so i’m pretty proud of this
but i haven’t been able to improve upon either ROM (getting my chin to or over bar)
or volume (# of reps) in years.
besides loosing weight what else can I do. Help?
325lbs here
those are good pull ups for a big man! Maybe start in the position you want to be at upon completion of the rep (chin over the bar) by using a bench under the bar to step on and then lower under control and repeat for a series of negatives and try some band assisted reps.
be aware that this site has confirmed my belief that a high volume of pull ups can lead to medial epicondylitis.
I have that same pull-up bar, good to see its sturdy!
It seems like with that many partial reps, you could get one with your chin over the bar, no? Can you get a better ROM with a palms-in/chin-up grip?
I’d agree with the above advice that some sort of assistance, like a partner lifting on your toes, bands, or negatives, might be necessary to get in more reps/better range of motion to get you over the hump without losing weight.
Yeah man, good stuff. Ditto on the band assisted pull ups.
[quote]Duwatsrt wrote:
be aware that this site has confirmed my belief that a high volume of pull ups can lead to medial epicondylitis.
[/quote]
looool - “medial epicondylitis”, what are you a doctor? ;)…I don’t think it’s “fair” to blame pull ups for Golfers elbow. Sure, any activity that flexes the forarm “CAN” lead to this but unless you are realy cranking your wrists while doing pull ups I don’t see this as a problem for most folks. Ive been on this site for a while and I’ve never heard of people claiming golfers elbow from doing pull ups. What do you mean this site has confirmed your belief? Maybe an article of some sort?
Actually, you’ll probably get Lateral, not Medial epicondylitis. Or at least in my experience. When your wrist can’t move naturally and is in the fixed position, some people are gonna be in trouble. Then the ‘isis’ turns to ‘osis’ and then you get to live with it for years, nagging away…
Yeah, that’s me.
I don’t know about others, but I have to be pretty vigilant in varying my grip between pull-ups, chin-ups, and neutral grip, and avoid some grip positions altogether, or my elbows get fucked up pretty quickly, and it was worse when I was two weight classes heavier. I’ve always assumed it was tendinitis, but I could see labeling it golfer’s elbow or tennis elbow, or whatever. With overhand pullups I have to use a wide grip and a radius bar or my elbows start hurting very quickly.
I just can’t do any pullups any more, any hand position. I can row like a mofo, any grip, pretty heavy for me (did 3 sets of db rows yesterday 100#x20) or BB w/225, but pull ups? My tendons will ache for a week if I do a set of 10.
[quote]strangemeadow wrote:
I just can’t do any pullups any more, any hand position. I can row like a mofo, any grip, pretty heavy for me (did 3 sets of db rows yesterday 100#x20) or BB w/225, but pull ups? My tendons will ache for a week if I do a set of 10.[/quote]
dang, that’s a bummer. HAve you tried the wrist straps with the hooks that would grab the bar?
[quote]StrengthDawg wrote:
[quote]strangemeadow wrote:
I just can’t do any pullups any more, any hand position. I can row like a mofo, any grip, pretty heavy for me (did 3 sets of db rows yesterday 100#x20) or BB w/225, but pull ups? My tendons will ache for a week if I do a set of 10.[/quote]
dang, that’s a bummer. HAve you tried the wrist straps with the hooks that would grab the bar?
[/quote]
I have the hooks, that’s what I use for all my pulling. I never used to even use straps, but now I’m f’ed…
I used to have horrible elbow pain, because I sucked at pullups - so I started doing them 4 days a week to get better at them, and it KILLED my elbows.
Thing that helped me most was dropping them completely and only doing Kroc Rows and Lat Pulldowns heavy for a while. After they healed, I added pullups back in, but now I always use wrist straps. Even though i’m still holding the bar, my grip can be loose enough so that I don’t get any elbow pain at all.
For the OP, remember that pullups are more or less an assistance exercise - you don’t necessarily need to PROGRESS at them, just be good enough at them so that you don’t have any weaknesses that would hurt your lifts, physique, etc. And what you are doing now is crazy impressive for your size. IF you REALLY want to increase your pullup ROM and number of reps, you could put a lot of time and effort into it and I’m sure you would get there - but that would take training time away from your lifts, and since you’re already pretty impressive at pullups, I don’t know if that’s worth it.
One suggestion for the ROM - pull as high as you can, then use your hips to get your chin all the way over and lower yourself with control. I know some people HATE kips, but I’ve found that using a little bit of a kip when I’m trying to squeeze in an extra rep or two, or just doing sets to failure of kipped pullups, really helps my lats grow. Like a kroc row, It’s doing a pull heavy, with less than ideal form, for many reps - and that helps me back grow. Kipping yourself up that last inch or two will get you into that ROM, and just being there and lowering yourself back down might be enough to help your muscles grow and get stronger with your chin over the bar.
Then again, you’ve got more than a hundred pounds on me, so that idea might not be worth shit. Just another idea, though.
I’ll echo the grip change and band assistance. It’s easier for me to get full ROM with palms facing.
Also, if you have the equipment, add some weight and do low reps for a training cycle, then try higher reps again afterwards.
I agree with above poster about grip change. I suppose you would the same thing with pronated grip.
You sought of use your lats to drag you into the bar even when you have to fight it, and then use your arms for the last bit almost pulling down on the bar .
I am probably not expressing that very well.
That’s odd. My elbows usually feel better when I incorporate chins and pull ups.
Thanks, guys lots of goodfeedback.
To answer some of our comments:
No I have no problem with elbow pain, or wrist pain, thank God. and I absolutely love pulls and chin-ups so probably wouldn’t give up doing them.
My ROM & rep volume is the same for palms in chin ups (i.e. chin not quite over the bar). I also throw in neutral grip ones too sometimes.
