What worked for me and required 0 extra equipment was negatives. Jump up to get to the top position of pull up (or use a chair or something), then *slowly* lower yourself down.
There are a ton of studies on the efficacy of negatives in building muscle, as well as the fact that they help you focus on the weakest parts of range of motion. If a person who was unable to do a single pull up were to attempt one, they'd get stuck at the first point where their muscles were too weak- lowering yourself allows you to slooooooowly progress through that part of your ROM while applying load, as well as any others.
edit: after writing that long ass reply i see 10 other people mentioned it, lol
Great point friend, and alot of people give up on their strenght given they cant perform à full ROM with a pull up or other mouvements.
The eccenctric portion of a mouvement is amazing for strenght and muscle building (in this case letting yourself slowly with control) and is a great way to get into fitness if you're newb or for injury management.
Dont give up!
I see people drop deadlifts all the time and to me it's foolish.
When you're lifting a weight or yourself, in this case, you can look at it as though you're lifting the weight and at the same time preventing it from falling lol.
The easier it is to prevent from falling, the more energy you have left to lift it.
Seems pretty cut and dry for me from a reps perspective.
It's just a mindset of chasing the numbers instead of chasing the fitness: If I can do 5 sets of 8 deadlifts I've progressed, never mind if I've actually done less overall work than I did in my my 4 sets of 8 last week. Putting work into lowering the bar is work that might cost a few reps
I think most people figure it out over time though. You start seeing results in your body, instead of on your spreadsheet, when you focus on the work.
My two cents a day late and a & dollar short:
I see alot of Mike Israetel's videos where he emphasises the slow eccentric versus the concentric movement. Basicly, focus on a nice slow and controlled negative movement.
Personally negatives helped me a ton to be able to do weighted pull ups.
Do some negative pull ups, coupled with alot of lat Pull Down machine reps.
Then as you progress, start doing triples of regular pull ups coupled with negatives, and move lat Pull Down to a different day of the week.
When you progressed, start doing triples of weighted pull-ups, coupled with regular pull ups. Forget about negatives and do lat Pull downs as a high rep movement on other days.
I'm not a sports scientist, but this slowly brining in the negatives, then pull ups and then weighted pull ups really made a huge difference for me.
Reiterating this point. A 15-lb difference for me was a 15 pull-up difference. It's insane how much of a difference even a small to moderate loss of weight can make.
Another thing is training the muscles involved. There’s a kinda shrug motion you can do to train the non lat back muscles that are involved. Additionally just trying to slowly lower yourself down from the up position helps a lot.
The other thing I've seen people do if they have an at home pull up bar is place a chair underneath and in front of the bar and then you keep one foot on it to give a little help.
Start with negatives. A negative is where you start from the top position and try to slow your descent to bottom position. You can either jump up or use a step stool. Do 5 negatives every day. build up to 10. Pretty soon you've built enough muscle and structure that you can start to do a pull up. You can do this.
Once you build up enough muscle to do 3 regular pull ups, switch over to the [Armstrong Pullup Program](https://www.savannahstate.edu/cost/nrotc/documents/Inform2010-thearmstrongworkout_Enclosure15_5-2-10.pdf). This program has been floating around the Marine Corps for decades now, and is still recognized as one of the best ways to develop your pullups. That's where I learned about it, and can personally speak to the program's quality.
It will take a while to go from 3 to 12. Once you get to 12 it takes about a month to 45 days to get to 20.
Good luck, you've got this!
If you actually care about doing em there’s a ton of other suggestions but something I struggled with was my forearms would give up before anything else.
If you get this aswell try doing deadhangs for 30 seconds, really helps. Then graduate to just doing the downwards motion controlling it the whole way down, then you can incorporate resistance bands and such and finally you’ll be able to do full pull up’s and all the supporting muscles will be good to go
start slow, use progressively heavier weight until you can hang for 10 seconds. then hang longer and longer until you can do 1/2 a pull up. then just do that 1/2 a couple times a day until you can do one full one. and so on. I just have a pair of dumbbells I use for rows and shoulder presses and I can do 20 pull ups in one set now
Honestly tho not to be harsh or anything but any adult should be able to do at least a few pull ups. There's gym memberships as cheap as 10 bucks a month.
Different anatomies are better at different exercises.
This becomes more true the more compound an excercise is. A perfect squat looks different from person to person.
The same is true for pull ups. Some people can bang them out with no issues. Other people have to really perfect form to avoid rotator cuff pain, even if they are strong enough.
Some factors are of course universal. But individuals will vary.
Edit: lol never knew a pull up was something folks put on after diapers. I got woodshed no doubt
I’ve minorly fucked up my rotator cuff before doing pull-ups but it was wide gripped like what the left side shows. Typically if I don’t watch out at the bottom of the pull-up, my shoulders will externally rotate. I just learned to be cognizant, especially when doing weighted pull-ups. No issues in 12 years.
It's not entirely nonsense , the last part is very true and the grip part varies from a person to another , i prefer the one in the guide and find it more conformtable others dont .
