As you may know from my frequent posts about them, I’m a big fan of pull-ups. I add them to every workout, as part of a warm up or as part of a simple circuit. Pull-ups work the arms like no other exercise and the multitude of variations make them a very scalable exercise.
However, I rarely see others at the gym doing them and I think its unfortunate. If you don’t already do them, I encourage you to give them a go. If you already do them in one form or another, that’s great. But I’d like to get an idea of how many people actually do pull-ups so I thought I’d create The Fit Blog’s first poll to try and get an idea.
4 Comments, Comment or Ping
Never do them, myself. I can’t even do one! I do work on the lat pulldowns though. Maybe someday…
September 29th, 2007
I do some almost every training session, at the very least, during a warm-up. today I did as many 18 of 5 pull-ups, 10 push-ups and 15 squats in 20 minutes. Pull-ups are essential, IMO
September 29th, 2007
I proudly and genially admit that i still cannot do even 1 pullup.It’s been 3 weeks and i try them everyday with assistance viz a viz instructor holding my legs. and half pull ups (if thats the word)…Its a long road but im not they type to give up.any advice?
October 1st, 2007
Rasingan – been there and yes, unfortunately it is a long road. But don’t give up. The only way to nail the pull-up is to keep at it.
If you have a gravitron machine available at your gym, I’d suggest using that. It will help you measure progress and help you incrementally lower the amount of assistance you’re getting. You can also look at working on the negative. That is, jump up into the pull-up and then slowly lower yourself. Some people may also suggest lat pull-downs, but don’t bother – you don’t need them.
When I first started pull-ups regularly, I would plateau for weeks at a time before I was able to reduce the assistance. Eventually one day I just headed to the pull-up bar instead of the gravitron and I was able to do a couple of consecutive unassisted pull-ups. It was a great feeling and I imagine that as long as you keep it up, you will get there as well. Give yourself a couple of months though and don’t get discouraged.
October 1st, 2007
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