measuring this (except perhaps to take groups and only have them perform one exercise per muscle group per exercise to see the effect on muscular growth, and fat chance of doing that study), I’m always a little wary of using things like EMG to determine the effect that an exercise will have on a muscle’s growth.

According to EMG studies, the upper pecs (clavicular head) is extremely heavily recruited during the decline bench press. But is anyone really going to try to say that decline bench would be a good choice for building the upper pecs? No.

As far as using feel, although I agree that it’s far less “scientific”, it’s seemed to work pretty well historically for BB’ers. For an inexperienced trainee, yeah it might not be the best idea. But for someone who knows their body, I personally feel that’s it’s a great way to go. And of course, results trump all theory.

As for myself, for the long head I prefer Larry Scott’s method of prone French presses off a cable machine. He has an explanation on his website.

I also certainly feel it in straight arm pulldowns whether at a 45 degree angle or a more traditional angle, but it seems to me that it’s only feel that is happening and doesn’t accomplish much for whatever reason. Ditto for DB pullovers (for me.)

I agree I don’t notice the long head working in pushdowns but that may have to do with the fact that you feel it when it’s stretched, as when the arms are overhead, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be working hard when contracted (which it is with elbows down.)

And Tesch’s results did not have it that any sort of pushdowns were selective for specifically for the long head anyhow.

[quote]Sentoguy wrote:
I’m not saying that I disagree with everything, so posting an entirely different list wouldn’t be necessary.

I agree that any movement where there is shoulder extension (ala PJR’s) will have substantial long head involvement. Also, from my understanding of biomechanics (and from my experience) any tricep extension done with the arms overhead (meaning the greater the shouder angle) the more long head recruitment.

There are just a couple that are different in my experience.

Pushdowns (regardless of the attachment or grip) will have minimal long head involvement.

Any type of overhead press isn’t a triceps exercise (unless maybe it’s lockouts, in which case BTN is irrelevant), so I don’t know why BTN shoulder presses are even on there.

One arm reverse grip pushdowns do not work all three heads in my experience, but preferentially work the medial head (reverse grip bench also hits the medial head really well in my experience).

Parallel bar dips also don’t hit the long head very well in my experience, but primarily work the lateral and medial heads.

How about you Carnage (or X, Scott, Brick, Derek, Bauer, or any of the other vets)? What exercises have you found work particularly well for you, and what (if any) specific part of the triceps do they work?[/quote]

Well, I mentioned PJR’s for the long head before (the most effective long head-emphasizing exercise that I know of, by far). Those made the difference between flat tris and bodybuilder tris for me…

Face-Away Extensions (or whatever they’re called… I’ve posted the link before: http://www.larryscott.com/bio/newsletter/97summer_2.cfm
Those also work my long head fairly well (if you do 'em standing, you’ll have to weigh a little more than 130 lbs…), especially when shoulder extensions (as you put it) is present.

For lateral heads, I find flat-machine presses with the narrowest possible grip on the regular handles (resembling a bb with a gap in the middle, for lack of a better description) to work very well.
BTN smith presses also tax the hell out of that area for me, as well as the medial head… I get a lot of tri involvement in those, no matter the grip-width (and I usually go very wide). Those stress my tris even when doing only the bottom half of ROM…

The regular CGP doesn’t do much for them (in my case), but the In-Human variation hits 'em real hard.

Medial heads, well, I never really feel those during any exercise, but they grew the most when I was relying on presses, avoiding any type of extension movement (due to my elbows not liking extension exercises… PJR’s and that Scott thing changed that for me).
Think Machine Dips, CGP’s, etc, In-Human style CGP as well.

As far as pushdowns go, I must say that those actually hit the long- and lateral heads somewhat when done with a narrow (not so narrow that your wrists kill you) grip on a straight handle… You can see plenty of
Pros do those in their DVD’s/Vids. Kinda depends on whether you’re hunched over the bar or allowing the bar to travel a little in front of you (the latter hits the long head in my case, prolly due to that head having to stabilize more or whatever).

Overhead DB Extensions have a similar effect on the long head as PJR’s, just much weaker imo. I have the same shoulder thing as Dante (shoulders not liking my arms to be straight up and close to my head) and my elbows kill me even on medium weights there… Not an injury from lifting, it’s been that way since the beginning of my training career.

DB skullcrushers don’t bother my shoulders, but still wipe out my elbows if I go past the 70’s… Usually way before that. I can do the 80’s for 2 or 3 reps after warming up for like 10 mins and wearing neoprenes, but what’s the point… My elbows start hurting badly after that, way before I reach failure.

So to sum things up: In-Human CGP, Reverse-Grip Smith Bench (forgot to mention those before, Sento’s right about which head they emphasize, you can get way more out of them and any other smith or rack press for tris by pressing towards your feet AGAINST the rack or smith, involves the long head more imo.), PJR’s, Scott Extensions (tired of trying to find a name for those), straight bar, kinda narrow grip Pushdowns (as an elbow warmup and/or after your regular exercises)… Those pretty much have your triceps covered from any angle you could wish for… My DC rotation consists only of those… (minus the pushdowns, those are just for warming up, as I’ve said).

