Yates' Guide to a Better Back

winner winner chicken dinner.

as previously stated, hook up a little “Back to Future” gaget on someone and it’s likely to beep beep beep more often within the upper region of the chest when doing inclines.

my instincts are instinctual.

On a differnt note, did rope pullovers for my lats last night, wow…have to go pretty light on those, dug them though, right after i went to the pullover machine just to make sure i didn’t miss any fibers…smoked em’! Sweet.

thank you dorian, thank you stu.

One aspect everybody is overlooking is the People aspect. Just as people have different muscle bellies some have different percentages of muscle fibers at each insert as well as, different concentration when focusing on them. Someone who doesn’t have a great mind muscle connection for the upper chest would not see much difference then someone who is more genetically predisposed for the upper chest.

The other thing is aesthetic upper chest and anatomical upper chest. Working the inclines in certain ways can build the shoulder and chest in a way to make it look like the upper chest is bigger. Versus shoulder exercises and chest separately where the shoulders look more like boulders standing out on the chest.

[quote]cyruseven75 wrote:
winner winner chicken dinner.

as previously stated, hook up a little “Back to Future” gaget on someone and it’s likely to beep beep beep more often within the upper region of the chest when doing inclines.

my instincts are instinctual.

On a differnt note, did rope pullovers for my lats last night, wow…have to go pretty light on those, dug them though, right after i went to the pullover machine just to make sure i didn’t miss any fibers…smoked em’! Sweet.

thank you dorian, thank you stu.[/quote]

Lol, ah yes,… it seems quite a few people have latched onto that Winner-winner phrase lately :slight_smile:

The rope pullovers are just one of the best ways to start a back session IMO. You can adjust your body position to get more of a lat specific target, or the usual, midback area most gym rats would expect. I employed these immediately followed by narrow pullups/pulldowns from my 2009 to 2010 contest seasons, and my lats thickened up considerably.

S

[quote]cyruseven75 wrote:

[quote]dre1986 wrote:

[quote]hungry4more wrote:

[quote]dre1986 wrote:

[quote]jake_j_m wrote:
Thanks a ton for this article. Always love what Yates has to say. In fact, come to think of it, is there anything Yates has said which has even been disproved? Seems like he seems on point with pretty much everything exercise selection/form wise (not really talking about HIT etc.)[/quote]

First off let me say Yates is a legend.

Right, now the patriotic bits been done, to answer your questions, yes.

He ran a small seminar a while back whereby he was discussing chest training. In the seminar he proceeded to advice everyone that when training the chest it was impossible, anatomically, to target a single portion of the chest with any sort of effectivness. Ie, if you want to hit upper chest and you’re doing incline bench to do this, it wont work. He firmly believes that you cannot target a particular portion of the chest. He also claims that doing decline bench presses are the best exercise for chest, as they offer the most ROM.

I got caught hook, line and sinker when i saw the seminar until i got put straight by a couple of guys on here and looked a bit more into the anatomy and the fact that there are multiple heads to the pec blah blah etc…[/quote]

Not sure if serious…[/quote]

Yes, i am. [/quote]

jesus man…there are not “multiple heads” to the pec. Yates is correct you cannot truly target the heads hehehehe. major minor of the pec involves where they insert regarding angle and depth of the muscle, e.g. sitting under the surface of the skin…meaning…can i touch it?

feel my biceps, they are really pumped vs feel my subscapularis muscles (rotator cuff). see the difference?

Yates saying you cannot specificaly target the dual functioning muscles of the pecs is true, during pressing or fly movements the entire muscle is “in use.”

he’s simply saying the pecs are not like the triceps, or better yet, the individually target(able) heads of the deltoids.

Yates likes the bang for your buck you get from decline press.

BY ALL FUCKING MEANS THOUGH, training inclines does help the upper chest, think of an electromagnetic “Back to the Future” type gaget hooked up to your chest and a fancy computer monitor, add lights and beep beep beep things in your mind if it helps. the upper chest would/will likely light up and beep w/ more vigor during upper chest work…but the whole muscle is activated.

Silly, silly, silly…this is a good thread.[/quote]

Bit late now, but want to clarify my original post. When i refered to multiple heads it was a poor use of terminology. I was refering more to the different portions of the pec major, ie the clavicular, abdominal and sternocostal. Not that it matters, the thread has moved way past this now.

