5 Best Compound Tricep Exercises for Strong Upper Body

If you’re looking to build your triceps while still increasing your overall upper body strength, you should give compound tricep exercises a try.

These exercises are famous for working more than one muscle group at a time. This means that even though the main focus of your exercise is on your triceps, nearly all of your upper body is benefiting from it and getting stronger.

The nature of compound tricep exercises makes them an excellent choice for those who want to build a balanced physique.

In this article, we’ll get a better understanding of compound tricep exercises: their properties, how they differ from isolation exercises, how to incorporate them into a workout routine, and the best ones you should try.

Compound Exercises Vs. Isolation Exercises

First, let’s get the basics out of the way and understand the difference between compound and isolation exercises:

Isolation Exercises

Isolation exercises are those that focus on the movement of only one joint and, consequently, engage only one muscle group. Think of your bicep curls, reverse curls, front raises, calf raises, etc.

They work wonders on isolating a single muscle group (hence the name) and making it stronger. Isolation exercises are great if you have a muscle imbalance and need to give a muscle group extra attention or if you are really focused on aesthetics and want to make sure your body looks like one of a Greek god.

Compound Exercises

Now, compound exercises are awesome for increasing overall strength. They are multi-jointed exercises, which means that, even though the exercise has a main target, several muscle groups are engaged and strengthened during its execution.

For example: everyone knows the bench press is an exercise that targets the chest, however, it also engages the triceps, the biceps, the shoulder muscles, and the core. Making it an awesome exercise for the upper body in general.

Compound exercises also play a part in increasing your balance, agility and overall body awareness since they involve more complex techniques than exercises on a machine. Think of a male gymnast’s body and what kind of exercises he performs during practice, their body is almost fully built on compound exercises!

Finally, compound exercises are considered a great option for working your core muscles. This results in improvements in your posture and prevention of back injuries and pains.

How to Integrate Compound Tricips Exercises in Your Routine

Now that you understand what compound exercises are and how they differ from isolation exercises, you can start incorporating them into your routine. How, do you ask? By starting your gym session with them

You see, compound exercises are harder to perform with proper technique than isolation exercises due to their complexity.

You should place your compound exercises at the start of your gym session so that your well-rested mind and body can properly perform them. Isolated exercises are way simpler to do with proper form. Besides, they are usually done with the help of machines. That makes it even harder to mess up even if you’re tired and wanna go home.

Best Compound Tricep Exercises

With all that in mind, let’s take a look at some of the best compound tricep exercises to get them chiseled and popping while still giving your whole upper body a pump.

1. Close Grip Bench Press

I know what you’re thinking: “Wait a minute, isn’t the bench press a chest exercise?”. And you’re right, the bench press is an awesome compound chest exercise.

However, with a few modifications to the grip width, we can transform this staple of chest exercises into an efficient compound tricep exercise.

Besides, even though the focus is now on the triceps, this variation will still target the shoulder and pectoral muscles since that’s the whole purpose of compound exercises.

Here’s a step-by-step on how to do it:

1. Load the bar with a challenging amount of weight and lie on the bench with the bar over your head.
2. Set up a bach arch by planting your feet on the ground and pushing, tucking your shoulder blades, and bracing your core while puffing your chest. Now you have proper tension throughout your whole body
3. Grab the bar at about shoulder-width, and make sure your elbows are close to your body and not at the traditional 45º angle.
4. Unrack the bar and lower it until it touches your chest
5. Now bring it back up and focus on pushing with your triceps while doing so. They should be the main driving force in the exercise
6. Repeat for the desired number of reps and sets.

By the way, if you want to take your bench press PR to the next level, learn how to bench more.

2. Diamond Push-Ups

Diamond push-ups are an incredible compound tricep exercise option. They are a slight variation to the push-up where you place your hands together in the shape of a diamond while doing the exercise.

This variation will mainly target your triceps, but your chest, core, and deltoids will also benefit from it. Finally, diamond push-ups are a versatile exercise since they require only body weight and can be done anywhere.

Check out how to properly do it:

1. Get into the standard push-up position: straight body parallel to the ground.
2. Place your hands on the ground forming a diamond shape with your thumbs and index fingers.
3. Lower your body slowly towards the ground, applying resistance to gravity.
4. Push with your triceps and go back to the starting position.
5. Repeat for the desired number of reps and sets.

This variation is sure to make your triceps sore.  However, different parts of your body might be sore after push-ups. It’s better to know where should you feel sore after push-ups to avoid injuries.  f

3. Tricep Dips

This popular calisthenics exercise is one of many bodyweight dips and consists of pushing yourself up between two parallel bars. That’s why it is also known as Parallel Bar Dips.

Besides the triceps, tricep dips are also going to work your chest muscles.

1. Stand between the parallel bars.
2. Hold the bars and push your body up.
3. Suspend yourself and maintain an upright position. Too much leaning forward will activate the chest more than we want and take the focus out of the triceps.
4. Engage your core muscles and lower yourself until your elbows are at about 90º.
5. Go back to the initial position by pushing, and focus on your triceps movement while doing so.
6. Repeat for the desired number of reps and sets.

Pro tip: if this exercise gets too easy, add weight to yourself by attaching plates to a lifting belt.

4. Bench Dips

If the tricep dips are too advanced for you, perhaps the bench dips may suit your tricep growing needs.

It is a similar movement (you still need to push your body weight through your triceps) but it’s easier and you need even less equipment. All you need for the bench dips are, you guessed it, a bench… or a chair, or a box, or any elevated surface with the proper height to be honest.

1. Sit on the floor with your elevated surface of choice behind you and extended legs.
2. Place your hands on it and lift your body until your arms are fully extended.
3. Now lower your body slowly until your elbows reach a 90º angle.
4. Repeat for the desired number of reps and sets.

Pro tip: You can adjust the difficulty of this exercise with minor adjustments to it. For example, bending your knees can make it easier, while putting your feet on a higher surface can make it more challenging.

5. Floor Tricep Dips

This exercise can be done without any extra equipment which makes it a very versatile option when there’s no gym available. Since it’s a bodyweight exercise, you’ll probably want to add more reps than usual tricep exercises to get the same results.

1. Sit on the floor with your feet flat and hands close to your hips.
2. Lift your hips with your arms.
3. Bend your elbows to lower your hips without touching the ground.
4. Lift them back to their original position.
5. Repeat for the desired number of reps and sets.

Final Word

At last, we’ve reached the end of the article. Hopefully, now you understand what compound tricep exercises are and how to properly incorporate them into your workout routine. If you have any doubts, don’t hesitate to ask a professional or come back to our blog! Surely we have the answer you’re looking for.

Now go out there and build those chiseled triceps you’ve always dreamed of!

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