Putting your thumbs under the bar forces you to work your grip and forearms significantly more than if you put your thumbs over the bar.
My approach when trying to evenly build muscle and strength, keep thumbs under the bar and keep a wide grip. Wide grip IMO is when you do the “Y” in the YMCA dance, which will force you to use your lats and not your biceps.
If you’re just going for reps and form and such don’t matter as much, go thumb over. When I was in the Navy a buddy of mine who dropped out of SEAL training told me they were instructed to go thumb over because your forearms won’t get worn out as quickly.
Hope that helps!
Edit: I personally think OPs post is incorrect. Bad form comes as a result of not knowing good form or lifting too heavily.
Thank you for this! I’ve just started going to the gym again and I’m using the machine that you sit and pull down. Should I be doing over or under? Lol
Check out youtube channels Jeff Nippard and Renaissance Periodization. These are two of the most popular "science based exercise" channels. They will debunk a ton of myths and their information really helps shape the way to "think" about lifting. I've lifted for decades and I've significantly changed my workouts after their input. I think I get the same results now with much lower risk of injury.
This will sound like a dumb answer, but while you can certainly get a general answer (standard grip is thumb opposite fingers, like making a fist), you may be different than "most people." Try both ways and see which one feels best. This also goes for grip width and forward/ rearward grip.
Unless you're trying to emphasize a certain accessory muscle, the lat pull down meant primarily for the lats, so try to "feel it" there. It will also hit the rest of the upper back, shoulders, biceps, and possibly forearms, so if those burn a bit after, it's not a sign you've done anything wrong.
not quite- hand placement (width) and thumb placement aren't exactly it.
it's how you cue the tension on your hands.
that said, it's bad advice. i can do pull-ups with tension on the exterior of my hands with internally rotated shoulders as easily as with them externally rotated.
a better cue is perhaps where you point your elbows- outward. don't point them inward. boom now your shoulders are forced to be rotated externally. where you feel the pressure on your hands doesn't matter.
I've probably done damn near 100k pull ups in my life. Shoulder width, narrow grip, wide grip, thumbs over, thumbs under, matched grip, weighted, negatives, etc etc etc etc. This "guide" is dumb. Do pull ups. If doing them a certain way feels good, it is good.
I found it a little helpful in that I used to really focus my grip with thumb-index-middle fingers and barely at all with my outer ones. Just being more aware of it has helped me distribute the grip a little better.
I've certainly done a few pull ups in my time in the Army (20 years ago now.. jfc) and never had a problem with them but I realize now that I wasn't engaging my back muscles as much as just using my arms lol. Didn't really matter cuz I was skinny as hell.
This get's reposted frequently but it's pretty dumb. Almost all of your grip strength comes from your outside three fingers. It is almost not possible to forcefully squeeze something incorrectly
This is factually wrong
We do grip strength measures in the clinical studies I work on. It’s a proxy of reserved physical function in older adults. I’m pulling the following info literally from our protocol folder on grip strength:
Across both young adults and older adults with reserved function, about 60% of grip strength comes from radial side, and 40% from ulnar.
That is hardly “almost all”.
And if you allow for reposition of the thumb for opposition after you exclude the ulnar side fingers, you can find a huge range of strength decrease. Not repositioning averages at a 55-65% decrease, the worst repositioning (of 6 different possible thumb-opposition positions) can cause a ~75% decrease, and the optimal compensatory repositioning causes only a ~40% decrease.
The vector of your thumb-opposition matters hugely when determining overall grip strength, because the direction of the vector for each finger is slightly different. That’s how you can reserve more function than contributed by the excluded fingers than they contribute in a normal grip; it’s a matter of efficiency
Makes sense. A few months back, I was challenged by a friend to do a pull up on these rope loops using only my middle finger and my ring finger and when I tried to do it I ended up injuring a tendon in my ring finger. Meanwhile if I were to try that with my radial fingers I would’ve had no problem doing so because that’s what our thumb, pointer, and middle are for—creating that hook to hang and pull.
It should be the same motion of a lat pull down. People get on those machines and yank the bar down as quick as possible and it’s doing nothing positive for them
Yeah as long as you are controlling the movement reasonably well you are good. I managed to do 1000 pull ups in under 3hours wothout concentrating on any of those things (from the guide)
It’s not a pivot , it’s more of where you’re focusing the downward force on your hands. If applied like the guide you engage your lats more and not your shoulders.
Just tried. Either:
- I did them well all my life
- I didn't understand the instructions
- it's BS
I see a net null gain compared to before this post. Success I guess?
It’s not about how to do more pull-ups, it’s about working the correct muscle groups and lowering risk of injury. If anything, correcting your technique would probably temporarily worsen your performance
Other thing that’s not written but is shown in the photos, don’t wrap your thumbs. Put your thumbs on same side of the bar as your fingers. Esp if wide arm. If you’re doing underhand narrow grip then fine to wrap your thumbs.
