Back Width Development

Training Bodybuilding
21

[quote]forbes wrote:

[quote]Bricknyce wrote:

[quote]forbes wrote:

[quote]The Mighty Stu wrote:
OKay, 1stly, wide grip back movements will always target your mid back, this has been discussed to death.

2nd- a nice little combo I always liked which helped me focus more on my lats (I think I have decent back thickness, but could certainly use more width as well) is to do straight arm pressdowns with a rope (great stretch, great contraction without involving the biceps),

and then afterward, go to a pulldown station, and make sure you’re sitting upright (none of that leaning back nonsense), using a close grip attachment where your hands are in a neutral position (facing each other), and as you do each rep, focus on keeping your elbows in front of your torso (don’t try to contract your scaps like most people do,… not this time).

Should feel that in your lats quite nicely :slight_smile:

S[/quote]

Interesting. Never thought of that. I’ll give that a try thanks stu![/quote]

I was going to mention pre-exhaust, but Stu beat me to it. I strongly suggest you do stiff-arm pulldowns or machine pullovers before your compound back exercises. You can also try static holds at the midpoint or end of a lift. If you don’t feel that in your lats, I don’t know what exercise or method you’ll be left with. And again, thinking of the lats working while you train. [/quote]

Pullovers never target my lats, however I’ve never tried straight arm pulldowns so I will give that a shot before I do any vertical pulling movements and see how that fees. If it works, I’ll do that until my mind muscle connection improves.

Here’s to hoping.[/quote]

Dumbbell or barbell pull-overs perhaps not, but the machine pullover that Brick mentions above is purely a lat exercise.

22

When you open doors, pull something in day to day life, try and pull it with your back. This has helped me a lot, so I guess it could help you too. Although I still seem to tense my left pec along with my left lat, I dont seem to be able to just get the lat… anyone else have that experience?

23

[quote]Ben_VFR85 wrote:
When you open doors, pull something in day to day life, try and pull it with your back. This has helped me a lot, so I guess it could help you too. Although I still seem to tense my left pec along with my left lat, I dont seem to be able to just get the lat… anyone else have that experience?[/quote]

all I can say is, the bigger my muscles have gotten, the easier it is to individually control them.

24

Egghead version: Its a simple “mechanics” concept to minimize bicep involvement by minimizing the torque generated by your biceps at the elbow.
Normal version: your hand moves towards your elbow (give or take obviously) so your forearms move along a straight line, i.e. aussi droit que possible (AGAIN PAS TOUT A FAIT) throughout the movement.

Watch the first few seconds of RC training back width.

Note that he uses a STRAIGHT bar meme temps wide grip. One of the main reasons IMHO rack chins work so much better than heavy pulldowns is that people are forced to grip the straight edge as opposed to the angled portion they would use in the pulldown station.

[quote]LarryDavid wrote:

[quote]tribunaldude wrote:

  1. Adjust hand position on the bar such that your hand (or elbow) moves roughly/somewhat along your extended forearm while doing the pulling and your biceps will be relatively limp whiel your back is forced to pull.

[/quote]

I’m having trouble understanding this description. Does this mean the same thing as keeping your forearms [close to] perpendicular to the bar as much as possible? Thanks.[/quote]

25

Gotcha, thanks.

26

Just got back from the gym. Tried those straight arm rope pulldowns. Stu’s right; you can go pretty heavy on these and the stretch at the top is great
I was able to do 140 x 11 after two sets of straight bar pulldowns.

Also, if you haven’t tried them yet put the rope at the bottom of the cable station and do bent over rope pulls. Hold the stretch at the top and control the weight at the end. There’s a vid on youtube of Justin Harris doing these.

27

Well I’m gonna work my back tomorrow, I’m gonna give the straight arm pulldowns a try. I totally forgot about that exercise.

Thanks guys for the responses.

28

[quote]The Mighty Stu wrote:

[quote]SteelyD wrote:

[quote]The Mighty Stu wrote:
… is to do straight arm pressdowns with a rope (great stretch, great contraction without involving the biceps) …
[/quote]

Stu-- is this it (but with rope)?

