maratoolCable Wrist Curl
How to do the cable wrist curl
- Start out by placing a flat bench in front of a low pulley cable that has a straight bar attachment.
- Use your arms to grab the cable bar with a narrow to shoulder width supinated grip (palms up) and bring them up so that your forearms are resting against the top of your thighs. Your wrists should be hanging just beyond your knees.
- Start out by curling your wrist upwards and exhaling. Keep the contraction for a second.
- Slowly lower your wrists back down to the starting position while inhaling.
- Your forearms should be stationary as your wrist is the only movement needed to perform this exercise.
- Repeat for the recommended amount of repetitions.
Muscles worked
The prime movers are the forearm flexors and extensors, which move the wrist and keep the hand closed around whatever you are holding.
Every exercise for:Forearms
How this movement works
One joint changes angle and the resistance travels toward you along a single arc. Nothing is positioned to help, so tension stays where you aimed it and the usable load drops sharply against a multi-joint pull for the same muscle. Protect the range of motion; buying weight by shortening the arc defeats the point.
It is filed under strength: produce force against resistance for a countable number of repetitions, and progress the resistance over time.
What you need
A cable holds tension for the whole range, including the point where a free weight would go slack. Moving the pulley changes the angle the resistance arrives from without changing the movement.
Every exercise using:Cable
These train the forearms too, using equipment this one does not:
- Dumbbell Lying Pronationdumbbell
- Finger Curlsbarbell
- Wrist Circlesbody only
- Bottoms-Up Clean From The Hang Positionkettlebell
Difficulty
Listed at beginner level: the pattern is simple enough to pick up without coaching, and a position that goes wrong mid-set is obvious enough to correct on the next repetition.
Of the 25 forearms exercises in this database, 18 are listed at beginner level.
Photos: free-exercise-db — public domain (Unlicense) Full attribution →
ⓘ Informational only — not a substitute for professional fitness or medical advice.