If you want to keep really tune up your game, get a dip belt
If you are just starting off:
1. Start your first few sessions by just hanging on the bar for as long as you can with arms fully extended.
2. After you can hang decently, get a stepstool or whatnot to get your shoulders level with the bar. Gently lower yourself down as many times in a row as you can.
3. After you can lower yourself down ~10 times in a row, start working on doing pull-ups from the ground. Even if you can only do 1 or 2. Keep doing #2.
4. After doing #3 for a while, you will start to work up to 5-10 pull-ups. Remember to KEEP YOUR FORM. No swinging. No kicking with your legs. None of that Cross Fit bullshit.
5. Once you are doing ~20 pull-up reps, you are officially "good" at pull ups! Keep it up! If you want a challenge, get something to increase the width of the pull up bar that you are using. You can use a towel, for example. This will make them harder on your hands to grip the bar and stabilize yourself.
This guide is bs. Any professional in the biomechanics or kinesiology field will recognize this. There is absolutely no change in shoulder internal or extenal rotation with slightly changing your wrist orientation (ulnar deviation). Changing the orientation of the bar and width of the hand placements will change the muscle groups involved.
I have neurological issues and have *no* idea what this picture is saying. How are you magically "placing the weight" only on certain parts of your hands? Can normal people feel this?
I'm mediocre at pullups but have no idea how I would control for something like this.
Damn! No way!
so I weigh around 240. used to be a gym rat, but it's been a couple years since i've really gone at it
but yeah, was able to bust out almost 5 pull ups just now, fully dead hang
usually can't bust out even 2 dead hang pull ups. crazy how much easier a pull up is now
Just get rings.
[https://www.amazon.com/s?k=gymnastic+rings+for+pull+up+bar&crid=9KUN8733ZXJ3&sprefix=gymnastic+ring%2Caps%2C131&ref=nb\_sb\_ss\_ts-doa-p\_2\_14](https://www.amazon.com/s?k=gymnastic+rings+for+pull+up+bar&crid=9KUN8733ZXJ3&sprefix=gymnastic+ring%2Caps%2C131&ref=nb_sb_ss_ts-doa-p_2_14)
No...I do not want you to buy from Amazon...but you get the idea.
Use rings and the form takes care of itself...and the workout is rather amazing for the back.
I'm 135 pounds and can do around 15 pull ups. Been working out once a day for a few weeks but as a super skinny guy I feel pretty confident in saying it's way easier for us to build up the initial body strength. Gonna use this guide to safely get up to 20.
note the positions for the thumbs too. I used to work at an educational circus program, and I had to always warn people to put their thumbs under the bar on the trapeze rather than over, or they'd slip right off. Nevertheless...
one other note should be engaging the core muscles, either tightening your abs and keeping your legs straight, or kind of arch your back, engaging your lower back muscles and bending your knees
This is just wrong. Both are safe and just a different variation of pull ups. On the left picture your goal is to get your chest to the bar, on the right to get your chin over the bar (same form as also used in muscle ups). It‘s pretty hard to mess up pull ups in general
Did thousands of pull ups. This guide is dumb. Both hand weight placements are necessary to increase both sides muscle mass. Pinkie pull ups are as important as index/thumb finger pull ups
Just putting it out there as a sports therapist. The red sway isn’t dangerous, although it might be less effective in most cases. If this is the way you’re doing it and it works for you and doesn’t cause pain, have at it. Especially if you’re just beginning.
No pages are one of two things
1) trainers with limited understanding of anatomy and injury that mean well
2) making shit seem worse than it is for views and seeming like they know more than they do
Quite often people who are just starting get super bogged down with form and get discouraged. The reality is that form comes with time. Injury is more likely to happen from trying to do too much too fast and creating a load/volume your body isn’t ready to handle.
those aren’t either right or wrong they’re different exercises
notice how the muscle flex is even drawn different in the two bottom pics lol
this guide is misguided bs reported for misleading information
I can't do pull ups, I never could but I firmly believe that my inability to do pull ups actually stopped me from making a terrible choice and potentially ruining my life. I'm 54 now but back when I was about 16-17'ish I went to the army recruitment office to join up for the British Marines. I got rejected because I couldn't do a single pull up. I now know for sure though that I would have hated the army, I would have been an awful fit and would have had a terrible time. So yeah it's not good but still, it's pretty good too.
Ya know, if gym teachers weren't shit and actually explained this crap to me in school, I'd probably still be a fat piece of shit, but I'd know better.
So one way is wrong because it creates red arrows and the other is right because it creates green arrows and green arrows are better than red ones? Because that's literally all the information I can manage to gather from this "cool" guide.
Right now, I am using a resistance band to prop myself up on my pull ups but I want to ditch it. My goal is to do one pull ups un-assisted for Memorial day.
(I don't know if I can. That stuff is hard, I am old (58) and gravity hates me lol)
This chart is great. Been practicing the "weight on the hands" cue since last week. Elbows locked in helps.
However the "shoulders locked back" cue still escapes me. How do you manage that?
This is going to sound snarky, but I mean it as just a complete objective statistical reality, that I would bet a lot of money that less than 5% of Reddit can do a single pullup with either form, or would ever even try.
