Have you heard of the benefits of hand exercise for hammers? Pick up the dumbbells and stand up straight. In the starting position, hands with dumbbells on the sides of the torso, grip neutral (palms toward you).
Breathe in and hold your breath. Bend the arm in the elbow with the biceps force, and lift the dumbbell up as high as possible. Secure your elbows on the sides of your torso.
- Lower the weight and exhale. At the bottom, take a short pause and start a new repetition.
- Keep an eye on your torso: keep your torso and pelvis stationary during lifting.
- To increase biceps reduction, linger for one or two seconds at the top.
Notes
Make sure that the elbows are firmly fixed on the sides of the torso and do not move during lifting. Bringing your elbow forward will make it easier for you to do your job, but it will also reduce the effectiveness of the exercise as well as the load.
During the starting phase of the movement, do not lean back and do not “push” the pelvis forward. This usually happens when the weight of the dumbbell is too high for the athlete. Always choose a weight that allows you to train perfectly.
Do not change the position of the dumbbells when lifting.
Always maintain a neutral position: it distributes the load evenly between all the muscles in your elbow. When the position of the hand changes, this “balance” is disturbed. For example, by turning the hand palm up, you shift the focus to the biceps, palm down to the shoulder muscle, and round pronator.
You can lift the hammer either synchronously (with both hands at once) or alternately. But at “synchronous” lifting there is a chance that by the end of the set, when the muscles are tired, you start to deviate backward. If this happens, limit yourself to the alternate variant.
Anatomy
This exercise involves the biceps, shoulder muscle, shoulder, and round pronator – that is, the entire “company” working on the flexion of the elbow. Biceps are located on the front surface of the upper arm (if the relief is well developed, it is possible to “track” both heads of the biceps – long and short). Under the biceps, slightly closer to the elbow, there is a shoulder muscle, and a bulky shoulder muscle – on the upper inside of the forearm (on the thumb line).
The round pronator, partially covered by the shoulder muscle, runs diagonally along the front part of the forearm. When the hammer is lifted, the shoulder muscle and the round pronator play an important auxiliary role.
Muscle and Joint Work
When the biceps are shortened, the forearm moves towards the top of the arm and the shoulder remains stationary. Since this exercise is performed with a neutral grip, the shoulder and shoulder muscles are actively involved. With supine (palm top) grip, the accent shifts to biceps, and with penetrated (palm down) – to the round pronator.
Sports
In bodybuilding, the hammer is one of the key exercises for the development of the “muscle mass” of the upper arms and forearms (especially the parts adjacent to the elbow joints). In weightlifting, elbow bending and muscles involved in weightlifting are essential when raising the barbell to the top position, particularly in the last phase of weight lifting.
Lifting the “hammer” works to strengthen almost all the “pulling” movements and is, therefore, an integral part of the training of gymnasts. Elbow bending plays an important role in such sports as wrestling, judo, American football, basketball, tennis, and hockey.
