Learn how to Do the Drag Curl: Kind, Advantages & Alternate options

The drag curl is an “old-school” bodybuilding train famed for its capacity to construct your biceps “peak.”

Whereas it might not be as widespread as common barbell and dumbbell curls, it’s a implausible train for gaining higher arm measurement and power.

On this article, you’ll study what drag curls are, the best way to do correct drag curl kind, the advantages of the train, which muscular tissues it really works, widespread errors and the best way to keep away from them, the most effective barbell drag curl options and variations, and extra. 

What Are Drag Curls?

Drag curls are a variation of the customary biceps curl that emphasize the biceps lengthy head. 

The biceps lengthy head is the portion of the biceps on the skin of the higher arm that provides the looks of a “peak” when flexed.

Drag Curl Kind: Learn how to Do Drag Curls Appropriately

To grasp drag curl kind, cut up the train into three elements: arrange, drag, and descend.

1. Arrange

Whereas standing up straight along with your toes shoulder-width aside, maintain a barbell with a shoulder-width grip and your palms going through away from you. Enable your arms to hold straight down so the bar rests in your thighs.

2. Drag 

Drag the bar up your physique by bending your elbows and permitting them to maneuver backward. Proceed transferring your elbows again till the bar reaches nipple top or barely under.

3. Descend

Reverse the motion and return to the beginning place. 

Right here’s the way it ought to look while you put all of it collectively:

The Advantages of the Drag Curl

Most Biceps Growth

Analysis exhibits that combining compound pulling workouts involving the biceps with focused biceps workouts just like the drag curl maximizes biceps development. 

Doing so lets you practice your biceps at completely different angles and thru various ranges of movement, which produces extra balanced and full development than solely utilizing compound workouts.

It additionally ensures you practice your “bis” with sufficient quantity (units) to stimulate development with out different muscular tissues changing into a limiting issue.

Biceps Peak Emphasis

The lengthy head of the biceps “crosses” the shoulder joint, so it’s most stretched and in a position to generate most pressure when your arm is behind your physique. 

Thus, workouts that place your arms behind your physique, just like the drag biceps curl, are typically the most effective workouts for creating your biceps lengthy heads, which is the portion of the biceps that contributes most to your biceps peak.

Shoulder Stability

The biceps, particularly its lengthy head, performs a position in stabilizing the top of the humerus (higher arm bone) throughout the glenoid cavity (a shallow socket in your shoulder blade that holds the humerus).

Due to this fact, strengthening the biceps might assist stabilize the shoulder and maintain it wholesome.

Drag Curl: Muscle mass Labored

The primary muscular tissues labored by the drag curl are the biceps brachii, or “biceps.” It additionally works your brachialis and forearms to a lesser extent.

Right here’s how the principle muscle group labored by the drag curl appears in your physique:

Units and Reps for the Drag Curl

Since you use a barbell (or EZ bar) for the drag biceps curl, it’s inherently extra secure and balanced than most different biceps isolation workouts, thus permitting you to raise heavier weights.

For males seeking to construct muscle and acquire power, doing 3 units of 4-to-6 or 6-to-8 reps works properly, whereas 3 units of 6-to-8 or 8-to-10 reps is extra becoming for girls.

Who Ought to Do the Drag Curl?

The drag curl is a superb train for anybody seeking to maximize biceps measurement and power. It’s well-suited to those that have entry to restricted tools (if you happen to practice at residence, for instance) because it lets you practice your arms in a novel method with out requiring any specialist tools.

Frequent Drag Curl Errors

Utilizing an excessive amount of weight

Making an attempt to raise an excessive amount of weight on the drag curl may cause your kind to interrupt down, lowering the effectiveness of the train and rising the danger of damage.

Keep away from this by selecting a weight that lets you full every rep with correct kind and deal with performing “clear” reps quite than how a lot weight you raise.

Letting the burden fall again to the beginning place

Analysis exhibits that controlling the eccentric portion (“reducing” part) of any biceps curl is a extremely efficient method to enhance muscle development. As a basic rule, you must take the identical time to raise the burden as you do to decrease it to the beginning place—round one or two seconds for every is an efficient goal.