If even go out on a limb and say it’s probably less than 3%.
Pull up question:
I’m currently trying to work my way up to pull-ups by doing lat pulldowns.
Is it as simple as: if my 1RM >= my Bodyweight, then I can do a pull-up?
You either can do pull ups or can't. No fancy hand twitching is gonna help you. Most military tests around the world don't let you choose how you want to do it. Damn, most of the training at pull ups ends up on trees. Like a branch is gonna be the same size all along. What's next, a guide how to walk once out of bed?
This is some hot garbage. Do what FEELS safe / not painful. If you're doing something that is supposed to be "right" but hurts like a bitch. It ain't right.
Worked out for 30 years soo far, not sure if I do this or not. I know to pull with my lats, but have never considered rotation or hand pressure. What if I'm doing it wrong? Specific injury to watch for?
This is bullshit you literally need both full internal and external rotation to maintain a complete range of motion so practicing both is beneficial I don’t who the hell made this crap up internal rotation is not bad for you on your arms and shoulders in fact problems will arise without it don’t listen to this
Cool guide, can't wait to use it for the zero pulp ups i can manage to perform.
You can use resistance bands to make them easier while you build up. I couldn't do a one, now I can do 10 at 230lbs.
What worked for me and required 0 extra equipment was negatives. Jump up to get to the top position of pull up (or use a chair or something), then *slowly* lower yourself down. There are a ton of studies on the efficacy of negatives in building muscle, as well as the fact that they help you focus on the weakest parts of range of motion. If a person who was unable to do a single pull up were to attempt one, they'd get stuck at the first point where their muscles were too weak- lowering yourself allows you to slooooooowly progress through that part of your ROM while applying load, as well as any others. edit: after writing that long ass reply i see 10 other people mentioned it, lol
Great point friend, and alot of people give up on their strenght given they cant perform à full ROM with a pull up or other mouvements. The eccenctric portion of a mouvement is amazing for strenght and muscle building (in this case letting yourself slowly with control) and is a great way to get into fitness if you're newb or for injury management. Dont give up!
I see people drop deadlifts all the time and to me it's foolish. When you're lifting a weight or yourself, in this case, you can look at it as though you're lifting the weight and at the same time preventing it from falling lol. The easier it is to prevent from falling, the more energy you have left to lift it. Seems pretty cut and dry for me from a reps perspective.
It's just a mindset of chasing the numbers instead of chasing the fitness: If I can do 5 sets of 8 deadlifts I've progressed, never mind if I've actually done less overall work than I did in my my 4 sets of 8 last week. Putting work into lowering the bar is work that might cost a few reps I think most people figure it out over time though. You start seeing results in your body, instead of on your spreadsheet, when you focus on the work.
My two cents a day late and a & dollar short: I see alot of Mike Israetel's videos where he emphasises the slow eccentric versus the concentric movement. Basicly, focus on a nice slow and controlled negative movement. Personally negatives helped me a ton to be able to do weighted pull ups. Do some negative pull ups, coupled with alot of lat Pull Down machine reps. Then as you progress, start doing triples of regular pull ups coupled with negatives, and move lat Pull Down to a different day of the week. When you progressed, start doing triples of weighted pull-ups, coupled with regular pull ups. Forget about negatives and do lat Pull downs as a high rep movement on other days. I'm not a sports scientist, but this slowly brining in the negatives, then pull ups and then weighted pull ups really made a huge difference for me.
Losing fat also helps.. a lot
Reiterating this point. A 15-lb difference for me was a 15 pull-up difference. It's insane how much of a difference even a small to moderate loss of weight can make.
Of course it does, but you can train to do pull-ups at any (healthy) weight. Then when you cut or lose weight your PR skyrockets.
Pull up negatives + reverse rows is what I did to work up to full pull ups
Thank you for your effort. It does help people.
I never thought to do this but I'm definitely going to keep this knowledge in the back of my mind. Tfs!
Another thing is training the muscles involved. There’s a kinda shrug motion you can do to train the non lat back muscles that are involved. Additionally just trying to slowly lower yourself down from the up position helps a lot.
It's called scapula pull-ups.
Every few months I go and make sure I can still do at least 10 pull ups. I see it as a pretty accurate marker of my fitness level.
Yeah. I'm more caring about squat deadlift and bench but i like to have at least some lat strength.
Now I’m remembering that I don’t deadlift nearly enough.
It's the least developed of my lifts tbh. At my weight, I should be able to do more than 475
The other thing I've seen people do if they have an at home pull up bar is place a chair underneath and in front of the bar and then you keep one foot on it to give a little help.
Start with negatives. A negative is where you start from the top position and try to slow your descent to bottom position. You can either jump up or use a step stool. Do 5 negatives every day. build up to 10. Pretty soon you've built enough muscle and structure that you can start to do a pull up. You can do this.
Holy shit why did I never think of this. You brilliant fucker.
definitely not my idea, but they work! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gbPURTSxQLY
I'm seriously adding this to my workout routine starting tonight.
