The bicep for the layman is the symbol of strength, with every person flexing their bicep to show off how strong they are. The bicep is also one of the first muscles a newbie starts to train after picking their first dumbbell and curling it, but exercising the bicep stretches far beyond just the basic bicep curl. 

Some of the exercises I do to train my bicep are:

Step 1: Pick up a weight appropriate for you, a way of figuring that out is by first picking up the lightest weight and curling it for 12-15. Do the same with subsequent weights until your form falters. Be sure to take adequate breaks between these reps to not reach the point of muscle fatigue.

Step 2: keep your body loose including legs and arms, with arms hanging by the side of your pelvis (not in-front). Make sure to keep your arm close to your body but also ensure that it doesn’t touch your pelvis.

Step 3: Start with your weaker arm – to prevent future muscle imbalance- and curl the dumbbell towards your shoulder (while simultaneously bringing your hands in-front and rotation) without moving your whole body (no jerks).

Step 4: breathing technique – exhale when you are lifting against the gravity and exhale slowly when you are going towards gravity. Lifting should be little fast and extension should be a slow process, for the best result. Feel the pressure in your biceps.

Step 5: Repeat the same for 12-15 reps if you want to increase your strength (but with lesser weight), and 8-10 reps with a heavier weight to increase muscle bulk.

Step 1: Pick up a single dumbbell of appropriate weight (I recommend 2-4kgs below your bicep curl weight) and sit on a bench while leaning forward and making an angle of approximately 30 degrees and with a firm back

Step 2: Place your elbow on the inner side of the mid-thighregion and stabilize it there and fully extend your arm downwards with hand fully supinated

Step 3: Then slowly curl your dumbbell to your shoulders and the last 20 degrees of flexion rotate that pink finger towards the sky (for that extra effect and to develop that peak in biceps), and repeat for 8-12 reps

Inclined curls are very similar to the normal ones but instead of doing them standing you lie down on a bench angled 60degrees

Step 1: arms hanging by the side with hand and dumbbells facing skywards in full supination with the right amount of weight

Step 2: curl that dumbbell towards the shoulder while breathing out, all the way and squeeze the biceps to its maximum

Step 3: relax the fully squeezed biceps and slowly uncurl your elbow going towards the gravity and inhale.

Each of these exercises mentioned has many different variants, a common one is to substitute dumbbells in each of them with a cable giving you a more controlled movement. Different biceps curl exercises and substituting with cable or barbell rod, give you variation and not let the biceps muscle adapt to a particular form of exercise, hence producing more effect.

So go ahead and enjoy training your biceps while keeping in mind the proper form as well as ensuring a diversified workout routine

Basic curl

Concentration curl

Inclined curl