29

[quote]SteelyD wrote:

[quote]The Mighty Stu wrote:
… is to do straight arm pressdowns with a rope (great stretch, great contraction without involving the biceps) …
[/quote]

Stu-- is this it (but with rope)?

You know, I’ve never done these!

This doesn’t look like something you can go very heavy on without changing stance-- so at some point (like more bent torso), does this become ineffective, or is that never the point with this movement (ie. like facepulls, usually only done relatively lighter for higher reps)?
[/quote]

LOL, this reminded me of when my old training partner (who died earlier this year) used to do straight-arm pressdowns…we didn’t know what they were called, so we called them “I’m Not Worthies” because they looked like the famous Wayne and Garth maneuver.

30

Thought I’d bump this because I found the information to be pretty helpful.

31

For people that have trouble feeling pulldowns in their lats, I think a lot of times it is an issue of going too heavy so you have to use excessive English to pull the weight down, and people end up pulling with their arms and shoulders.

One trick you can try to develop the right feeling is to take a light weight and do 1.5 reps, meaning you do a full rep pulling to your body, let the weight come halfway back up, and then pull back down. That is 1 rep. Doing this forces you to control the weight and helps teach the proper way to squeeze your shoulder blades together.

32

[quote]austin_bicep wrote:

[quote]Ben_VFR85 wrote:
When you open doors, pull something in day to day life, try and pull it with your back. This has helped me a lot, so I guess it could help you too. Although I still seem to tense my left pec along with my left lat, I dont seem to be able to just get the lat… anyone else have that experience?[/quote]

all I can say is, the bigger my muscles have gotten, the easier it is to individually control them. [/quote]

QFT

33

i have this thing in the back of my head that tells me pulldowns, pullups, chins are mediocre exercises at best for back width. Have had much better luck using bodybuilding style rows more upright like dorian yates does them and wide grip rack pulls while flexing the lats.

i believe chins, pullups and such are great pre/rehab exercises but dont do much for lat width because anytime i go nearly as heavy enough my bis take over no matter what. I would highly suggest you try rows Dorian Yates style (somewhat upright, dragging along the legs.)

34

[quote]Hazzyhazz24 wrote:
i have this thing in the back of my head that tells me pulldowns, pullups, chins are mediocre exercises at best for back width. Have had much better luck using bodybuilding style rows more upright like dorian yates does them and wide grip rack pulls while flexing the lats.

i believe chins, pullups and such are great pre/rehab exercises but dont do much for lat width because anytime i go nearly as heavy enough my bis take over no matter what. I would highly suggest you try rows Dorian Yates style (somewhat upright, dragging along the legs.)[/quote]

that thing in the back of your head is probably a tumor.

35

[quote]WormwoodTheory wrote:

[quote]Hazzyhazz24 wrote:
i have this thing in the back of my head that tells me pulldowns, pullups, chins are mediocre exercises at best for back width. Have had much better luck using bodybuilding style rows more upright like dorian yates does them and wide grip rack pulls while flexing the lats.

i believe chins, pullups and such are great pre/rehab exercises but dont do much for lat width because anytime i go nearly as heavy enough my bis take over no matter what. I would highly suggest you try rows Dorian Yates style (somewhat upright, dragging along the legs.)[/quote]

that thing in the back of your head is probably a tumor. [/quote]

I read this post before reading Hazzyhazz24’s post and thought, “Wow, that sucks.”

And then I read Hazzyhazz24’s post.

36

[quote]The Mighty Stu wrote:
OKay, 1stly, wide grip back movements will always target your mid back, this has been discussed to death.

2nd- a nice little combo I always liked which helped me focus more on my lats (I think I have decent back thickness, but could certainly use more width as well) is to do straight arm pressdowns with a rope (great stretch, great contraction without involving the biceps), and then afterward, go to a pulldown station, and make sure you’re sitting upright (none of that leaning back nonsense), using a close grip attachment where your hands are in a neutral position (facing each other), and as you do each rep, focus on keeping your elbows in front of your torso (don’t try to contract your scaps like most people do,… not this time).

Should feel that in your lats quite nicely :slight_smile:

S[/quote]

i tried that close grip pull down thing but with pull ups and that attatchment instead, talk about a strong stretch lol