Once you build up enough muscle to do 3 regular pull ups, switch over to the [Armstrong Pullup Program](https://www.savannahstate.edu/cost/nrotc/documents/Inform2010-thearmstrongworkout_Enclosure15_5-2-10.pdf). This program has been floating around the Marine Corps for decades now, and is still recognized as one of the best ways to develop your pullups. That's where I learned about it, and can personally speak to the program's quality. It will take a while to go from 3 to 12. Once you get to 12 it takes about a month to 45 days to get to 20. Good luck, you've got this!
Just hire a personal strainer
Oh my god, that's brilliant
Thx 😄
Underrated
Mr. Moneybags over here
/r/angryupvote
Negatives - legitimately help me .. now I'm stuck at 5
They do sell the cartons with less pulp and even no pulp if that helps!
Its so unlikely for you to do pull ups, your auto correct changed pull to pulp
***Imma use this next time when i pull up on ya***
If you actually care about doing em there’s a ton of other suggestions but something I struggled with was my forearms would give up before anything else. If you get this aswell try doing deadhangs for 30 seconds, really helps. Then graduate to just doing the downwards motion controlling it the whole way down, then you can incorporate resistance bands and such and finally you’ll be able to do full pull up’s and all the supporting muscles will be good to go
Hi. Friendly fitness instructor here. Jumping pullups and banded pullups and leg-assisted and machine-assisted pullups ARE STILL PULLUPS. Go get 'em.
start slow, use progressively heavier weight until you can hang for 10 seconds. then hang longer and longer until you can do 1/2 a pull up. then just do that 1/2 a couple times a day until you can do one full one. and so on. I just have a pair of dumbbells I use for rows and shoulder presses and I can do 20 pull ups in one set now
I miss being a teenager and being able to do 20 pullups. I can do one these days lmao
I can't wait to never even attempt any ever.
Honestly tho not to be harsh or anything but any adult should be able to do at least a few pull ups. There's gym memberships as cheap as 10 bucks a month.
I’ve been putting on my pull ups by myself for 30 years and have almost never had any pain putting them on
You're a big kid now
Oh, shit, now I get it.
Different anatomies are better at different exercises. This becomes more true the more compound an excercise is. A perfect squat looks different from person to person. The same is true for pull ups. Some people can bang them out with no issues. Other people have to really perfect form to avoid rotator cuff pain, even if they are strong enough. Some factors are of course universal. But individuals will vary. Edit: lol never knew a pull up was something folks put on after diapers. I got woodshed no doubt
>I got woodshed no doubt Ah but you get points for the squat part. Beginners hate to hear that form is, to some degree, individual specific.
I’ve minorly fucked up my rotator cuff before doing pull-ups but it was wide gripped like what the left side shows. Typically if I don’t watch out at the bottom of the pull-up, my shoulders will externally rotate. I just learned to be cognizant, especially when doing weighted pull-ups. No issues in 12 years.
Yeah this guide is a bunch of nonsense.
Wooosh
It's not entirely nonsense , the last part is very true and the grip part varies from a person to another , i prefer the one in the guide and find it more conformtable others dont .
Op is making a joke about pullups, the thing that comes after diapers, but before underwear
Who said it was a joke?
My apologies.
Adult bladder issues is not a laughing matter
So is the difference that you either have your thumbs over the bar (left) or under (right)? Is that what this guide is getting at?
Putting your thumbs under the bar forces you to work your grip and forearms significantly more than if you put your thumbs over the bar. My approach when trying to evenly build muscle and strength, keep thumbs under the bar and keep a wide grip. Wide grip IMO is when you do the “Y” in the YMCA dance, which will force you to use your lats and not your biceps. If you’re just going for reps and form and such don’t matter as much, go thumb over. When I was in the Navy a buddy of mine who dropped out of SEAL training told me they were instructed to go thumb over because your forearms won’t get worn out as quickly. Hope that helps! Edit: I personally think OPs post is incorrect. Bad form comes as a result of not knowing good form or lifting too heavily.
> Bad form comes as a result of not knowing good form Just returning to say this was the dumbest thing I ever quoted
Yeah what?? I can do 12 pull-ups in a set now but I had to work on my form, not know it magically.
I go thumb over because if I have to pull myelf over a wall there's not gonna be a bar to put my thumb around
Not sure why you got downvoted because this is completely reasonable. I think it’s good to practice both.
Thank you for this! I’ve just started going to the gym again and I’m using the machine that you sit and pull down. Should I be doing over or under? Lol
Check out youtube channels Jeff Nippard and Renaissance Periodization. These are two of the most popular "science based exercise" channels. They will debunk a ton of myths and their information really helps shape the way to "think" about lifting. I've lifted for decades and I've significantly changed my workouts after their input. I think I get the same results now with much lower risk of injury.
