Thanks for this tip! I am trying to build upper body strength and pull-ups kill me

Bands help. You get the most assistance at the bottom and the assistance decreases as you pull up to your strongest position.

Thanks

> I am trying to build upper body strength and pull-ups kill me

IMO, the best thing is if you have access to an assisted pull up machine or lat pull down.

Bands can work alright (and they're cheap!), but assisted pull ups and/or lat pull down allow you finely tune your progressive overload. The general problem with bands (and spring type resistance in general) is that the non-linear resistance makes it more difficult to judge your progress.

I'd have to disagree. To me a negative is worth more than an assisted rep because you get to practice the real range of motion and activate all muscles (incl. stabilizers).

Assisted forms ultimately "assist" you at some fixed point which alters the path you would take if hanging, often removing your core entirely.

Also, I'd take the non-linear resistance of bands over the absence of core activation from a pull-up machine or the very different lat pulldown motion.

I'm a big calisthenics nerd, and I agree with this.

For reference, I'm a rounding error away from 50 and I still do advanced bar work - muscle ups, archer pullups, pull overs, etc...

I think it's important to always work with your bodyweight.

80% of strength is neuronal coordination, you'll get strong with the way you train.

Use your bodyweight in closed kinetic chain [1] exercises and avoid the machines unless you're injured or have a specific reason.

There are progressions for every level.

I recommend "Be your own gym" and "Overcoming Gravity" for great references on bodyweight training.

(Also: don't do muscle ups. The only people who like that are sports medicine docs.)

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Closed_kinetic_chain_exercis....

Upper body strength is a lot more than pull ups. To me, pull ups are a back exercise (lats), upperbody is a lot more than that. Chest, delts, traps, tris, bis, forearms. Very different workouts when your prioritize a muscle group. This was my goto for years. https://www.bodybuilding.com/exercises/finder/?

> pull-ups kill me

To build volume with pullups, complete your sets with negative pullups as gp describes (nb: at least three seconds down from chin over bar to full hang) when you fail the full pull-up (at least two seconds up, from full hang to chin over bar) any more.[1]

>> I am trying to build upper body strength

1. Keep a diary recording every session. 2. Stay away from the bench press. Focus on your back chain, arms, and grip: deadlifts, pullups (weighted, when you can do a set of 20 body weight), and overhead presses. Add squats and weighted press-ups if you insist. (Make sure you get taught both proper form and proper warm-up sequencing and always use them!)

Observe that these are all exercises that most people hate doing. For good reasons: they are hard work, and nearly all the gain is in your back, which you can't see in the mirror.

1. I used to see a lot of people doing what they claimed were pullups, with only a ten inch range of motion. Not helpful in real life. Start from a full hang: shoulders under hands, arms straight.

* * *

I wouldn’t focus exclusively on back in isolation. Ideally you want a push/pull combo to keep musculature balanced.

Also, “make sure you get taught proper form” is doing a lot of work here. It can be hard to find someone who really knows their stuff and pays close enough attention to correct subtle mistakes.

There's a lot more to upper body strength than just doing pull ups. You can absolutely work up to it in many ways (including negatives as mentioned).

Recommend giving this video a look, and the channel in general. Lots of good vibes and solid advice for working up through a progression without the muscle bro wankery.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fO3dKSQayfg

I had a similar experience in learning to do my first pull-up at age 40. It felt great!

Though in addition to the lowering, I also did horizontal rows using my kitchen table to work in the concentric direction.

Doing "negative" pullups also helped me build up from zero to a max of about ten regular pullups in one set. Unfortunately I took a long break from strength training and can now barely do 1-2. Was just thinking of going back to negatives to start rebuilding my strength.

I am going to guess you are younger. Even if not, don’t worry about falling off the wagon. I’ve learned will happen again and again. The key is to get good at climbing back on, e.g., not letting shame get in the way, not jumping straight back to your previous weights, etc.

That’s great that you got to 10 pull-ups. Looking forward to hearing about when you get there again!

Now here’s a coach.

I'm in the process of doing that right now. It goes away surprisingly quickly. I'm finding that rebuilding grip strength is crucial

It also comes back surprisingly quickly, unless it's been decades.