Thoughts on kayak rows vs straight rope pulldowns and full ROM close grip PD vs partial ROM?

nice post Delta

Gotta love DY.

I had read this before and started to apply a narrow grip to the majority of my back exercises and it has worked pretty good. It worked pretty good and I had a friend use this technique while getting ready for a show recently. Here is before using a narrow grip on most exercises Rx Muscle Contest Gallery and here is 6 months later while using narrow grip during his contest prep Rx Muscle Contest Gallery

Tomorrow is back day - my favorite day of the week!

Going to start with rope pulldowns and some bodyweight pullups, then onto my latest favorite exercise - underhand BB rows. I can get a good pump even without a bar just by doing the ROM.

Yates deadlifts then a machine or two followed by back extensions.

LET’S DO THIS SHIT

Thanks for posting this - I have been doing Pendlay rows and underhand BB rows lately but now I really want to try and work in some rope pullovers.

Wow, I really thought I was doing everything needed to build a bigger back. After reading this thread tomorrows back day will be seeing a couple changes. This just may be the thing I needed for new stimulation. Thanks!

@Stu - Love these rope pullovers, I have always done cable pullovers on a incline bench with a straight bar but these feel better to me.

[quote]flat6nut wrote:
Wow, I really thought I was doing everything needed to build a bigger back. After reading this thread tomorrows back day will be seeing a couple changes. This just may be the thing I needed for new stimulation. Thanks![/quote]

You’ve got a great back, Flat. And damn, you’re 45?

I guess old dogs CAN learn new tricks!

:wink:

[quote]View 1 wrote:
@Stu - Love these rope pullovers, I have always done cable pullovers on a incline bench with a straight bar but these feel better to me. [/quote]

I’ve done the bench variation myself (with DBs actually), but what I like so much about just standing at the high cable, is that you can really position your torso and hit the lower attachments well (an area I’ve really focused on the last 2 years to offset my waist). Also, with the rope, you have the option of keeping your hands together, or pulling them apart. My preference is to let them touch at the stretch point, but pull apart at the full contraction. Sort of the best of both worlds in terms of what I want out of the movement.

S

[quote]The Mighty Stu wrote:

[quote]View 1 wrote:
@Stu - Love these rope pullovers, I have always done cable pullovers on a incline bench with a straight bar but these feel better to me. [/quote]

I’ve done the bench variation myself (with DBs actually), but what I like so much about just standing at the high cable, is that you can really position your torso and hit the lower attachments well (an area I’ve really focused on the last 2 years to offset my waist). Also, with the rope, you have the option of keeping your hands together, or pulling them apart. My preference is to let them touch at the stretch point, but pull apart at the full contraction. Sort of the best of both worlds in terms of what I want out of the movement.

S[/quote]

Thanks for the tip about the hand placement I will try that this week, I just kept my hands close threw out the entire movement ( which still felt great ).

Well thank you for this thread. That was a gret read.

Can’t wait to try Stu’s Rope Pullovers tomorrow.

We are calling those rope pullovers now? Ahhh

I’ve always called them rope pressdowns

Yea, they’re sick.

[quote]Ct. Rockula wrote:
We are calling those rope pullovers now? Ahhh

I’ve always called them rope pressdowns

Yea, they’re sick.[/quote]

Not the same exercise. Read Stu’s description.

[quote]Iron Dwarf wrote:

[quote]Ct. Rockula wrote:
We are calling those rope pullovers now? Ahhh

I’ve always called them rope pressdowns

Yea, they’re sick.[/quote]

Not the same exercise. Read Stu’s description.[/quote

See, I would but I don’t wanna scroll through all the other jabronis who posted in this thread.

[quote]Ct. Rockula wrote:

[quote]Iron Dwarf wrote:

[quote]Ct. Rockula wrote:
We are calling those rope pullovers now? Ahhh

I’ve always called them rope pressdowns

Yea, they’re sick.[/quote]

Not the same exercise. Read Stu’s description.[/quote

See, I would but I don’t wanna scroll through all the other jabronis who posted in this thread.[/quote]

LOL!

The decline press the way Yates performed them were the best movement to stimulate growth assuming you could go heavy and survive. The fact is that most people cannot. If you lower the weight, with your elbows flared as opposed to tucked, using somewhere between 20-24 inches between your indexs