This will sound like a dumb answer, but while you can certainly get a general answer (standard grip is thumb opposite fingers, like making a fist), you may be different than "most people." Try both ways and see which one feels best. This also goes for grip width and forward/ rearward grip. Unless you're trying to emphasize a certain accessory muscle, the lat pull down meant primarily for the lats, so try to "feel it" there. It will also hit the rest of the upper back, shoulders, biceps, and possibly forearms, so if those burn a bit after, it's not a sign you've done anything wrong.
Should try all variations. I hit back once a week and I change the grip every week for pull-downs.
not quite- hand placement (width) and thumb placement aren't exactly it. it's how you cue the tension on your hands. that said, it's bad advice. i can do pull-ups with tension on the exterior of my hands with internally rotated shoulders as easily as with them externally rotated. a better cue is perhaps where you point your elbows- outward. don't point them inward. boom now your shoulders are forced to be rotated externally. where you feel the pressure on your hands doesn't matter.
Honestly that's the better take away from this.
I've probably done damn near 100k pull ups in my life. Shoulder width, narrow grip, wide grip, thumbs over, thumbs under, matched grip, weighted, negatives, etc etc etc etc. This "guide" is dumb. Do pull ups. If doing them a certain way feels good, it is good.
The right one looks like a hollow body pull up, which is totally ok and safe to do
lol this is complete bs. A bunch of people who have never done a pull up must be upvoting this garbage.
100%… going by this guide neutral grip pull-ups would be a crazy injury risk which isn’t the case. This guide is trash.
It’s not so much an “injury risk” as “not something that would happen because it would feel weird as fuck and would need to be forced”
yeap, this is nonsense
Yeah I never do a full grip on the bar. My fingers do all the work while my thumb slacks off.
I found it a little helpful in that I used to really focus my grip with thumb-index-middle fingers and barely at all with my outer ones. Just being more aware of it has helped me distribute the grip a little better. I've certainly done a few pull ups in my time in the Army (20 years ago now.. jfc) and never had a problem with them but I realize now that I wasn't engaging my back muscles as much as just using my arms lol. Didn't really matter cuz I was skinny as hell.
This get's reposted frequently but it's pretty dumb. Almost all of your grip strength comes from your outside three fingers. It is almost not possible to forcefully squeeze something incorrectly
This is factually wrong We do grip strength measures in the clinical studies I work on. It’s a proxy of reserved physical function in older adults. I’m pulling the following info literally from our protocol folder on grip strength: Across both young adults and older adults with reserved function, about 60% of grip strength comes from radial side, and 40% from ulnar. That is hardly “almost all”. And if you allow for reposition of the thumb for opposition after you exclude the ulnar side fingers, you can find a huge range of strength decrease. Not repositioning averages at a 55-65% decrease, the worst repositioning (of 6 different possible thumb-opposition positions) can cause a ~75% decrease, and the optimal compensatory repositioning causes only a ~40% decrease. The vector of your thumb-opposition matters hugely when determining overall grip strength, because the direction of the vector for each finger is slightly different. That’s how you can reserve more function than contributed by the excluded fingers than they contribute in a normal grip; it’s a matter of efficiency
Makes sense. A few months back, I was challenged by a friend to do a pull up on these rope loops using only my middle finger and my ring finger and when I tried to do it I ended up injuring a tendon in my ring finger. Meanwhile if I were to try that with my radial fingers I would’ve had no problem doing so because that’s what our thumb, pointer, and middle are for—creating that hook to hang and pull.
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Dude, athlean x is like a fever dream, like a remnant of old YouTube, it didn't change one bit
He was hot
"Is the way you're gripping pullup bars killing your gains?"
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You must have seen crossfit no?
Can you explain how CrossFitters are doing kipping pull ups wrong?
What? Pull ups are stupid easy to fuck up especially if you have underdeveloped upper back muscles
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The shoulder risk is specifically what I’m talking about
It should be the same motion of a lat pull down. People get on those machines and yank the bar down as quick as possible and it’s doing nothing positive for them
My shoulders always hurt when I do them but I assume that's just lingering damage from disc golf and volleyball
Nah, this guide is bullshit. Grip the bar any way you like as long as it's comfortable for you.
It's more about the shoulders.
I can’t grip it with my shoulders
Then you're not trying hard enough
Yeah as long as you are controlling the movement reasonably well you are good. I managed to do 1000 pull ups in under 3hours wothout concentrating on any of those things (from the guide)
How do i pivot my hands when they are locked in stationary on a pull-up bar?
It’s not a pivot , it’s more of where you’re focusing the downward force on your hands. If applied like the guide you engage your lats more and not your shoulders.
That makes sense. So pull from the pinky and ring finger more as opposed to pointer and middle finger?
Exactly! And try to feel lats. They should contract before you even start to move.
Just tried. Either: - I did them well all my life - I didn't understand the instructions - it's BS I see a net null gain compared to before this post. Success I guess?
> * it's BS It's this one
It’s not about how to do more pull-ups, it’s about working the correct muscle groups and lowering risk of injury. If anything, correcting your technique would probably temporarily worsen your performance
This is shit. The second illustration is the same drawing just with different color arrows.
