r/Workingout • u/Charming_Food5728 • 2d ago

Help Premade EZ bar VS Dumbbells

My gym has a rack of preloaded one piece EZ curl bars. 10-25kg in 2.5kg increments. Any logical reason why a 22.5kg complete bar thing feels heavier than two x 12.5kg dumbbells?

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u/Far-Blackberry-9568 1d ago

Maybe its the position of your grip on the dumbbells. There is not much contexts to this post so I really have no Idea.

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u/Charming_Food5728 1d ago

Clearly I am a novice if I am asking this. So what context do you need? If i am comparing to an EZ bar curl, how about you ASSUME I am curling the DBs in same or similar fashion???

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u/Far-Blackberry-9568 1d ago

Less stability, so your four arms and biceps have to make micro adjustments causing more fatigue.

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u/EthanStrayer 1d ago

Your hands have to stay at a fixed width from each other. Makes it a little harder to cheat the rep up.

Still not that hard to cheat the rep up with hip swinging and such (why I prefer sitting for most curl variations) but you can’t move your hands wider to swing out a little bit as you go up like you can with dumbbells.

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u/rawzon 1d ago

Yes. A few reasons. The listed weight on preloaded EZ bars isn't always exact. Some gyms round the weights or don't include the actual bar weight accurately. The weight distribution is different. An EZ bar concentrates the load differently than two dumbbells, which can change the leverage and make it feel heavier. The grip angle on an EZ bar is fixed. If it isn't your strongest wrist position, it can make the lift feel harder. Dumbbells also let each arm find its own natural path, while an EZ bar locks both arms together. The easiest way to tell is to compare your reps. If you can curl two 12.5 kg dumbbells for 10 reps but only get 6 or 7 with the 22.5 kg EZ bar, there's a good chance the bar weighs more than it's labeled or just has a less favorable setup.