Fitness Model, Rob Riches, claims that doing bicep curls with Olympic bars is different than lifting with normal bars.
Biceps have always been a favorite muscle group of mine to train, but
since I’ve started using the Olympic bar to curl with, I’m noticing my
arms start to thicken out, where as before they had good size from the
side view, but when viewed from straight on, I felt as though they
lacked the width I should have in them.
Normal barbell curl (short)
Olympic barbell curl (long)
Does Rob Riches' tip make sense when explained with physics? Let's take two barbells. The first barbell is an Olympic barbell loaded to a total of 60 lbs. The second barbell is a normal length barbell at 60 lbs as well. How would the force on the biceps differ when lifting these two different length but identical weight barbells? I don't see how the biceps would feel any difference.
Best Answer
Provided your hands remain the same distance from the centre of each bar then in a simple physical model the weights can be any distance further out (assuming they are at the same distance and the bars remain the same weight).
Differences in arm strength (right v left) and not exactly holding the bar in symmetric positions can add lots of complicated rotations that might lead to less efficient lifting but more exercise for the muscle.
Though it is hard to be sure with physiological models, the human body is a long way from a simple mechanical model!