Utilizing momentum

Counting on momentum to “hump” the burden up reduces the work your biceps do and, thus, how a lot muscle you acquire. To stop your self from utilizing momentum within the drag curl, maintain your torso, hips, and knees nonetheless throughout every rep.

Letting your elbows drift ahead

Letting your elbows drift ahead turns the train into a conventional curl. Whereas this isn’t essentially dangerous, it lessens the emphasis on the biceps lengthy head, undermining the first advantage of the drag curl.

The Finest Barbell Drag Curl Alternate options and Variations

1. Dumbbell Drag Curl

The primary advantage of the dumbbell drag curl is it trains all sides of your physique independently, which may help you discover and repair muscle imbalances. 

2. Cable Drag Curl

The cable drag curl retains extra fixed pressure on the biceps than the barbell drag curl, which can help muscle development. That stated, some individuals discover the cable variation difficult to carry out as a result of the cable pulls you backward, which might make it difficult to stability. 

3. Smith Machine Drag Curl

The Smith machine drag curl is nearly precisely the identical because the barbell drag curl; the one distinction is that you simply use a Smith machine quite than a barbell. The Smith machine drag curl is a superbly viable drag curl different. Nonetheless, keep in mind that it forces you to coach by a barely unnatural vary of movement, which some individuals dislike.  

4. Bayesian Cable Curl

The Bayesian cable curl mimics drag curl kind however lets you use cables as an alternative of a barbell. The advantages of the Bayesian curl are that it trains your biceps in a stretched place and retains fixed pressure in your biceps all through every rep, each of which profit development.

5. Incline Dumbbell Curl

The incline dumbbell curl trains your biceps once they’re behind your torso, which emphasizes the lengthy head, much like the drag curl. The incline curl additionally creates intense biceps pressure all through all the vary of movement, which is necessary for creating balanced measurement and power.

Drag Curl Ideas

1. Finish each set 1-to-3 reps shy of muscle failure.

As I clarify in my health books for males and girls, to maximise your outcomes, you have to take most units to inside a rep or two of failure.

Ask your self on the finish of every set of drag biceps curls, “If I needed to, what number of extra reps may I’ve gotten with good kind?” If the reply is greater than two, enhance the burden or reps to make your subsequent set more difficult.

2. When you hit the highest of your rep vary for a set, transfer up in weight. 

In case your exercise requires 6-to-8 reps of the barbell drag curl and also you get 8 reps for a set, add 10 kilos to your subsequent set.

When you handle 3 or fewer reps with the brand new weight, cut back the burden by 5 kilos to make sure you keep within the 6-to-8 rep vary. 

Comply with this sample of attempting so as to add reps or weight to each train in each exercise.

3. Contract your biceps laborious on each rep.

Analysis exhibits that utilizing “inner cues” (psychological mantras that draw your consideration towards what you’re doing along with your physique) might enhance biceps development.

As an example, in a research performed by scientists at Lehman School, members elevated biceps activation when the researchers reminded them to “squeeze the muscle” throughout units of biceps curls. 

What’s extra, members who used this cue skilled twice as a lot biceps development over the 8-week research as members who used a cue like “get the burden up.”

Drag Curl FAQs

FAQ #1: What does a drag curl do?

Drag curls strengthen your biceps muscular tissues. Moreover, performing drag curls with the bar near your physique emphasizes your biceps lengthy heads, that are the parts of your biceps that contribute most to your biceps peak. 

FAQ #2: Are drag curls good for the lengthy head?

Sure, drag curls are helpful for the lengthy head of the biceps as a result of they place your higher arms behind your physique, which helps to emphasise the lengthy head over the quick head. 

FAQ #3: What do drag curls work?

Drag curls primarily work the biceps brachii. Whereas they practice each the lengthy and quick heads of the biceps, they’re significantly well-suited to concentrating on the lengthy head, serving to to boost total biceps measurement and top.