How many pull ups do you go for in an upperbody workout? On my overhead press days I get about 15-20 chin ups in. But on my bench day I get 15 in by supersetting them with bench press. I was wondering should I increase my pull ups. Other then that what I do for back is deadlift, then kroc rows on bench day then shrugs and band pull aparts on overhead press day.
Try to get 2 pullups for every pressing rep INCLUDING warm-ups. If its too hard in the beginning - match them 1 for 1 or 1.5 for each pressing rep (asin, if you did 30 pressing reps that day, have 45 pullups). I’ve been doing tis for awhile and have 0 shoulder problems plus the added volume of pullups in addition to the otehr back work def helps add mass to the lats.
[quote]Vladamir wrote:
How many pull ups do you go for in an upperbody workout? [/quote]
What are you doing them for? Or in other words what are you trying to accomplish by doing pull-ups? Ex. get a bigger back, stronger back, shoulder health, etc… This greatly influences how many you might do and with what kind of resistance.
Im trying to build a bigger and stronger back so I can have a better base for bench press, have balance so my chest isnt a lot bigger then my back
Vlad,
I try to stick to the two reps to pulling for every rep of pressing. Currently I am at 85 BW underhand/neutral grip chins (I have elbow tendonitis and this helps alleviate some of it) split between every set of pressing movement on my bench press days and I do 30 weighted chins at a given weight and add 5lbs. every time I can get the 30 in less than 6 sets (currently at 45 lbs) on my press days.
Along with chins I do kroc rows and T-bar or cable rows as my finisher for the day. Doing 5/3/1 with a boring but big assistance (5x5-10) using a variation of the main lift for that day.
The extra pulling movements have added a lot of stability to my bench and my back is noticeably stronger/thicker after two months of doing this.
As a baseline, at one point, I was in the same range of pullups you were in and I just tried to increase either my total reps for the day or my total reps per individual set every couple weeks. Took a while but it helps me a lot with pressing.
I think a good easy measurement is keeping your 1RM bench, and your 1RM weighted chin equal (including BW)
If there’s any confusion there, say you weigh 200, and bench 300. You should be doing enough chin-up work to be able to strap on 100 lbs and get 1.
Another way to look at it would be to keep the overall work equal (at least), between pressing vs pulls/chins/rows. For the sake of simplicity, lets say you weigh 225, and on a bench day you bench 225 5x5. A good baseline might be 30-35 chin-ups/pull-ups to match it (accounting for warmup). Can play around with assistance/weighted chins, and rep/set schemes to find what works best.
What I’ve had the most success with is making upper back workouts their own day, they tend to be pretty short though. The last one I did, I simply did 100 chin-ups for time and done.
I did like supersetting back stuff with pressing stuff, ala 5/3/1, but entire upper body DOMS didn’t mesh well with my job.
A final note: I don’t think you can really do too many pull-ups/chin-ups.
[quote]mkral55 wrote:
I did like supersetting back stuff with pressing stuff, ala 5/3/1, but entire upper body DOMS didn’t mesh well with my job.
A final note: I don’t think you can really do too many pull-ups/chin-ups. [/quote]
What do you do mkral?
And I agree, I just do pulls and chins randomly on trees or whatever just to get a little back pump during the day.
[quote]TheTexican wrote:
[quote]mkral55 wrote:
I did like supersetting back stuff with pressing stuff, ala 5/3/1, but entire upper body DOMS didn’t mesh well with my job.
A final note: I don’t think you can really do too many pull-ups/chin-ups. [/quote]
What do you do mkral?
And I agree, I just do pulls and chins randomly on trees or whatever just to get a little back pump during the day. [/quote]
I started doing them on the train and get some funny looks. But hey, if I’m going to ride the train for 20 minutes I might as well grab that bar above my head and do some pull-ups every 30 seconds.
[quote]Vladamir wrote:
Im trying to build a bigger and stronger back so I can have a better base for bench press, have balance so my chest isnt a lot bigger then my back[/quote]
In that case I think higher frequency than just your upper body days might be in order. There was an article about chins on this site not long ago promoting high frequency training for them. Find it and check it out.
I’d say do them every day (with bodyweight), but not to failure and accumulate a lot of volume and watch your back grow. 10 reps three times a day (I’m assuming you can do more than 10 reps already, but if not that number might have to be lowered) wouldn’t be out of the question.
And obviously you could do more on your upperbody training days or you could add weight those days. Frequency though I really think will help you get the volume you need to accomplish your goal fast.
I usually do 40-50 in a workout, in sets of 6-12, with added weight (25-70lb), although sometimes I’ll start with a warmup set of 20 BW. If I’m just using bodyweight, I’ll shoot for around 75 total. The more the better, try doing them twice a week if you can take it.
[quote]mkral55 wrote:
I think a good easy measurement is keeping your 1RM bench, and your 1RM weighted chin equal (including BW)
If there’s any confusion there, say you weigh 200, and bench 300. You should be doing enough chin-up work to be able to strap on 100 lbs and get 1.
Another way to look at it would be to keep the overall work equal (at least), between pressing vs pulls/chins/rows. For the sake of simplicity, lets say you weigh 225, and on a bench day you bench 225 5x5. A good baseline might be 30-35 chin-ups/pull-ups to match it (accounting for warmup). Can play around with assistance/weighted chins, and rep/set schemes to find what works best.
What I’ve had the most success with is making upper back workouts their own day, they tend to be pretty short though. The last one I did, I simply did 100 chin-ups for time and done.
I did like supersetting back stuff with pressing stuff, ala 5/3/1, but entire upper body DOMS didn’t mesh well with my job.
A final note: I don’t think you can really do too many pull-ups/chin-ups. [/quote]
I can do that, My bench is terrible (3 rep max is my bodyweight)
Personally i start out with 10 in between every pressing movement whether it’s bencg or overhead press. Usually by the end im doing about 5 though because my back gets fatigued. I just started doin this recently so idk how well its worked but my back and lats have been really sore. Yesterday when i went to the gym i felt lighter i think my pull up max may have increased to about 17 or 18 i had a previous pr of 15.
[quote]TheTexican wrote:
[quote]mkral55 wrote:
I did like supersetting back stuff with pressing stuff, ala 5/3/1, but entire upper body DOMS didn’t mesh well with my job.
A final note: I don’t think you can really do too many pull-ups/chin-ups. [/quote]
What do you do mkral?
And I agree, I just do pulls and chins randomly on trees or whatever just to get a little back pump during the day. [/quote]
What I’ve been doing lately is a quick back workout on it’s own day, where I do 100 chins (or equivalent work) in about 20 minutes. By equivalent work, I mean I might do 100 chin-ups, or I might do 40 weighted pull-ups. Only thing that stays the same is the time (somewhat, anyways)
It’s not a gem of perfect programming, but it’s working for me. I can mark progress in several different ways: chins per minute, total reps, total reps at X weight, adding weight, shortening time, etc.