10 wall exercises for shoulders and biceps. Using a wall is an excellent way to isolate the muscles because you are eliminating excess hip and back movement.
To target the biceps and shoulders, or any other muscle group, you want to isolate the body as much as you humanly can. For this purpose a wall can be a great tool to allow you to hit the targeted area more thoroughly.
In the previous wall row video we talked about how "cheating" in the form actually ruins the connection to the targeted muscle:
The only problem is that most people also like to use lots of hip drive to lift the heavy weights up which doesn't allow you to engage the targeted muscles to their full potential.
When it comes to isolating a certain body part, you want to maximize the amount of quality work that is done to these muscle groups. When you are using too much momentum and hip drive, you are generating lots of force with your hips and legs which is taking away quality work from the targeted muscles.
Sometimes cheating is good but there is a big difference between an isolation exercise and a compound exercise. When the purpose is to isolate, you want to isolate the muscle 100% to the best to your ability.
If you are swinging and using your entire body to move the weight, you are doing a compound exercise and barely isolating the targeted area.
In isolation exercises or mobility drills the purpose is not to lift the most weight possible, but to train the muscle the best way possible. This usually means that you need to use high reps (10-20), light weight and focus heavily on mind-muscle connection.
Bicep Curls
Wall allows you to do the most of the bicep curl variations without need to worry about any hip engagement in the exercises. Great curl variations include:
- Spider curl is excellent for targeting the brachialis muscle if your arms are externally rotated (outside).
- Concentration curl will target the short head of biceps unless the arm is externally rotated (in this case it will hit more the brachialis and the long head of biceps)
- Bent over drag curl allows you to target the short head of biceps.
- Hammer curl targets the long head of biceps, brachioradialis (forearm muscle) and brachialis.
Bent over curls are excellent because you will keep tension in the biceps in the upper portion of the repetition. This will help to build both size and strength.
Shoulder Raises
Wall is phenomenal for shoulder raises because the wall will allow you to completely eliminate both hips and the upper body movement if you so desire. Almost everyone at the gym does swinging shoulder raises where the majority of the force is created with their hips and back muscles.
By eliminating the other body parts, you can solely focus on the targeted muscles (shoulders) and thus produce great results. Great variations for shoulders are:
- Front raises for front delts. Excellent to do back against the wall.
- Lateral raises for middle deltoids.
- Rear delt flyes where you are in a bent over position.
- Bent over front raises which target the traps and front deltoids.
By doing all of these different raises with control and slow tempo, you will maximize your results in all heads of the shoulders.
