Chins No Traps?

OP: Regular, supinated grip chip ups should work your traps minimally. Obviously overhand and even neutral grips will work them more. I don’t know what sort of “variation” you’re looking for.

If regular chin ups still hit your traps more than you’d like, try adding some weight via a belt and only going down half way on your chin ups.

Can’t say I understand the request, but I think this is the answer.

OP,

please post a pic of your overdeveloped traps. Thanks.

To answer the original question, I would imagine staying very vertical on a chin-up would minimize it to the best degree. If you start bringing your legs forward and bring your chest to the bar as opposed to your chin over it, you will get more scapular retraction.

In other words, try to minimize the amount your scapula retracts and focus on extension of the humerus and flexion at the elbow.

If you have a partner, have them lightly tap your lats as you do them. It will help you active the lats. The biceps aren’t going to be an activation issue. If your lats are working enough, you probably will have use other muscles (traps, rhomboids) to compensate.

Just a guess. Not that the chins are a huge trap builder anyway.

[quote]P1 wrote:
I recently read an article here (I forget which one) that talked about the doing 10x10 of chinups to help develop thickness (front to back width).
My biceps are lagging and my thickness isn’t great either so I decided I’d try it out.

No-traps because I want to focus on bi’s/back and keep my traps from developing any more for fear of imbalance. Plus, I’ve never been one for the huge trap look. [/quote]

See, here is where things got fuzzy.

In your original post you asked for a pull-up variation which would minimize trap involvement. Ok. strange request but answers were provided nonetheless. Then, Mike asked “why would you want to do that?” To which you replied with the above.

So, I tried pointing out that traps are essential for thickness (front to back width as you put it) and therefore should not only not be minimized, but should instead be focused on through the use of rows instead of pull-ups. Since, as was already stated, pull-ups aren’t great thickness (trap) developers anyways.

Oh, and I read back through the article “Sicilian Volume Training” and it never said that doing pull-ups would improve back thickness, you made the mistake of assuming that.

As far as the bicep emphasis goes, someone already suggested doing supinated grip (chin-ups), but honestly if you feel like your biceps are lagging, then do some exercises specifically designed to work your biceps; curls for example.

I think the problem is that you are trying to get everything you want out of one single movement. Sorry, but that’s probably not going to happen. Yes, during a ME weighted chin you do involve your biceps, lats, rear delts, lower traps, etc… (in theory anyway).

But, if some of those muscles have poor neuromuscular connections, then they will probably not develop well. While the muscles which are the strongest (have the greatest neuromuscular connections) will develop the most.

This can eventually lead to lagging body parts. And in the case that it does then you need to add in exercises specifically directed at building these lagging body parts. In the case of traps the best exercises are row variations. For biceps the best exercises are curl variations.

Hope this at least helps you understand how, or at least why, your thought process was flawed.

Good training,

Sentoguy

[quote]Body Hammer wrote:
kinein wrote:
In the spirit of the subject title I ask this. If a killer whale and a space monkey were to race, who would win, and why?

The space monkey of course, what kind of retard are you for even asking a question like that??? Jeez!
[/quote]

You’re reasoning is flawed body hammer. Space money’s don’t have the level of development needed to win such a competition because they spend too much time ignoring major muscle groups. In my gym alone I frequently have to kick the space monkeys out of the curl rack so I can squat. Killer whales, on the other hand, are just badasses all around.

just food for thought, why dont we all just pool our knowledge, answer the question and thats it, theres no use ranting about the image in your head that is acceptable, the poster asked a question and all we need to do is answer it and worry about nothing else, seems like life is too short to me.

oh secondly, someone explain to me how you can train for thickness, if muscle grows in cross sectional area, muscles only contract and thats it, i don’t think they are that smart in terms of knowing how to grow thick or ???, dependent on the exercise you do.

also for upper back size everyone revisit Poliquin’s article on the best upper back exercises, most of them pull-up variations with super high contractions.

[quote]hardcoreukno0359 wrote:
just food for thought, why dont we all just pool our knowledge, answer the question and thats it, theres no use ranting about the image in your head that is acceptable, the poster asked a question and all we need to do is answer it and worry about nothing else, seems like life is too short to me.

Because the question didn’t make much sense. Why answer a flawed question just to answer it. I was under the impression that we here are to HELP not just answer for the sake of it. The OP said he doesn’t like the “overdeveloped trap look”. Do you honestly think he was saying- “man I hope my lower traps don’t get over developed”? You can bet he meant upper traps. Have you ever seen ANYBODY with overdeveloped LOWER traps?

oh secondly, someone explain to me how you can train for thickness, if muscle grows in cross sectional area, muscles only contract and thats it, i don’t think they are that smart in terms of knowing how to grow thick or ???, dependent on the exercise you do.

