Five Great Ways to Get Popeye’s Forearms!

Estimated reading time: 3 minutes

There are five great ways to get Popeye’s forearms without lifting weights. You only need sticks for the exercises demonstrated below.

The following methods will leave you feeling like you have Popeye’s forearms!

(1) Squeeze the sticks

One exercise is to do the controlled version of the angles of attack. At the end of the strike, squeeze the stick for 10 seconds (or however long you want to squeeze it). Squeeze it as if you are squeezing water out of the stick. You’ll feel like you have Popeye’s forearms!

(2) Winter gloves

I like to don extra thick winter gloves for this exercise. I have worn gloves for a few private lessons. Let me tell you, doing this for an hour is a nice workout for the forearms. To make this extra intense, squeeze the sticks at the end of a prescribed movement. Give it a try!

(3) Heavy sticks with winter gloves

Want Popeye’s forearms? This will do it! As demonstrated in the above video, try the heavy sticks without gloves. If that is not sufficiently challenging, train with the winter gloves on and see how that goes!

(4) Abanico

The abanico exercise has different versions, ranging from the basic to hirada and the double-action version. Regardless of the abanico version, start with a light stick and work up to a heavy stick with gloves. Take your time.

(5) Arm wraps

I got this exercise from Kwan Ying Do Kung Fu, a style that I studied for a couple of years, way back in my late teens. I fell in love with this exercise and still do this on a regular basis. It’s a dynamic tension exercise. It’s another way to get popeye forearms!

In this exercise, you squeeze your arms as much as possible throughout the entire exercise. Inhalation and exhalation are important, as demonstrated in the below video.

While there are many more forearm exercises that you can do, these are the ones that I have done on a consistent basis. I have mixed in other exercises to keep from getting bored.

The video below contains some basic exercises to strengthen the forearms. Give them a try. I particularly like the first exercise.

If you are not able to view this video, go here.

That said, you must stretch after doing the above exercises. Do them after you do any type of forearm strengthening regimen. Below is a video with a good overview of the type of stretches you should do.

Over to you, FMA practitioners, what kind of forearm exercises do you do, along with your overall fitness program? Let’s hear it from you!

Additional Reading:

• Fantastic Abanico Corto Drill!
• The Coming Winter
• Bodyweight Exercises
• Killer Left Hand Abanico Techniques
• Countering the Punyo Feed

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