pull ups?

when are you doing pull ups? Are you doing them in the beginnign for your routine or during it when your lats are already used? Because I've been OVERtraining for the past few weeks and i decided to cut it short and during those days i couldn't do ONE pull up/chin-up. I could only do close grips. Now I can do 4 sets of 12 chin ups.
 
jimed43 said:
I still can not do pull ups. Is there an alternative I can do to build muscle up, to do pull ups?

thanks
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Negative wide grip pullups with full range of motion. Single arm seated lat pull down. Also make your weakest exercises the first ones hit in the routine.
 
assisted pullups, either on a machine that reduces your bodyweight with counterweights, or have a friend grab your legs and lift up on them a little to lower your weight/resistance.
 
I'm glad to see you are interested in doing pull ups... they are an excellent exercise.

Unfortunately, as you know, they are very difficult.

Here are some things you can do:

Build strength (like you said). My advice is to do assisted pull ups, chin ups (they are easier), and weighted pulling movements. Just keep in mind that there is no substitute for the pull up... so concentrate on the assisted pull ups until you can do 1 good one.

Lose weight: If you are carrying some extra weight, concentrate on losing some fat. The less weight you have to pull... the easier it will be.

Practice: Once you can do 1 good pull up... practice. Perform pull ups throughout the day, or throughout your regular work out. I know it is a simplistic answer, but you get better at doing pull ups by doing more pull ups.

At this point you have to strengthen your resolve... many people just give up and never get good at doing pull ups. Keep practicing and you will get better.

I believe pull ups should be a part of everyone's well rounded fitness program... so don't give up!

Pull ups are one of those exercises that are a point of pride... and the physical (and mental) benefits are well worth the effort.

Keep up the good work and good luck,
Eddie Lomax
 
same spot as you a year or so ago. Lose weight, work on total fitness strengthen your arms back chest (and everything else) and keep practicing. Before each workout I warm up with 3 sets of 10 and a brief jog and then stretch out.
 
Lat Pull Downs are good for working up your ability to do pull ups. It is a similar motion and you can add/subtract weight as needed depending on how strong you are and work your way up. Believe it or not I was only able to do 3 pull ups before I had worked out about a year ago and after about 6-8 weeks of consistent workouts and Lat Pull downs 2-3x a week I was doing 12 or so pull ups.
 
You can try an assist machine. If you don't have access to such, get a jump band or other similar band, you can get them for about $20 or less, loop it over the bar and put your legs it in.

It'll assist you on the initial pull, but then it's mostly your effort at the top, where most people start to fail.
 
trainerty said:
Negative wide grip pullups with full range of motion. Single arm seated lat pull down. Also make your weakest exercises the first ones hit in the routine.
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why do wide grip? contrary to popular belif, it wont put the lats all that much more into it, if that was what you are aiming at, scalp movement is more importaint for that, pluss with a narrow grip you get a bigger ROM.
 
trainerty said:
Also make your weakest exercises the first ones hit in the routine.
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I dont know if I agree with this. If tricep extensions were his weakest exercise, should he do them first? Unless you really wanted to excel at one exercise, but i hardly think improving your tricep exercises would be worth fatiguing your tris before you do your bench press, causing your chest exercises to suffer.

That's just my opinion though.
 
junkfoodbad said:
I dont know if I agree with this. If tricep extensions were his weakest exercise, should he do them first? Unless you really wanted to excel at one exercise, but i hardly think improving your tricep exercises would be worth fatiguing your tris before you do your bench press, causing your chest exercises to suffer.

That's just my opinion though.
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i dont think thats what trainerty meant, no isolation first is an overruling rule.
But if you're squats are weak, do them first, before you do other compound movements that may tire you. If your tris are weak, do something that hits the tris early on, like bench or overheads.
 
Karky said:
i dont think thats what trainerty meant, no isolation first is an overruling rule.
But if you're squats are weak, do them first, before you do other compound movements that may tire you. If your tris are weak, do something that hits the tris early on, like bench or overheads.
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Ah gotcha...just trying to prevent misleading information from spreading.
 
junkfoodbad said:
Ah gotcha...just trying to prevent misleading information from spreading.
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yeah, good you said it, could quickly have been taken that way, i know i used to do biceps curls before i did my pulldowns/pullups when i used to have my back/bi day :p I learned from myself though, to putt the back movements first since my bi got so ****ed up during the pulldowns :p
 
wide grip, negative resistance pull-ups are a good way to really target the lats and help bring up their strength so you can do the positive movement eventually.

and by wide grip, i'm sure 'wider than shoulder width' was meant...not a 48" wide grip
'wide grip' means diff. things to diff. people
 
yeah i figured wider than shoulder was meant too, which doesnt really hit the lats more, since its the scalp movement that does this, atleast so ive been told.
 
wow thanks for all of the information. I figured once I drop more of the excess weight, I will be good to go. I am down from 340 --> 265 since last November...
 
Karky said:
why do wide grip? contrary to popular belif, it wont put the lats all that much more into it, if that was what you are aiming at, scalp movement is more importaint for that, pluss with a narrow grip you get a bigger ROM.
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Sorry I missed this....Malkore already answered it. My 2 cents.... it is a harder movement than narrow grip because of the leverage of the joints and limbs. The hands grip farther away from the body causing the shoulder joints to...."open up"....when this happens the muscles will have to work harder to move the load(your body)......physics.
 
but is it worth the sacrefise of ROM? besides and you can always just add weight so it would be just as hard.
 
I read (I don't remember where), that lat pulldowns and close reverse grip pulldowns give you the same benefit as pull ups and chins.
 
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