The Lower Biceps Myth: What’s Really Going On Down There

The lower biceps is the area of the biceps which inserts into the elbow area. Purportedly, this area can be targeted directly to achieve the ‘jumping out’ appearance of the biceps when relaxed, and some have even claimed that working the lower biceps helps to close the gap many people have between the lower biceps and the inner bend of the elbow. These things sound brilliant, but the problem is the lower biceps doesn’t exist – at least not how most people think.

Why the lower biceps doesn’t really exist…

Take a look at any anatomy picture of the biceps; do you see any subdivision of the biceps which creates a lower biceps? You shouldn’t because there isn’t any such part. As far as the biceps brachii go, you have 2 muscles (hence ‘bi’) which run down and that’s it.

Now you know this, let’s get to the other fact: When you flex a muscle, you cannot choose to flex only a select section of it. And, that is precisely what most ‘lower biceps’ proponents must be advocating or how would you be able to target the lower biceps?

Try it now. Try and flex only the lower part of your biceps whilst keeping the rest of your biceps completely relaxed. You cannot do it, right?

That’s because a muscle pulls in its entirety or not at all. A muscle is either flexed or it’s not. It can be flexed gently, it can be flexed strongly, but that’s it.

The ‘real’ lower biceps…

It can’t be denied that certain biceps exercises such as preacher curls in particular do appear to stress the lower area of the biceps, but that area isn’t the lower biceps per se, it is in fact the brachialis which runs underneath the biceps and inserts in that area. This is what people are experiencing when they feel pumped and worked in the lower biceps area.

The good news is, training the brachialis does push the biceps out more, including the lower part, and creating the ‘jumping out’ effect. The bad news is, no amount of training will cause a biceps gap to disappear – the gap is tendons, and even though slightly elongating muscles is possible through stretching, shortening tendons is clearly impossible.