When I dip, you dip, we dip

I’m sure this post sounds like it’s going to be about a ’90s roller-skating jam, but it’s actually about my favorite tricep exercise.  Bodyweight dips. A dip is an exercise where you support your body weight with your arms and lower and raise yourself using a combination of your triceps (back of arms), deltoids (shoulders), and pectorals (chest).  The muscle groups most affected is determined by the angle that you dip.  The more you lean forward, the more your chest will be involved.  The more you lean back the more your shoulders get into it.  Triceps are doing work no matter what.

This girl knows how to dip!

I like dips for several reasons.  First off, it’s a bodyweight exercise.  A bodyweight exercise is any motion that forces your muscles to work harder than normal, without adding outside weight.  The majority of exercises you’ll see on this blog are bodyweight because they don’t require gym equipment and can be done almost anywhere.  The most common bodyweight exercise that people know is the pushup.  You don’t need dumbbells, resistance bands, or a Bowflex to do pushups.  And you won’t need any of that stuff for dips either.  All you need is one or two steady surfaces that are at least a foot or so tall.  There are a couple variations to the dip, and I will eventually post a video of me doing them all, but for now, I’ll try to explain them with words.

The easy dips require you to put hands behind your back on a stable raised surface and your feet on the ground in front of you.  You then lower your body while using your triceps to support yourself and eventually return to the starting position.  This is also great for the shoulders.  To make this exercise easier, bend your knees and bring your feet in closer.  To make it harder, stretch you legs out farther or even put them on a raised stable surface.

That's a random place for handrails, use 'em anyway

The hard dips require more chest and are best done between surfaces, like hand railings.  They also use the entirety of your bodyweight, making them more intense.  You simply grip the rails on either side, raise yourself up and then lower yourself, rise and repeat.  Try to keep your elbows straight back when lowering instead of bowing them out to the sides.  It will focus the effort on your triceps no matter what and your chest if you lean forward.

I train for strength over size, so I like to do the majority of my exercises in sets of 5 reps.  The 6-12 rep range is geared toward tearing your muscles in order to grow them back bigger, but I prefer my muscles to be stronger, harder, and more dense.  I prefer to look more like soccer players/kick boxers and less like body builders/pro wrestlers.

So here’s a basic tricep routine:

5 sets of 5 reps of easy dips.  Rest 60 seconds between sets.

5 sets of 5 reps of hard dips.  Rest 60 seconds between sets.

If you’re a beginner, start with 5-10 sets of easy dips (5 reps, of course) and if you’re more advanced, go for just 8-10 sets of hard dips.  As you begin to master the exercise, I prefer to add weight or even sets, but not reps (which I explain why later).

Place your feet where the exercise is still a challenge, but you can get through the 5 reps.  Do not, however, make it so easy that you could do 25 reps without getting winded.  Pretend you only want to make it though 6, and then do 5.  This is called stopping short of failure.  It’s the opposite of what body builders do.  Their goal is to get their muscles to failure so that they will grow back bigger.  This is also why I used to be sore 6 days a week and didn’t get to enjoy life (read the About section).  Our goal here is to make stronger, denser muscles that make us look lean (or cut), as well as live a normal life between workouts!

Good triceps look good on everyone.  Period.  Both men and women can benefit from this exercise.  Try it out and see what works best for you, but remember if you don’t do the work, you won’t get the results!

To read more articles by Zack Pennington, check out his blog at www.road-warrior-fitness.com