Pull ups and lat exercises

[lookatthat]

I'm about 6'5" and roughly 200lbs. I have long arms and have just begun working out, so not a lot of strength or muscle mass.
Pull ups have always been difficult for me given my shape. I have to lift more weight further than others, and so it's extremely difficult.
Lat pull down machines aren't great at my gym. I feel like it's more arm and muscles and not so much working the back, even though I concentrate on driving my elbows down and letting my back do the work. Negligible strength gains after about 6 weeks.
What movements on a pulley machine would provide results? Note, I'd have to kneel or sit on a small balance ball otherwise my long arms prevent a full range of motion.
Or is fighting the pull up machine with the weighted spring-step the best option?

 

[twoton]

I've never used a weighted pullup machin. It might work to assist you. I'd go that route. I don't think a lat machine will help you get a pullup much except maybe as a 'back-end' auxiliary exercise to get a little extra work after your pullups, if that makes sense.

 

[steel33]

Try this program. As long as your form is correct you will see results:
http://www.50pullups.com
If I'm doing pull downs or pull-ups I also do shoulder presses as part of my superset so I oppose the motion. Like the op when I am doing a lat pull down my goal is to drive my elbows down by trying to mentally isolate just my lats.

 

[shrevela]

I'm about 6'5" and roughly 200lbs. I have long arms and have just begun working out, so not a lot of strength or muscle mass.
Pull ups have always been difficult for me given my shape. I have to lift more weight further than others, and so it's extremely difficult.
Lat pull down machines aren't great at my gym. I feel like it's more arm and muscles and not so much working the back, even though I concentrate on driving my elbows down and letting my back do the work. Negligible strength gains after about 6 weeks.
What movements on a pulley machine would provide results? Note, I'd have to kneel or sit on a small balance ball otherwise my long arms prevent a full range of motion.
Or is fighting the pull up machine with the weighted spring-step the best option?

Most people who just start working out often complain about getting a better arm workout when they are working back due to them not having a strong mind-muscle connection. It takes time to develop that. One exercise I would recommend you is using an underhand grip on the lat pulldown machine. I see that you're are driving your elbows rather than pulling with your hands and that is very good. The target area you want to bring the bar to is between the nipple area and upper chest. Focus on squeezing and contracting your lats on every rep.

 

[Hieronymous]

How about using resistance bands for your pull-up/chin-ups? I've seen many people use these until they build enough strength to start doing standard pulls. For myself, I found the best way to increase my pull up strength was doing pull ups of different variations. The Lat pull down machine never seemed to help. At the beginning I would just do a lot of hanging, or negatives until my strength increased. Keep up the good work! Time is your friend when it comes to pull ups. You'll be cranking out sets of ten in no time.

 

[sangheili90]

I'm 6' 4 1/2" and 240 and I can do weighted chins with 70 lbs. around my waist for around 3-5 reps.

Anyway, you just need to build up strength and a great exercise to do would be to simply keep practicing pullups, does your gym have the assisted pullup machine at all? Another great exercise that I really like is the cable row, very easy to properly target the lats without putting much strain on the shoulders or lower back.

 

[Alex22876]

There are some good suggestions here. I also have long arms and a long trunk.

One thing that I found useful is to not even think about your arms (biceps) or you hands, and imagine the whole movement is about bring your elbows back to your body. Not your hands to your body, but your elbows. It seems weird, but it focuses on what you really want.

 

[Snarky_succubus]

Lat pulls really don't seem to do much for pull-ups. I can pull my body weight on the lat pull but I can't yet do an unassisted pull-up. I just bought resistance bands. The assisted pull-up machine is fine but I think the bands are probably going to help me learn the mechanics of an actual pull-up better. You can get bands pretty cheap on Amazon.

