SunGod

Currently im only able to do about 3 BW pullups at a time, i was wondering what are some over exercises i could do to increase that number or should i just keep doing them 3 at a time. Thanks

Striker

Just keep doing them until you can do more.

Herc2015

My plan is to do chin ups with good form every other day with lat pull downs, high cable rows, and dumbbell rowing. I had gotten up to five then BAM! A shoulder injury, sore wrist, tendonitis, etc, etc. Weird shit, just when I was getting good! I'm going to get some alflutop to see if it will help.

Herc2015

I try to work on the pull ups in this manner. I warm-up for ten minutes or so until I feel a little perspiration on my forehead then I'm ready to go. I try to use good form. One chin up at best with good form is better than three done poorly. This is followed by lat pull downs, high cable rows, and dumbbell rows. 3 giant sets at this point for five-six weeks. After the five to six week period, I would add another chin up and increase the weight 5-10lb. So if I started today at doing 1 chin up, by December, I should be doing ten chin ups. Starting the lats at 120lb., by December, I should be doing 220-230lb. I've done this routine before in 2005, but I couldn't continue because of other commitments and a surgical operation. This year, however, I'm free to tackle my routine once again. I call my training, "Incremental weight training". It works well for me.

digitor

Otherwise known as, weight lifting! Anything other than incremental is pointless.

Interesting strategy, definitely wouldn't do that every other day though. Too much volume surely!

Gazhole

The best way to learn how to do chinups is to do chinups. There are a few things you can do to get better at them though.

Assisted pullups can be useful, either using bands, a machine, or a friend.

Instead of sticking to more conventional rep range setups, do something like 10x1. Sure you're only doing one at a time, but the cumulative effect of doing 10 pullups separately will mean more than doing 3 to failure and not being able to do any more.

Take the number you can do in one go and double or triple it, this is your number of reps to get to. For that movement, all you have to do is reach that number of reps. Doesnt matter how many sets, doesnt matter if you do sets of 20, 10, 5, or 1, just get to that number. Take as much rest as you need between sets, and just get to that number.

More advanced techniques which i dont reccomend doing too often, if at all depending on your overall levels of development, are things like negative only lifts, where you only do the negative part of the lift, even loading up with more weight than you can perform for that many reps (your eccentric strength is generally stronger than your concentric strength). These are incredibly taxing on the muscles and the CNS so use them VERY sparingly if at all.

Try the other methods first for a while. Ive added 2 or 3 reps to my bodyweight max for pullups using some of those techniques over a few weeks on my last program. Ive also nearly doubled the reps i can do with bodyweight squats to about 50 in a row, and about 30 pushups in a row from 20, all on the same program.

If you concentrate your efforts on just pullups, im sure these can help you. Keep us posted.

Good luck.

SunGod

Thanks for the comments guys. Gazhole the 10X1 seems to make sense, i'll try that for a couple months and let you know the results.

oval61251

I am confused about this can you explain it better please?

Gazhole

Well, ill take me as an example.

I can do 10 in a set at BW.

So for this method i would triple the number of reps i want to complete in the session for pullups to 30.

For this part of the session, i would do as many sets of pullups as it takes to reach 30 pullups, just so long as i get there. The workout i did a week or two ago looked something like this:

Pullups @ BW (0:30 Rest Interval) - x10, x8, x6, x4, x2

I did 30 pullups over 5 sets with short rest intervals. If id have done 3x10 i may not have been able to get to 30 because 10 is pretty much the max i can do in a set. Not only that, but using the shorter rest intervals makes it a little bit tougher, even though you should be still able to complete all the reps.

Is that clearer? ress:

Gazhole

Good stuff, i hope it works out. Pullups are a great movement that people tend to leave out because theyre more difficult than curls.

Herc2015

Not quite! You see when I exercise let's say the chest. Warming up with 90lb./41kg. for two-three sets, I then would double the weight at 180lb./82kg. I would do 4-5sets with this weight without increasing or decreasing the poundage. It takes the nervous system 21 days to become adapted to that particular stress on that muscle. By exercising every other day and allowing for rest and some recuperation for the 21 days. This will double to 42 days, 6 weeks! At the end of the six weeks, I increase the weight by one increment. Meaning, adding one more rep, or adding 10-50lb. depending on the exercise. All in all, it is simply a modified form of weight training! But I still like to call it, "Incremental Weight Training" This gives my routine a little class! LOL

Malley

Here listen. This question gets thrown at me like once a week. If there is an assisted pullup machine around then use it. Use enough assist to get a tempo of 3 up and 3 down for 10 reps. Normally 3-5 sets work pretty well. After a month of this try to see how many you can do then. But make sure pullup number 10 is super hard.

Not only that, but just improving pulling strength in general. Sometimes it just takes time.

wala

Good answer

I could only do no more than 5 when I first started going to the gym. as gaz said, the best way to learn how to do pull ups is to do pull ups! lol

Good idea from Malley, worth a shot definately if you have an assisted pull up machine.

digitor

Yeah keep it simple, if you want to be better at something and it's too hard, then you make it an easier form of that exact same exercise so that you can work on progressive overload in the correct rep range with enough workload. So Malley's idea is the best IMO, but Striker had the right idea too