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Pull ups

morgan000

morgan000

Member
Hey guys,

I'm trying to get my pull ups happening as an overall back developer but I am at a sticking point. I use the assisted machine on 50 pounds and I can't physically get past the same reps every week. First set I'll do 8, second set I'll do 6 or 7 and the last set I barely make it to 5. My end goal is to do pull ups with my body weight for 3 sets of however many reps but how can I get past this sticking point?

Thanks for the help.
 
The day I stopped doing assisted pullups/chinups was the day I realised I could actually perform them anyhow, the assisted setup impedes your natural movement and paradoxically makes them harder to a degree.

Switch to unassisted, perform as many as you can across 3-4 sets. Do so every day if you can, every second day if not.

You should get 3 sets of 5 in a month or less.

If you cant perform even a single unassisted pullup, drop the assistance by one step every time you enter the gym and just do as many as you can. Once it gets down to only 10kg assistance or whatever, ditch the silly machine.
 
The first thing you can try is what's called negative ecentuated
When you are fully fatigued, you disengage the assisted function.
Step up and very, very slowly lower yourself down, then very quickly step up and repeat keep going until you are unable to control the downward movement.

So your muscles are only controlling the downward movement.

If your first set is 8, good full rep's

(Then your aim (goal) in say, 12 months is to complete 3 sets of 8)

Now, this is the course...

On the final two sets where you presently fatigue at "5" and "3"

I want you to finish off doing doing as many as possible negative movements

Take note of how many negatives you add to each set, your goal is to add negatives.

Do this for three months.

On the negative, make sure you breath, taking short breaths, sort of like a women breaths when giving birth, sounds funny, but it's a sure way of getting enough oxygen to feed the muscles, you'll need it.
 
A note with negatives is that the downward portion must be slow and controlled, maintain he same speed of movement, once you are unable to control that speed terminate the set.

You don't want to give your muscles a chance to rest.

Take a minute between sets or however long it takes to catch your breath.

You won't get DOMS with these, but be carful not overdo these, they'll wear yourself down quick, once a week should be enough.
 
Take it from me too morgan ...
I ditched that dumb@rse machine a while back and at the time could only do 2-3 chins (not pulls). Since doing negatives 1 - 2 times a week my reps have only increased and feeling a lot stronger!
If your legs are spent from squats or whatever then put a box underneath and jump up to start ya negatives.
Be sure to eat well though cause your gonna be one sore mofo once you start all that!

Good luck mate!
 
Today I ditched the pull up assisted machine and discovered that I could do 3 sets of 4 reps unassisted. Pretty happy with that. Now I'm gonna work on increasing the reps. Thanks for the help guys.
 
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