They are great as asst exercise, but some events call for them, like I did once the Tactical Challenge meet, which is 3 events: max deadlift, kettbell snatches for reps, and pull-ups for reps. I had one of the best deadlifts, and kbell snatches were respectable, but I couldn’t get a single legit pull-up(chin over the bar) so that effected my overall score.
Negatives are tough as hell, I used to try them , but gotta get back to doing them, but without a partner it’s a pain in the ass.
Kipping won’t work on this bar cuz of all the rocking, but i get access to a much sturdier power rack that I also do pullups from. My concern tho is that at my weight, the rocking & jerking action involved in kipping may do harm to my elbows and wrists.
HAHAHAHA gotta a wedgie
I can’t imagine doing kipping at 300lbs, if you do definitely don’t max out for a month a two to prepare your shoulders for the amount of jerking on it.
- Why are you not squeezing at the top? If you can’t get your chin over the bar you should be squeezing at the top of every rep until you can.
- Do you use lat pull downs? How far down do you pull that bar? What about standing military press where does each rep start? Find out if it’s a ROM issue or a strength issue.
- Straight arm pull downs > pullovers help increase ROM, concentrate on ROM first then increase strength.
- until you can do it completely vertical try leaning back if you can to have your chest touch, similar to a Gironda maybe not as far back.
If your not doing them already you can add a 8 week cycle of flyes, they help more than you think.
As far as endurance goes the first muscle to go are the biceps, pic a high rep range and do as heavy as you can single arm curls. 4 sets of 20 increased my pull-ups the quickest. I’m smaller than you so it was only 20-30lbs but my pull up number sky rocketed. Since your training and not worried about max, really squeeze as you curl work your grip also.
[quote]Airtruth wrote:
HAHAHAHA gotta a wedgie
I can’t imagine doing kipping at 300lbs, if you do definitely don’t max out for a month a two to prepare your shoulders for the amount of jerking on it.
- Why are you not squeezing at the top? If you can’t get your chin over the bar you should be squeezing at the top of every rep until you can.
- Do you use lat pull downs? How far down do you pull that bar? What about standing military press where does each rep start? Find out if it’s a ROM issue or a strength issue.
- Straight arm pull downs > pullovers help increase ROM, concentrate on ROM first then increase strength.
- until you can do it completely vertical try leaning back if you can to have your chest touch, similar to a Gironda maybe not as far back.
If your not doing them already you can add a 8 week cycle of flyes, they help more than you think.
As far as endurance goes the first muscle to go are the biceps, pic a high rep range and do as heavy as you can single arm curls. 4 sets of 20 increased my pull-ups the quickest. I’m smaller than you so it was only 20-30lbs but my pull up number sky rocketed. Since your training and not worried about max, really squeeze as you curl work your grip also. [/quote]
thanks Airtruth, that’s some good tips
Yeah the kipping thing worried me too, think i’ll pass on that.
I doubt i have an issue with ROM, i can OH press with no prob lots of weight from off the chest to full lockout.
Never really got much out of lat pull downs, i gave them a try and experimented with various grips/widths, even tried initiating the pull with pure lats. If it helped i couldn’t notice it.
Straight arm standing pull downs i do those, and i feel it in the lats, get a good pump & burn in the lats.
i’ll keep in mind the squeezing at the top, flies and curls. Thanks
[quote]Duwatsrt wrote:
those are good pull ups for a big man! Maybe start in the position you want to be at upon completion of the rep (chin over the bar) by using a bench under the bar to step on and then lower under control and repeat for a series of negatives and try some band assisted reps.
be aware that this site has confirmed my belief that a high volume of pull ups can lead to medial epicondylitis.
[/quote]
Just FYI if pull-ups were going to cause elbow pain it would almost always be lateral epcondylitis (tennis elbow), it would be Chin-ups that would be more related to Golfer’s elbow
Would about one and half reps emphasizing the bottom portion of a lat pull down? Or holding the bottom position of a lat pull down for a 3-5 count? Ways of strengthening the portion of the pull up you can’t get.
[quote]Fletch1986 wrote:
Would about one and half reps emphasizing the bottom portion of a lat pull down? Or holding the bottom position of a lat pull down for a 3-5 count? Ways of strengthening the portion of the pull up you can’t get.[/quote]
Maybe you mean holding for 3-5 count {and squeezing} the finish position (chin over the bar) in lat pull-down, since that’s where i’m weak.
Sounds like a sensible idea. i’ll throw that in the mix.
[quote]Tim Henriques wrote:
[quote]Duwatsrt wrote:
those are good pull ups for a big man! Maybe start in the position you want to be at upon completion of the rep (chin over the bar) by using a bench under the bar to step on and then lower under control and repeat for a series of negatives and try some band assisted reps.
be aware that this site has confirmed my belief that a high volume of pull ups can lead to medial epicondylitis.
[/quote]
Just FYI if pull-ups were going to cause elbow pain it would almost always be lateral epcondylitis (tennis elbow), it would be Chin-ups that would be more related to Golfer’s elbow[/quote]
I agree that it seems like it would be that way but it was definitely medial (both elbows). Trying to get back to a 20 rep max at 212 lbs at 50 years old. Tried the “grease the groove” approach. Multiple sets of pull-ups at 50-60% of my weekly tested RM (body weight only). Did them almost daily. Saw improvement but started feeling discomfort early into the training. Tried to push through thinking it may be temporary. Got bad enough I had to stop and ended in physical therapy (which didn’t work). Only thing that got rid of it was several months of rest. Now only do occasional chin-ups which do not seem to cause a problem and only pull-downs varying the hand position between neutral and supinated grip with an occasional set of very light pronated wide grip with emphasis on full range of motion and strong emphasis on scapular retraction/depression.