Overhead Cable Extension

Muscles worked

Effectiveness

★★★★☆ 4/5

A longitudinal trial found elbow extension training in the overhead position produced substantially greater whole-triceps hypertrophy than the neutral arm position, and an 8-week elbow-extensor trial increased triceps cross-sectional area. Evidence is direct but limited in trial count.

How to perform

Facing away from a cable stack, the lifter extends the elbows against cable resistance with the arms held overhead. The overhead arm position places the long head of the triceps brachii under stretch, and all three heads of the triceps contribute to elbow extension. It is a single-joint isolation movement for the triceps.

References

1. Maeo et al., Eur J Sport Sci (2022) - overhead vs neutral elbow extension and triceps hypertrophy
2. Goto et al., J Strength Cond Res (2019) - elbow-extensor training and triceps cross-sectional area