Btw, parallel-bar dips suck for my tris… Never got ANYTHING out of them, even when leaning back. Machine Dips worked better (kinda depends on the handles and machine), but I still prefer other exercises.

“In-Human CGP, Reverse-Grip Smith Bench”

Does anyone have a video of this? I’d like to try them out but want to make sure I am doing them correctly.

Carnage, is it really necessary – I haven’t done them – to use the Smith machine to accomplish the same as the In-Human CGBP’s?

And same question for the reverse grip.

Though in the past, non-Smith (and outside the rack) reverse grip bench presses seemed to nothing in particular for me personally. Who knows, maybe the feet pressing against the rack detail of method might change that though.

I’d prefer and it’s more convenient for me to use the rack, but if the results depend on it being a Smith machine, I’d want to know that.

Thanks!

[quote]k8thegr8 wrote:
“In-Human CGP, Reverse-Grip Smith Bench”

Does anyone have a video of this? I’d like to try them out but want to make sure I am doing them correctly.
[/quote]

The In-Human one or the RGSB ?
You could check out IM for vids, I’ve never seen one of the In-Human CGP, but he describes it in a post of his.

One integral part of both exercises is to having your ass hang off the bench so that you can arch a little and really keep your shoulderblades on the bench… Same for the pressing towards your feet thing (which would end up in a catastrophe if done with free-weights, as you can imagine).

Check youtube for Jason Wojo doing RGB’s

Over at IM: Search for “Close-Grip Bench, In-Human style” or something like that. Future quoted that old post by In-Human, so you can go into advanced search and use the “find posts by username” function.

[quote]Cephalic_Carnage wrote:
Sentoguy wrote:
I’m not saying that I disagree with everything, so posting an entirely different list wouldn’t be necessary.

I agree that any movement where there is shoulder extension (ala PJR’s) will have substantial long head involvement. Also, from my understanding of biomechanics (and from my experience) any tricep extension done with the arms overhead (meaning the greater the shouder angle) the more long head recruitment.

There are just a couple that are different in my experience.

Pushdowns (regardless of the attachment or grip) will have minimal long head involvement.

Any type of overhead press isn’t a triceps exercise (unless maybe it’s lockouts, in which case BTN is irrelevant), so I don’t know why BTN shoulder presses are even on there.

One arm reverse grip pushdowns do not work all three heads in my experience, but preferentially work the medial head (reverse grip bench also hits the medial head really well in my experience).

Parallel bar dips also don’t hit the long head very well in my experience, but primarily work the lateral and medial heads.

How about you Carnage (or X, Scott, Brick, Derek, Bauer, or any of the other vets)? What exercises have you found work particularly well for you, and what (if any) specific part of the triceps do they work?

Well, I mentioned PJR’s for the long head before (the most effective long head-emphasizing exercise that I know of, by far). Those made the difference between flat tris and bodybuilder tris for me…

Face-Away Extensions (or whatever they’re called… I’ve posted the link before: http://www.larryscott.com/bio/newsletter/97summer_2.cfm
Those also work my long head fairly well (if you do 'em standing, you’ll have to weigh a little more than 130 lbs…), especially when shoulder extensions (as you put it) is present.

For lateral heads, I find flat-machine presses with the narrowest possible grip on the regular handles (resembling a bb with a gap in the middle, for lack of a better description) to work very well.
BTN smith presses also tax the hell out of that area for me, as well as the medial head… I get a lot of tri involvement in those, no matter the grip-width (and I usually go very wide). Those stress my tris even when doing only the bottom half of ROM…

The regular CGP doesn’t do much for them (in my case), but the In-Human variation hits 'em real hard.

Medial heads, well, I never really feel those during any exercise, but they grew the most when I was relying on presses, avoiding any type of extension movement (due to my elbows not liking extension exercises… PJR’s and that Scott thing changed that for me).
Think Machine Dips, CGP’s, etc, In-Human style CGP as well.

As far as pushdowns go, I must say that those actually hit the long- and lateral heads somewhat when done with a narrow (not so narrow that your wrists kill you) grip on a straight handle… You can see plenty of
Pros do those in their DVD’s/Vids. Kinda depends on whether you’re hunched over the bar or allowing the bar to travel a little in front of you (the latter hits the long head in my case, prolly due to that head having to stabilize more or whatever).

Overhead DB Extensions have a similar effect on the long head as PJR’s, just much weaker imo. I have the same shoulder thing as Dante (shoulders not liking my arms to be straight up and close to my head) and my elbows kill me even on medium weights there… Not an injury from lifting, it’s been that way since the beginning of my training career.

DB skullcrushers don’t bother my shoulders, but still wipe out my elbows if I go past the 70’s… Usually way before that. I can do the 80’s for 2 or 3 reps after warming up for like 10 mins and wearing neoprenes, but what’s the point… My elbows start hurting badly after that, way before I reach failure.

