3 Exercises for Strengthening Arm Muscles

You need arm strength to do all kinds of things – not to mention it makes your arms look great. As such, it’s important to know how you can go about strengthening arm muscles.

The strength of your arms and legs depends on muscle mass; therefore, you should make sure to target them often.

Still, muscle mass isn’t the only factor when it comes to strengthening arm muscles. Another important factor is muscle tone.

What is muscle tone?

Muscle tone is also known as residual muscle tension. It’s very important for your health.

What’s more, its job is to keep your body in partial muscle contraction. It also helps you keep good posture. In other words, it supports your body’s structure.

Adequate muscle tone should be present in all of your muscles, including your arms.

As for the other factors in arm strength, flexibility and hydration also play a key role. Thus, it’s vital to follow a balanced diet and to keep your muscles in shape.

The importance of targeting arm muscles

When talking about your arms’ muscular function, it doesn’t just involve strength or appearance.

When you don’t exercise them properly, there can be significant problems, such as:

• Muscle atrophy
• Hypotonia

These are serious conditions and the best way to treat them is with exercise.

Next, we’ll go through a series of exercises for strengthening arm muscles.

Exercises for strengthening arm muscles

There are many ways you can strengthen your arms. Along with a proper diet and hydration, exercise is crucial.

Here are three great exercises:

1. Triceps dips

When people create exercise routines focused on arm strength, they tend to get a lot of things wrong.

The most common problem is that they tend to be all about the biceps, neglecting other muscles like the deltoids and triceps.

As such, we’ll focus on triceps dips; you can do them anywhere and they’re very easy.

• Firstly, stand with your back to a surface where you can rest your hands (this could be a bench, wall, or chair, for example).
• Your legs should be shoulder-width apart.
• Your arms should form a 90-degree angle when you lower your body.
• Then, taking advantage of gravity and your own body weight, lower your body while keeping your legs straight.
• We recommend doing 4 sets of 10 repetitions each.

Find out more: 5 Key Tips for Getting Firm, Toned Arms

2. Arm scissors

This exercise works all the major muscles of your arms but focuses on the deltoids, which makes up part of your shoulders.

• Firstly, stand normally (feet shoulder-width apart).
• Then, hold a dumbbell in each hand, arms extended out from either side of your body.
• Bring the weights towards the front of your body, as if they were going to meet each other, but instead, keep going until you form an X (hence the name “scissors”).
• The pace of this move shouldn’t be fast but also not too slow.
• It’s recommended to do 3 sets of 10 repetitions each.

We recommend: The Best Exercises to Tone Your Legs

3. Side push-ups

Push-ups are one of the most common strength-training exercises.

Here, we’ll show you an effective version for our particular goal. It’s a bit more complicated and may require some extra effort.

• Firstly, you’ll need an exercise or yoga mat.
• Then, support yourself with one palm and both feet together on the mat.
• Just like with regular push-ups, bend the arm that’s supporting your body and return to your starting position, extending your other arm above you.
• It’s a good idea to do them slowly to avoid injury and to switch arms after each push-up.
• Do 3 sets on each arm.

Principal image courtesy of wikiHow.com

5 Exercises to Tone Your Arms Without Going to the Gym

There are a variety of machines and equipment at the gym that can help strengthen your body and tone your arms in various ways. Considering that not everyone has time to go to the gym, however, it’s good to know that there are plenty of exercises that will provide you with results without having to have a membership. Read more »