The Best Exercises for Forearms

Javier Colomer 4 min. of reading Training Routines Leave a comment

We present a compilation of the best forearm exercises, which will help us increase grip strength and arm volume…

The forearms are possibly the muscle least trained directly, or the one that receives the least emphasis in most routines. Do these exercises for an extremely strong grip and develop your forearms more than ever!

Index

1 Towel Pull-Ups
2 One-Arm Barbell Forearm Curl
3 Seated Dumbbell Wrist Curl
4 Standing Reverse Barbell Curl
5 Farmer’s Walk with Dumbbells
6 Rope Climb

Towel Pull-Ups

This exercise adds an extra difficulty factor to pull-ups themselves, and it will be our own body weight that the gripping muscles will have to support. Performing this exercise regularly will result in a noticeable change in our grip strength, as well as in the development of forearm size.

Perform more sets with fewer repetitions, as we will probably soon reach fatigue in the target muscle, for example 6×6.

One-Arm Barbell Forearm Curl

To perform this exercise, it is recommended to use an Olympic barbell, as its weight and length will suit us quite well. The aim is to perform the curls while trying to maintain balance at all times, that is, preventing the bar from swinging more to one side than the other.

To allow this stability, it will precisely be the effort we have to make from the forearm.

Although at first it may seem to you that the goal is to perform a biceps curl, we actually do perform it, but under the premise of maintaining the correct position of the bar at all times thanks to the effort of the forearm.

Perform fewer sets with more repetitions, such as 3×15 per side.

Seated Dumbbell Wrist Curl

An excellent exercise for working the wrist flexors, a muscle area that is quite underdeveloped in many athletes. We can work it by adding the fatigue component, that is, reaching muscular failure.

We will know it well because the dumbbell itself would fall from our hand.

It is important to pay close attention to the full range of motion, where, in the eccentric phase, it is extremely important to extend the wrist and maintain the grip even with the fingers.

Standing Reverse Barbell Curl

We can use an EZ bar or a short barbell. The load will be lower than the one we would normally use to perform a biceps curl itself. The target muscle in this case would be the brachioradialis, the outer part of the forearm.

Perform 2-4 sets of 12-15 repetitions.

Farmer’s Walk with Dumbbells

Although this is an exercise focused on grip work, what we will notice is the isometric contraction and, therefore, our heart rate will rise significantly. We can even include it as part of a metabolic circuit.

You can perform “walks” of 5 metres to each side with the dumbbells.

Rope Climb

One for advanced users. Without a doubt, climbing the rope has a specific objective: to strengthen our grip. In each climb, we apply a synergistic connection of upper-body strength, leaving the distal end as the only link with the rope itself, which we must grip firmly enough to avoid a dreaded fall.