Training for thickness in the back is a collective statement. Many muscles make up the back. Obviously you don’t have a “back” muscle. For thickness in the back you would focus on traps, rhomboids, etc. the muscles surrounding the scapula and closer to the center line. These would grow "out from your back causing a thicker look. For width you would focus mainly on the lats.

also for upper back size everyone revisit Poliquin’s article on the best upper back exercises, most of them pull-up variations with super high contractions.[/quote]

[quote]hardcoreukno0359 wrote:
just food for thought, why dont we all just pool our knowledge, answer the question and thats it, theres no use ranting about the image in your head that is acceptable, the poster asked a question and all we need to do is answer it and worry about nothing else, seems like life is too short to me.

oh secondly, someone explain to me how you can train for thickness, if muscle grows in cross sectional area, muscles only contract and thats it, i don’t think they are that smart in terms of knowing how to grow thick or ???, dependent on the exercise you do.

also for upper back size everyone revisit Poliquin’s article on the best upper back exercises, most of them pull-up variations with super high contractions.[/quote]

The only way to train for thickness (which I read as front to back depth, i.e. from the vertical center of body backward) is to go heavy on pulling and rowing and eat big.

To the OP, you can’t have a “thick” back without thick traps. Traps are a major part of the upper back. If you want width, that is a different issue because you can get lat width without a thick back - just do lots and lots of t-bar rows to the mid-section. You can also do full-range pullups and chinups. The amount you work your lats vs the amount you work you traps means that you will put on far more mass in your lats than in your traps. This will reduce any imbalance in traps that you think you have.

Think in terms of a a square rotated so that the corners are pointing up-down and right-left (otherwise called a diamond). If you stretch it out from the corners by pulling the right-left (your lats) 3" and the top corner 1" (your traps), what happens to the shape? Sure, the diamond grew taller, but because it grew disproportionately width-wise, you don’t really notice the vertical increase.

And the race between the space monkey and the killer whale is dependent on the venue (air/land/sea/space). In space, the monkey wins a close one because he doesn’t die near the finish - like the whale. In the sea, clearly the whale. On land, the whale can’t move, yet the space monkey can’t handle the gravity, so neither of them win. In the air, it’s an African Swallow. Since the African Swallow can also walk on land, it is a superior racer to the other two.

DB

I think that like others have said developing traps that are “too big” shouldn’t be a worry of yours. They aren’t a muscle that will “get in the way” as some would say and they are pretty much needed for every type of row.

If you don’t want to build your traps, have them removed from your body. If you really don’t think your hitting your lats enough with pullups, try adjusting how you hold your body off the bar, or look into Technically correct lat pulldowns (In Thib’s hss-100 back spec). Good luck

You need not fear size.

[quote]hardcoreukno0359 wrote:
just food for thought, why dont we all just pool our knowledge, answer the question and thats it, theres no use ranting about the image in your head that is acceptable, the poster asked a question and all we need to do is answer it and worry about nothing else, seems like life is too short to me.
[/quote]

But isn’t that what has been going on? The problem with just answering the original question is that it is a flawed question. The OP wants to build back thickness, but minimize trap development. That is impossible to do.

So, what needs to happen is that the OP needs to realize that his understanding of physiology/muscle recruitment is wrong. Several of us have already explained that pull-ups don’t heavily recruit the traps (only the lower portion is recruited and is not the prime mover). Several of us have also tried to explain that trap development is crucial for back thickness.

Please tell me how this is not answering the question?

Good training,

Sentoguy

[quote]Professor X wrote:
P1 wrote:
Thanks for the responses.
Of course you don’t. You don’t see what is wrong with your line of thinking because you are a NOOB. [/quote]

OMG NOSTALGIA… Counterstrike… Warcraft… lol

I think alot of confusion was caused on this thread because I didn’t specify upper and middle traps. I guess only some people inferred that’s what I ment. Upper and middle trap involvement, though more so upper, is what I was looking to minimize.

Haha! I swear, I have a freaking man-crush on Professor X. I wonder if he kicks as much ass in real life as he does over the internet, I certainly think so.

I made my girlfriend read Professor X’s posts. I don’t know why, I just did…

Eherm, anyways, I have a solution. Just do the damn pull-up and quit bitching. No explanation needed.

[quote]P1 wrote:
I think alot of confusion was caused on this thread because I didn’t specify upper and middle traps. I guess only some people inferred that’s what I ment. Upper and middle trap involvement, though more so upper, is what I was looking to minimize. [/quote]

Try wrapping your traps with tape or athletic wrap before the lift. This should minimize their involvement.

or

Do reverse pullups on a smith machine so that you don’t need trap stabilization.