True. Just takes a bit of practice. With grip strength specifically, it's easy to just finish a day with a long hang

Are you gripping your thumb around the bar? I got to ~18 max set a few years back and found it much easier to go thumb in line with all your other fingers. Another tip is to train wide grip lat pull downs at a gym then do your pull ups with wide grip since it uses more back and less bicep (bigger vs smaller muscle). Last tip is don’t forget to breath :)

Definitely something you can integrate but the wide grip pull-up is less efficient even if it better isolates the back. Again, I’m not saying avoid it, but just that it’s not as much a compound exercise as a normal pull-up.

My rule of thumb is to stick with as much compound work as possible as it’s a more efficient use of time. Single arm isolated work as example is great, sure, but hardly makes use of other muscles in the time you have to perform a workout.

Another variation I use: neutral (palms face each other) grip pull up.

I play around with different variations of grip widths and positioning, and feel like there's a time and place for pure isolation or totally compound movements. If one area is significantly weaker than the others, it helps to work on that in isolation, and if another significantly stronger, you're probably going to be doing all of them a disservice and possibly risking injury.

Leg presses, delt flys, and lat pulldowns are some that I prefer to sometimes do in isolation to ensure that one side isn't significantly compensating for the other. I find that it's also a more effective use of the mental energy required, by reducing the total amount of muscles to pay attention to.

Definitely agree it uses less muscles. I was solely talking to increase one set max rep count. Neutral grips are nice.

I switch both of them up periodically and through sets. Fairly limited bars that are tall enough at my gym, so I just work with what I can get, and with what my shoulder anatomy will allow. There's a theshold past which the right muscles continue being engaged, and below which not enough are. Between those, I find there's room to play around and either shoot for more upper trap engagement and scapular retraction, or lat/chest/shoulder etc.. depending on grip. I find that the grip position you mention is a little easier getting chest to bar, which has a bit of an implication for upper back engagement, especially with my shoulders that just won't get out of the way otherwise.

I tend to prefer about shoulder-width lat pulldowns, but slow ones. Somewhere between shoulder width and a right angle at the elbow.

> Another tip is to train wide grip lat pull downs at a gym then do your pull ups with wide grip since it uses more back

This is a common misconception. Close grip allows for greater range of motion in the lats. Think about it, wide grips are harder to do than close grip and if you were recruiting more back muscle compared to biceps that wouldn't be the case since your back is far stronger.

This applies to all back exercises. Wide grip will hit different muscles (so bodybuilders still utilize it) but close grip overall will hit the most back muscles with the greatest ROM.

There was a recent study somewhere that talked about how they'd cracked the code on muscle memory.

We've known for a long time that it's way easier to regain muscle than it is to develop it in the first place.

Turns out the reason is pretty simple, muscle cells are similar to fat cells - meaning that they never go away. They just activate as needed.

So it takes enormous effort to develop muscle cells, but one you have them, getting the size and strength back after taking a break is way easier.

The best thing I did for my pullups was lose weight. It's amazing what a difference losing 20 lbs will do for your ability to do pullups.

For me it's the reverse, I gained weight and noticed how much harder it is. Used to be able to do like 5-6 unassisted pullups and now that I've been bulking and gained like 20 lbs, it's a bit harder. Too be honest, most of my weight gain is probably creatine lol.

To be honest, that's what actually happened to me too, though with me it's fat.

Stavvybaby is that you?

It is not.

I assume this works for push-ups too? Lower yourself then reset and lower again? That’s amazing. I guess it makes sense. If the research in the article holds true this makes strength building much simpler and a lot less grueling.

Have you never done long eccentric phases? It’s the worst. Barring injuries, there’s no worse day after than the day after long eccentrics. DOMS for days!

Yeah I used to do a routine that was composed of very slow movement, so super slow push-ups. It was grueling.

Planks are the ultimate simple thing. Everyone can do it, at any age, at any level of fitness. Plank.

Just two minutes.

The article suggest you should have kept doing eccentric pull-ups.

I’m going to re-add eccentric focused movements back into my pull-up routine.