Skull Crushers VS Tricep Pushdowns

[Goosey]

Sitting in a dip machine doing dips is like doing squats in a smith machine. The movement is set to a defined path and your core muscles don't get a chance to work. More so with weighted dips, I find the pecs, abs and lats get way pumped up compared to just strapped in a chair pushing some levers down.

That's a stupid analogy.

and there are so many things wrong with this sentence in general.

All exercises barbell or machine are defined by their paths.

"core muscles" are/should be the deep flatter muscles closer to the spine the the rounder ones you see externally.
the rounded ones do the mechanical work, they have a large range of motion.
the "core" type play a more supportive roll there not really responsible for moving joints but more so just making sure, joints are held together, if they move they fatigue real quick.

using a dip machine will enable one to focus on the limbs doing the movement thus enabling greater inroads into fatigue.

 

[Goosey]

This is possibly why we feel more fatigue in the triceps using a seated machine type exercise.

 

[Goosey]

I just can't see how it can isolate the movement purely to the tri's. It's the same as doing dips but you're pushing a weight stack instead of your bodyweight no?

It doesn't isolate anything, the machine enables one to focus on the arms, the torso is strapped in and cannot move.
and there is no fear of falling off the bars, like the conventional exercise.
that can be nasty if you have 30kg strapped to your waist going to fatigue.

 

[Jungnaut]

Well, unless the dip bars are set way overhead I don't think falling off at fatigue is that much of an issue. Surely its just a matter of hopping down the 6-12inches back onto ground zero.

Yeah I see how the tricep machine can help you to focus on the arms more. For those who only have an hour to train and want to maximise their workout with multijointed exercises with a bit of assistance work towards the end, then I'd choose weighted dips anyday. But then I'm not a bodybuilder lol so my observations are a bit skewed.

 

[Darkoz]

An hour is more than enough for a workout
And what do those 'assistance' exercises assist??

 

[Shrek]

An hour is more than enough for a workout
And what do 'assistance' exercises assist??

It's PL terminology used to describe an exercise other than Bench, Dead or Squat.

 

[0ni]

I thought that was the geared BB'ers training modality of choice. I'm not one, so I don't know for sure.

Only when there is insulin in high amounts do you have the ability to do this
You should just get a pump anyway, from just lifting

 

[0ni]

Also I've really been liking triceps punchdowns at the moment
It is very similar to a dip

 

[Goosey]

An hour is more than enough for a workout
And what do those 'assistance' exercises assist??

The accessory lifts silly.

 

[Darkoz]

The accessory lifts silly.

I don't wear any accessories

 

[Shrek]

I don't wear any accessories

Maybe you should.

Anyhow Pushowns for me, 20 reps lately. Yeah Buddy!!!

 

[Darkoz]

Maybe you should.

Anyhow Pushowns for me, 20 reps lately. Yeah Buddy!!!

Took you two years for that, tubby

 

[Fadi]

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Skull crushers or pushdowns?

This is not about either or as far as I'm concerned, but rather in which order and why, is what really matters here (if you care about the health of your triceps' [long head muscle]).





I speak from experience when I tell you that the chance of you tearing the long head of your triceps, increases dramatically if you opt for performing muscle stretching under full load type of triceps exercises such as the skull crushers and the like first off. The triceps need to be fully warmed up before you place it under a load that sees it being stretched to its maximum capacity.

I can't think of a better exercise to warm up the triceps safely than a triceps pushdown type of an exercise. In these form of exercises, the focus is on the contraction of the triceps muscle instead of the stretching. Once thoroughly warmed up, one can then move onto stretching the muscle whilst under load type of exercises.

The muscle micro tears you've probably read about, more often than not occur whilst a muscle is in a stretched position (under load ) as in (say) chest dumbbell flys, or the micro damage can occur whilst controlling/ decelerating /lowering an extreme load (beyond what you can normally lift) in the contraction/concentric phase of a lift. So in a stretched phase as well as the eccentric phase of a lift is when you're more than likely to experience some deep muscle micro tears, more than likely leading to some DOMS, peaking at 36 hours after your workout session.

 

[Goosey]

Lately been using french press to pre fatigue the triceps, then to dip machine, the thing I do like about the machine is you can use a weight to spend a good amount of time on it.

driving home is difficult