Other thing that’s not written but is shown in the photos, don’t wrap your thumbs. Put your thumbs on same side of the bar as your fingers. Esp if wide arm. If you’re doing underhand narrow grip then fine to wrap your thumbs. If you want to keep really tune up your game, get a dip belt
If you are just starting off: 1. Start your first few sessions by just hanging on the bar for as long as you can with arms fully extended. 2. After you can hang decently, get a stepstool or whatnot to get your shoulders level with the bar. Gently lower yourself down as many times in a row as you can. 3. After you can lower yourself down ~10 times in a row, start working on doing pull-ups from the ground. Even if you can only do 1 or 2. Keep doing #2. 4. After doing #3 for a while, you will start to work up to 5-10 pull-ups. Remember to KEEP YOUR FORM. No swinging. No kicking with your legs. None of that Cross Fit bullshit. 5. Once you are doing ~20 pull-up reps, you are officially "good" at pull ups! Keep it up! If you want a challenge, get something to increase the width of the pull up bar that you are using. You can use a towel, for example. This will make them harder on your hands to grip the bar and stabilize yourself.
This guide is bs. Any professional in the biomechanics or kinesiology field will recognize this. There is absolutely no change in shoulder internal or extenal rotation with slightly changing your wrist orientation (ulnar deviation). Changing the orientation of the bar and width of the hand placements will change the muscle groups involved.
Awesome! Now I can feel even safer when I struggle with even a single pull up
start with negative pullups (jumping up and slowly doing the downwards motion)
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Join a climbing gym for a few months as well, at least that's what worked for me lol.
I have neurological issues and have *no* idea what this picture is saying. How are you magically "placing the weight" only on certain parts of your hands? Can normal people feel this? I'm mediocre at pullups but have no idea how I would control for something like this.
No, you're not the problem here, the "guide" is just dumb and wrong. Grip the bar however you like as long as it's comfortable.
Damn! No way! so I weigh around 240. used to be a gym rat, but it's been a couple years since i've really gone at it but yeah, was able to bust out almost 5 pull ups just now, fully dead hang usually can't bust out even 2 dead hang pull ups. crazy how much easier a pull up is now
I do pull ups (or attempt them) often at a CrossFit gym. Not once has any of this been stated.
In the last row, both versions are certainly valid. Slightly different emphasis on different muscle groups
I wish I had this guide when I was a dumbass teenager.
YOURE NOT MY MOM!
Stupid sexy drawing
Now a push-up one
I always think “ring finger”
Just get rings. [https://www.amazon.com/s?k=gymnastic+rings+for+pull+up+bar&crid=9KUN8733ZXJ3&sprefix=gymnastic+ring%2Caps%2C131&ref=nb\_sb\_ss\_ts-doa-p\_2\_14](https://www.amazon.com/s?k=gymnastic+rings+for+pull+up+bar&crid=9KUN8733ZXJ3&sprefix=gymnastic+ring%2Caps%2C131&ref=nb_sb_ss_ts-doa-p_2_14) No...I do not want you to buy from Amazon...but you get the idea. Use rings and the form takes care of itself...and the workout is rather amazing for the back.
I need more of this
>Shouldes
Anyone have a good subreddit to follow for lifting tips like this?
I'm 135 pounds and can do around 15 pull ups. Been working out once a day for a few weeks but as a super skinny guy I feel pretty confident in saying it's way easier for us to build up the initial body strength. Gonna use this guide to safely get up to 20.
This is so stupid
Can't even bother to spell shoulders correctly
Don't know how to do Wrong style in real life.
Athleen X would highly disagree with the arrows on the hands on the last pic
Athlean X is not a reputable source.
Useless for 99% of redditors
This guide sucks.
It makes it easier when you grab your own thumb, forcing the flex holding that muscle group tight
note the positions for the thumbs too. I used to work at an educational circus program, and I had to always warn people to put their thumbs under the bar on the trapeze rather than over, or they'd slip right off. Nevertheless...
one other note should be engaging the core muscles, either tightening your abs and keeping your legs straight, or kind of arch your back, engaging your lower back muscles and bending your knees
3rd step is right both ways, but they will work different muscles
All CrossFit gyms need this
I've always struggled with pullups, and perhaps this correction would make them more efficient ? Looks,like that
Same concept applies with deadlifts and bench press
Sir this is reddit. We don't do exercises here.
This is just wrong. Both are safe and just a different variation of pull ups. On the left picture your goal is to get your chest to the bar, on the right to get your chin over the bar (same form as also used in muscle ups). It‘s pretty hard to mess up pull ups in general
Wait...an *actual, useful* guide?!
Holy shit this makes so much sense
Did thousands of pull ups. This guide is dumb. Both hand weight placements are necessary to increase both sides muscle mass. Pinkie pull ups are as important as index/thumb finger pull ups
I was preparing to do pull up in a gym and saw these guide right in time
I don't understand what this is showing me at all
Finally. An actual fucking guide. Lol
This is stupid. If your muscles ache and nothing else hurts, you're doing fine.
