Close-Grip EZ Bar Curl
Also works: Forearms
Curling the inner handles of an EZ bar puts the hands about 20 cm apart and tilts the wrists inwards, roughly 20-30 degrees short of full supination. That angle is the most elbow-friendly way to curl a bar, which matters more than any claim about which head of the biceps it favours.
Own the movement
Set up first, then execute. Every cue below is something you can check on your next set.
Before the first rep
- Load the EZ bar and take a supinated grip on the innermost angled section, hands roughly 20 cm apart.
- Stand feet hip-width with the bar hanging against the front of your thighs.
- Tuck your elbows into your sides and set them just in front of your hip bones, never behind them.
- Squeeze your glutes and brace your abs before the first rep so the torso has nowhere to go.
Every rep
Breathing & tempo — Exhale on the way up, inhale on the way down. One to two seconds up, a one-second squeeze, three seconds down. If the bar falls faster than that you are training half the movement.
Sets, reps & load
Where to start, and what to change when it stops being hard.
An EZ bar weighs 7-12 kg empty, which is a working set on its own for a beginner. Most trained lifters land between 25 and 40 kg for sets of 10. Add 2.5 kg once you hit the top of your rep range on every set with the upper arms vertical and no hip drive.
What goes wrong
The errors that show up most often, and the cue that fixes each one.
Stand with your back a few centimetres from a wall and keep it there for the whole set. The first rep that touches the wall is a cheated rep: end the set, or drop 5 kg and start again.
Grip hard enough to feel the forearms tighten and keep the knuckles level with the forearm bones. If they still fold, the bar is too heavy for your grip position rather than for your biceps.
Lower until the elbow is fully open and pause for a count before the next rep. Half-range curls with a big bar are the most common way arm training stalls without anyone noticing.
Run it as the same movement with a friendlier wrist angle. Rotate grip width every few training blocks for joint comfort, but do not stack both in one session expecting different results.
Why bother
A straight bar forces both wrists into full supination and holds them there for the whole set. For plenty of lifters that is fine; for anyone with a clicking wrist or a sore inner elbow it is the reason curls hurt. The cambered inner section of an EZ bar lets the wrists sit short of that end range, and the pain usually leaves with it.
The common claim is that a narrow grip shifts work onto the long head of the biceps. The measured difference is small, small enough that it should not drive your programming. Choose this variation because you can load it comfortably and repeatably, not because of the head it supposedly favours.
Where it fits
Open your arm work with it, in the 8-12 range, while your elbows are fresh and you can still load a bar honestly. Follow it with something that loads the stretched position, such as an incline or preacher curl. Two sessions a week and six to ten hard sets of elbow flexion in total covers most people.
If this one isn't it
No kit, too hard, or too easy — here's where to go instead.
Same job, different kit
Start here instead
When this gets easy
Asked and answered
Does a close grip build the long head or the short head?
The usual answer is the long head, and the effect is real but small. Grip width moves your elbows relative to your shoulders by a couple of centimetres, which is not enough to reorganise how your arms develop. Pick the grip that lets you load the bar pain-free, and get head-specific work from shoulder position instead: incline curls for the long head, preacher curls for the short.
Why does an EZ bar hurt my wrists less than a straight bar?
Because full supination is an end-range forearm position and holding it under load is what irritates people. The angled inner section lets you sit 20-30 degrees short of it. If it still hurts there, move to dumbbells, where each hand chooses its own rotation independently.
Can I do these seated?
Yes, and it removes the hip swing entirely. The cost is that a seated bar curl runs into your thighs at the bottom, so you lose part of the range. If cheating is the problem you are solving, a chest-supported curl solves it better than sitting down does.
Should I hold the inner or the outer angled section of the EZ bar?
The inner angles, which is what makes this the close-grip version and gives the biggest tilt away from full supination. The outer angles put your hands near shoulder width and sit only slightly short of a straight bar, so use those when you want your ordinary curl with a friendlier wrist. Alternating the two across training blocks keeps the elbows fresh; doing both in one session is just curls twice with extra steps.