5 Tricep Exercises You’ve Never Tried

There’s no beating the basics, but a little bit a novelty never hurt either. In the first installment of this series, I focused on the polarizing world of bicep exercises – 4 Bicep Exercises You’ve Never Tried. Next, I’ll focus on the largest part of the arm (2/3 of it) – the triceps.

Here are 5 different tricep exercises that you’ve likely never tried.

1.) Dead-stop Skull Crushers

I first learned about dead-stop training when I was looking for ways to increase muscle mass. Typically you’ll see this used for floor bench or box squats, but you can definitely include it in your accessory movements.

The pause breaks the eccentric-concentric chain and eliminates the assistance you’d normally get from the stretch shortening cycle. In simple terms, this makes it way fucking harder! I’ll do an article on my favorite dead-stop, assistance movements in the future.

I don’t typically go as heavy as I did here, so the reps are usually in the 6-12 range.

2.) Cross-Body Tricep Extension

If traditional skull crushers kill your elbows, this might be the solution for you. These can be done single arm or with both. You might also see it performed with the dumbbells staying in contact from the bottom of the rep to the top. My shoulders are all sorts of fucked up, so I perform them with more space in between.

This is one of the accessory exercises I program the most because it’s a great tricep builder and most of my clients seem to tolerate them really well. These are not as difficult as the dead-stop extensions above, so I’ll program reps from 8-15, 2-5 sets depending on volume elsewhere that day.

3.) Pushdown with Band Attached

This is one of my favorite ways to improve the lockout strength of the triceps. Depending on the tension of the band you use, this will really humble you. I would recommend dropping the weight you normally use by 20-30% to account for the additional band tension. I tend to keep the reps here between 8-12.

4.) Rock Back Tricep Extension (Dumbbells)

I first learned this exercise over 15 years ago when I became obsessed with trying to grow my triceps. This is definitely an old-school bodybuilding movement that you don’t see too often these days. Some find that this is less stressful on their elbows vs. the traditional skull crusher as well due to the change in the eccentric component of the rep.

5.) Barbell JM Press

I love the JM Press and program it with the barbell and dumbbells for every single person I train. I no longer use traditional skull crushers for myself and instead opt for the JM Press. This exercise is credited to the powerlifter, JM Blakley, and popularized by Westside Barbell.

I feel more comfortable loading this than most other tricep exercises, so rep ranges can go from 5-15.

Bonus Exercise

This is kind of a hybrid tricep/chest exercise, but it’s one that I program often. You can use two dumbbells (touching in the center) or the bottom of a kettlebell. I typically use a 5 count eccentric (lower) and 5 count concentric, which leads to an absolute monster burn and incredible pump. You will likely fatigue out by rep 6-8. If not, you aren’t going slow enough.