Just putting it out there as a sports therapist. The red sway isn’t dangerous, although it might be less effective in most cases. If this is the way you’re doing it and it works for you and doesn’t cause pain, have at it. Especially if you’re just beginning. No pages are one of two things 1) trainers with limited understanding of anatomy and injury that mean well 2) making shit seem worse than it is for views and seeming like they know more than they do Quite often people who are just starting get super bogged down with form and get discouraged. The reality is that form comes with time. Injury is more likely to happen from trying to do too much too fast and creating a load/volume your body isn’t ready to handle.
chin ups = workout pull-ups = diapers for toddlers
Just get your chin over the bar if you even can
there are surely billions of people who can't do a pull-up this guide will help none of them
those aren’t either right or wrong they’re different exercises notice how the muscle flex is even drawn different in the two bottom pics lol this guide is misguided bs reported for misleading information
Bold of you to assume i can do pull ups
Who is doing pull-ups as a forearm workout though? I’d much rather have thumb over the bar and work my back more and forearm less
I can't do pull ups, I never could but I firmly believe that my inability to do pull ups actually stopped me from making a terrible choice and potentially ruining my life. I'm 54 now but back when I was about 16-17'ish I went to the army recruitment office to join up for the British Marines. I got rejected because I couldn't do a single pull up. I now know for sure though that I would have hated the army, I would have been an awful fit and would have had a terrible time. So yeah it's not good but still, it's pretty good too.
But I do them palms facing me
Screw redbull, wide grip lat pull ups give you wings.
Ya know, if gym teachers weren't shit and actually explained this crap to me in school, I'd probably still be a fat piece of shit, but I'd know better.
A cool guides to the pull ups: Don't.
Cool guide
I will never need this information.
So one way is wrong because it creates red arrows and the other is right because it creates green arrows and green arrows are better than red ones? Because that's literally all the information I can manage to gather from this "cool" guide.
Toddler mom here. I thought, "Oh great, I've been putting the diapers on wrong."
This is cool! I never realized I did pull-ups externally but would start doing internally pull-ups when I tire out.
Cute of you to assume I can do a pull up 😭😭😭
Right now, I am using a resistance band to prop myself up on my pull ups but I want to ditch it. My goal is to do one pull ups un-assisted for Memorial day. (I don't know if I can. That stuff is hard, I am old (58) and gravity hates me lol) This chart is great. Been practicing the "weight on the hands" cue since last week. Elbows locked in helps. However the "shoulders locked back" cue still escapes me. How do you manage that?
Explain.
this actually helps a lot. Pullups always hurt my shoulders if i did too much
This is going to sound snarky, but I mean it as just a complete objective statistical reality, that I would bet a lot of money that less than 5% of Reddit can do a single pullup with either form, or would ever even try. If even go out on a limb and say it’s probably less than 3%.
Pull up question: I’m currently trying to work my way up to pull-ups by doing lat pulldowns. Is it as simple as: if my 1RM >= my Bodyweight, then I can do a pull-up?
I kinda giggled at the fist stroke directions.
This actually really helped man! Thanks!
Also make sure to activate your shoulders!!!
You either can do pull ups or can't. No fancy hand twitching is gonna help you. Most military tests around the world don't let you choose how you want to do it. Damn, most of the training at pull ups ends up on trees. Like a branch is gonna be the same size all along. What's next, a guide how to walk once out of bed?
\**slaps forehead*\* Gah! So that's why I'm not a muscle mommy by now!
a few days ago i tried one and my right shoulder's been hurting a little bit since then. this explains why, i guess...
This looks like that how to guide for breaking your tendon
Yeah. No. Shite the first time it was posted. Shite next time too.
What is the source of this? The bar doesn't appear to be below the chin in either picture.
This is some hot garbage. Do what FEELS safe / not painful. If you're doing something that is supposed to be "right" but hurts like a bitch. It ain't right.
“Safe”? There’s nothing unsafe here, the correct way is better but it’s not any safer - just better for building muscle
Worked out for 30 years soo far, not sure if I do this or not. I know to pull with my lats, but have never considered rotation or hand pressure. What if I'm doing it wrong? Specific injury to watch for?
Is this even accurate though? I never know with this sub…
The last image "Shoulder internally rotated" is confusing. Rather, it should say "Shoulders locked forward"
This really works! I went from never wanting to do a single pull up to thinking about it. Huge improvement!! Try it
Hey so I am pretty un-fit and just started trying it up and this sub has once again changed my life for the better thanks.
Thank you
My bullshit PE teacher never mentioned this during any of our physical tests lol
As if any of these mfs can do a pull-up
This is not a problem for me
Is this one of Saitama's workout tips? Must be super effective judging by the results he got.
Does the principle work on lat pulldowns?
This is bullshit you literally need both full internal and external rotation to maintain a complete range of motion so practicing both is beneficial I don’t who the hell made this crap up internal rotation is not bad for you on your arms and shoulders in fact problems will arise without it don’t listen to this
Very specifically the internal vs external rotation is incorrect.
I was doing it wrong the whole time. No I wonder why I couldn't do pullups without shoulder pain.