How to do the Alternate Hammer Curl

Steps

1. Stand up with your torso upright and a dumbbell in each hand being held at arms length. The elbows should be close to the torso.
2. The palms of the hands should be facing your torso. This will be your starting position.
3. While holding the upper arm stationary, curl the right weight forward while contracting the biceps as you breathe out. Continue the movement until your biceps is fully contracted and the dumbbells are at shoulder level. Hold the contracted position for a second as you squeeze the biceps. Tip: Only the forearms should move.
4. Slowly begin to bring the dumbbells back to starting position as your breathe in.
5. Repeat the movement with the left hand. This equals one repetition.
6. Continue alternating in this manner for the recommended amount of repetitions.

Tracking it in OneRep

Add the alternate hammer curl to a routine and your previous weight and reps sit beside every set, so the decision to add load is made by what is already on the screen rather than by memory. Exercise history and volume trends are one tap away, and logging works offline for the gyms where signal does not reach.

Because OneRep tracks food on the same timeline, a stall on this lift can be read against what you were actually eating that month — which is the difference between a programming problem and an eating one. More on that in tracking progressive overload without a spreadsheet.

Where the instructions come from

The steps above come from free-exercise-db, a public-domain exercise dataset. They are general guidance, not coaching for your body: if a movement hurts, stop and get someone qualified to look at it.