So to sum things up: In-Human CGP, Reverse-Grip Smith Bench (forgot to mention those before, Sento’s right about which head they emphasize, you can get way more out of them and any other smith or rack press for tris by pressing towards your feet AGAINST the rack or smith, involves the long head more imo.), PJR’s, Scott Extensions (tired of trying to find a name for those), straight bar, kinda narrow grip Pushdowns (as an elbow warmup and/or after your regular exercises)… Those pretty much have your triceps covered from any angle you could wish for… My DC rotation consists only of those… (minus the pushdowns, those are just for warming up, as I’ve said).

Btw, parallel-bar dips suck for my tris… Never got ANYTHING out of them, even when leaning back. Machine Dips worked better (kinda depends on the handles and machine), but I still prefer other exercises.
[/quote]

Cool. Thanks Carnage.

[quote]Bill Roberts wrote:
As for myself, for the long head I prefer Larry Scott’s method of prone French presses off a cable machine. He has an explanation on his website.

I also certainly feel it in straight arm pulldowns whether at a 45 degree angle or a more traditional angle, but it seems to me that it’s only feel that is happening and doesn’t accomplish much for whatever reason. Ditto for DB pullovers (for me.)
[/quote]

My problem with straight arm pulldowns (other than that they are generally used as a lat isolation exercise), is that they are so, so limited in terms of weight progression. Because of the leverage, it’s pretty much impossible to build up to any type of impressive poundages on that exercise.

Oh, I’m not saying that it isn’t working at all. It must contract to stabilize the shoulder joint. But anytime you have a muscle (or head of a muscle) stabilizing a joint, it pretty much means that it can’t participate fully in the action of another joint.

This is a fairly well know concept when it comes to any biarticulate muscle. If you want to really hit the long head of your biceps, you do incline curls, not preacher curls. If you want to hit the long head of the biceps femoris, you do RDL’s, not leg curls.

This is oftentimes also referred to in terms of how well you can “stretch” a muscle. PJR’s produce a tremendous stretch, and likewise the long head is heavily stressed. Incline curls work very well for stretching the biceps, and heavily stress the long head. RDL’s stretch the hamstrings well, and heavily stress the long head of the biceps femoris (one of the hamstring muscles). And the list goes on (for muscle’s that are biarticulate).

[quote]
And Tesch’s results did not have it that any sort of pushdowns were selective for specifically for the long head anyhow.[/quote]

True.

Carnage, is using a Smith machine important to the results for the In-Human CBGP and the reverse grip bench press performed as you describe?

An ordinary RGBP has never done anything in particular for me, but I did them outside a rack and did not have feet pressing against a rack, and made no point of having the elbows flared out, as perhaps you are doing it (I don’t know) inasmuch as that is how the In-Human CGBP’s are done.

Do those make all the difference, or is the Smith needed?

It’s more convenient for me to use a rack, and besides this, the only Smith machine available doesn’t go straight up and down, which inherently changes an exercise. It’s a choice, depending on which way you face, of moving towads the head or the feet – I’ve chosen towards the head the occasions I’ve used it.

Thanks!

[quote]Bill Roberts wrote:
Carnage, is using a Smith machine important to the results for the In-Human CBGP and the reverse grip bench press performed as you describe?

An ordinary RGBP has never done anything in particular for me, but I did them outside a rack and did not have feet pressing against a rack, and made no point of having the elbows flared out, as perhaps you are doing it (I don’t know) inasmuch as that is how the In-Human CGBP’s are done.

Do those make all the difference, or is the Smith needed?

It’s more convenient for me to use a rack, and besides this, the only Smith machine available doesn’t go straight up and down, which inherently changes an exercise. It’s a choice, depending on which way you face, of moving towads the head or the feet – I’ve chosen towards the head the occasions I’ve used it.

Thanks![/quote]

Not Carnage, but, you don’t need a Smith for the RGBP. You could use a rack, it’s just that it’s a little easier/safer IMO to use a Smith.

But, if you are going to use a rack, then you need to perform them with the bar actually sliding up and down against the rack (hope this makes sense). You need to do this because you should be actively trying to push the bar towards your feet (like doing a reverse grip triceps extension) while you are also pressing the weight up. Just doing this simple trick will make you feel RGBP considerably more in your tris.

As for the In-Human CGBP, I haven’t tried that one yet, so I’ll let Carnage handle it.

[quote]Sentoguy wrote:

Not Carnage, but, you don’t need a Smith for the RGBP. You could use a rack, it’s just that it’s a little easier/safer IMO to use a Smith.

But, if you are going to use a rack, then you need to perform them with the bar actually sliding up and down against the rack (hope this makes sense). You need to do this because you should be actively trying to push the bar towards your feet (like doing a reverse grip triceps extension) while you are also pressing the weight up. Just doing this simple trick will make you feel RGBP considerably more in your tris.[/quote]

Ah, now I understand.

Unfortunately my gym traded out a perfectly good but older rack for a new piece of crap that has a radically uneven surface on each end (designed to comprise multiple “hooks” for a barbell) so that is impossible with this rack, but in general sounds excellent. I’ll use the Smith for that then.

Perhaps, as the Smith is slightly angled, I’ll do it where there actually is slight movement towards my feet, instead of towards my head. Or I’ll try both ways to see what works.