[quote]P1 wrote:
I think alot of confusion was caused on this thread because I didn’t specify upper and middle traps. I guess only some people inferred that’s what I ment. Upper and middle trap involvement, though more so upper, is what I was looking to minimize. [/quote]

The only way that you could recruit the middle traps is if you lean back and actually touch the bar with your chest. As for the upper traps, it is physically impossible to recruit them while performing a pull-up, regardless of hand position.

This still is in contradiction to your goal of wanting to build back thickness though. You need to develop your middle and lower traps if you want to build back thickness. And honestly, are your upper traps really that huge that you need to minimize training them? Do you mind if I ask how you developed your upper traps?

No offense intended, it’s just that it’s rare to see people who really have developed their traps to their potential.

The above picture is of WSM competitor Andrew “Stumpy” Raynes. If your traps are as developed as his, then maybe you need to worry about working them out too much.


Another example of truly huge traps. Brock Lesner.

[quote]hardcoreukno0359 wrote:
oh secondly, someone explain to me how you can train for thickness, if muscle grows in cross sectional area, muscles only contract and thats it, i don’t think they are that smart in terms of knowing how to grow thick or ???, dependent on the exercise you do.

.[/quote]

It is very strange that you can use the words “cross sectional area” in a sentence, and not know how that would apply to thickness.

Heres an example.

You have a cylinder. It is one inch in diameter, and has a .5 in. radius because the radius is half of the diameter. Its cross sectional area would be related to the radius in the formula- A=pi*(r^2)

Now increase that cylinders diameter to two inches. Its “cross sectional area” has changed proportionaly to the difference in the radius.

How does this relate to muscle thickness? As a muscle grows, it gets thicker (like the cylinder), and increases in cross sectional area.

See, this right here is exactly the problem with acces to a bunch of information with out the foundation of knowledge to understand it.
You get guys misunderstanding entire concepts, and throwing around words like “cross sectional area” without a clue as to what they actualy mean.


Last one. Kevin Randleman.

[quote]Sentoguy wrote:
P1 wrote:
I think alot of confusion was caused on this thread because I didn’t specify upper and middle traps. I guess only some people inferred that’s what I ment. Upper and middle trap involvement, though more so upper, is what I was looking to minimize.

The only way that you could recruit the middle traps is if you lean back and actually touch the bar with your chest. As for the upper traps, it is physically impossible to recruit them while performing a pull-up, regardless of hand position.

This still is in contradiction to your goal of wanting to build back thickness though. You need to develop your middle and lower traps if you want to build back thickness. And honestly, are your upper traps really that huge that you need to minimize training them? Do you mind if I ask how you developed your upper traps?

No offense intended, it’s just that it’s rare to see people who really have developed their traps to their potential.

The above picture is of WSM competitor Andrew “Stumpy” Raynes. If your traps are as developed as his, then maybe you need to worry about working them out too much.
[/quote]

I think most of us who have actually lifted weights for a while understand that only a newbie would make a request like this. In fact, it is RARE for me to see someone with truly large traps.

The only reason mine stand out is because I worked the hell out of them for a while and they responded well. It isn’t like they accidentally grew or that my neck just suddenly hit over 19" because I was doing chin ups.

This thread would actually have some decent info in it…if there weren’t these little ticks that keep jumping into threads complaining about how we aren’t answering questions…because we answered the question.

[quote]Professor X wrote:
Sentoguy wrote:
P1 wrote:
I think alot of confusion was caused on this thread because I didn’t specify upper and middle traps. I guess only some people inferred that’s what I ment. Upper and middle trap involvement, though more so upper, is what I was looking to minimize.

The only way that you could recruit the middle traps is if you lean back and actually touch the bar with your chest. As for the upper traps, it is physically impossible to recruit them while performing a pull-up, regardless of hand position.

This still is in contradiction to your goal of wanting to build back thickness though. You need to develop your middle and lower traps if you want to build back thickness. And honestly, are your upper traps really that huge that you need to minimize training them? Do you mind if I ask how you developed your upper traps?

No offense intended, it’s just that it’s rare to see people who really have developed their traps to their potential.

The above picture is of WSM competitor Andrew “Stumpy” Raynes. If your traps are as developed as his, then maybe you need to worry about working them out too much.

I think most of us who have actually lifted weights for a while understand that only a newbie would make a request like this. In fact, it is RARE for me to see someone with truly large traps.

The only reason mine stand out is because I worked the hell out of them for a while and they responded well. It isn’t like they accidentally grew or that my neck just suddenly hit over 19" because I was doing chin ups.

This thread would actually have some decent info in it…if there weren’t these little ticks that keep jumping into threads complaining about how we aren’t answering questions…because we answered the question.[/quote]

Right on. It just wasn’t the answer he wanted to hear.