 

[bananaclubcock]

I'm with Snarky_succubus on thinking the Lat pulls don't do too much for pull-ups. An option I'd recommend is doing negative pull-ups. Get a chair or stool near the bar and step up into place at the top of a pull-up. Hold it at the top for a few seconds and then do a controlled lowering of yourself that takes a few seconds. I'd start with 5 of these with a bit of rest in between, prolly 10 seconds minimum, and then work up to doing 10. If you are doing these right, you will be sore at first. Once you've mastered getting 10 of these, then try doing real pull-ups in singles with a lots of rest. Gradually reduce the rest and then you should be knocking out sets of 5 in no time.

Basically, pull-ups, like many strength movements, are actually skill movements as much as anything. The easiest way to learn the skill is to do negatives to practice the grove and get your body to moving that way.

 

[twoton]

An option I'd recommend is doing negative pull-ups.

Agreed.

 

[publackstar]

How about using resistance bands for your pull-up/chin-ups? I've seen many people use these until they build enough strength to start doing standard pulls. For myself, I found the best way to increase my pull up strength was doing pull ups of different variations. The Lat pull down machine never seemed to help. At the beginning I would just do a lot of hanging, or negatives until my strength increased. Keep up the good work! Time is your friend when it comes to pull ups. You'll be cranking out sets of ten in no time.

Second this...the resistance bands helped me go from nothing to a set of 10 unassisted.

 

[hotcockalex]

negatives as slowly as you can build up strength and help you to reach unassisted quickly

 

[deleted258434]

I've been on the convict conditioning program, and one of the earlier steps before you begin pullups is something called horizontal pullups. You find a stable bar about waist height, sit down below it, and gripping the bar, you flatten your body like a board, your heels being the only thing touching the ground, and you proceed to do a pullup.

It took me one year of doing horizontals every tuesday every week before I hit the progression standard of 3 sets of 30. But my biceps exploded huge as a result.

If you have patience, I would definitely recommend looking into convict conditioning because it trains immense strength through solely body weight exercises. From pushups and pullups to handstand pushups/bridges and squats. My current pullup status is still every tuesday, a set of 13 close grip pullups, then a set of 13 shoulder grip, and then a set of 10 cliffhangers. Sometimes if I'm feeling ambitious I'll go past 3 sets and do wide grip or repeated grip sets.

 

[Hieronymous]

Here's a recent article you might find helpful.
https://www.t-nation.com/training/pull-ups-youre-doing-them-wrong

H

 

[lookatthat]

I began yesterday. I don't actually care about doing a pull up, fwiw. I'm not an aspiring rock climber or whatever, I'm just vain (and I have a bad back that needs strength to stabilize itself). I want a V shaped back and to have lats for once.
I did negatives on the pull up bar. Four sets of 5. Then I did a row machine, 3 sets of 10 at the max weight could manage 30x. Then lat pull down machine at the max weight I could manage 30x. At this point my back and arms are quivering like jelly.
Then back to the pull up bar to do spring -assisted pull ups. Three sets of 6. It's funny, if you really do think about your lats and driving your elbows down, your arms don't play a role and you can feel your back muscles moving the weight. It's weird how you have to train your brain to make the lats conquer the weight, and once it happens, it's weirdly foreign. But, now I get it and it's repeatable.
then straight arm pull downs on the cable machine, and four sets of 15 cable rows at the highest point, then the mid-high point, then straight ahead, then from below... to hit my back in different aspects.
My back was shredded when I was done. I'm sure 8 weeks of this and I'll be moving a great deal of weight (barring injury, I'm 45), and the results will be visible in terms of size and tone.

 

[steel33]

Good job. Make sure you don't burn yourself out right away. You might be quite sore from the lactic acid buildup for up to a week if you haven't been lifting. I know it happens to me if I take off more than a few weeks for a muscle group.
I try to do a few more reps or a few more pounds each sessions do chart my progress so I can see how I'm doing.

 

[chicocklarge]

You might want to try rolling your back on a foam roller to reduce the lactic acid buildup. It helps my legs after a run.