“The best training regimen is the one you will actually follow consistently.
A single, weekly game of beer-league hockey or ultimate frisbee or golf is nowhere near as effective as a Starting Strength NLP (or any other scientifically-grounded program) combined with a weekly game … but the perfect truly is the enemy of the good.
‘Fun’ is a great motivator, but it’s just a subset of ‘passion.’ Passions vary, but every successful exerciser has the passion to do whatever disparate training they choose with adequate depth and consistency.”
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Gregory Johnson has been a relative mainstay at the annual International Powerlifting Federation (IPF) World Equipped Open Powerlifting Championships for a little while now. Since 2015, the powerlifter has participated in three of these respective equipped IPF contests (2015, 2017, 2021), notching his best-ever result of sixth place at the 2021 iteration. After rewriting the record books at the latest edition, he may have lifted his arguable strength magnum opus.
During the 2022 IPF Equipped World Championships on Nov. 16, 2022, in Viborg, Denmark, Johnson captured an equipped World Record deadlift of 371.5 kilograms (819 pounds) in the 93-kilogram weight class. (Note: As the competition is still underway at the time of this writing, it is unclear where Johnson finished in his division.)
As the clip of his feat shows, Johnson’s joy was palpable. The moment he successfully completed his lockout, a beaming smile appeared across Johnson’s face. After dropping his massive barbell, he proceeded to do a short dance before dropping to his knees, then exploding in clear elation before standing up to hug two of the first people he saw on the lifting platform.
An experienced powerlifter who has competed in some capacity since February 2010, Johnson could be considered a jack-of-all-trades when it comes to lifting set-ups. According to Open Powerlifting, the athlete has participated in sanctioned lifting contests while competing raw, with wraps, and equipped at least once in his 12-plus-year career — most notably focusing on his raw and equipped exploits.
Here’s an overview of some of the more notable results from Johnson’s extended career:
Gregory Johnson | Notable Competitive Results
2011 USA Powerlifting (USAPL) Panhandle Power Games (College/Raw) — First place | First career victory
2012-2013 USAPL Aggie Showdown (Open/Raw and College/Equipped) — First place
2013 IPF Classic World Powerlifting Championships (Juniors/Raw) — Third place
2014 USAPL Raw Nationals (Juniors/Raw) — First place
2015 USAPL Men’s and Women’s Nationals (Open/Equipped) — Second place
2016 USAPL Winter Games of Texas (Open/Raw) — First place
2017 USAPL 35th Annual Open National Championship (Open/Equipped) — Second place
2018 USAPL Texas Strength Classic (Open/Raw) — First place
2018 USAPL Open Nationals (Open/Equipped) — First place
2021 USAPL Equipped Nationals (Open/Equipped) — Third place
2021 IPF World Powerlifting Championships (Open/Equipped) — Sixth place
Here’s a rundown of Johnson’s all-time equipped competition bests:
Gregory Johnson | All-Time Equipped Competition Bests
Johnson’s record pull might be one of many stellar achievements and moments of unfiltered joy from the 2022 Equipped Worlds. The competition will officially end on Nov. 20, 2022.
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With two International Powerlifting Federation (IPF) World titles (2017, 2019), Heather Connor has a diverse powerlifting resume outside of her usual prolific deadlifting. Even still, this superstar has undoubtedly developed her household name-worthy reputation in large part thanks to the massive amounts of weight she can pull.
On Nov. 17, 2022, Heather Connor shared an Instagram clip of herself capturing a raw 202.5-kilogram (446-pound) deadlift during a training session. According to the caption of her post, the earth-shattering pull is a personal record (PR) for the athlete. It’s also her heaviest-ever deadlift (in training or competition), finally surpassing her previous training PR, a 200-kilogram (440-pound) pull from December 2020. The competitor wore a lifting belt to help her with her strength achievement.
Per Open Powerlifting, while unofficial because it didn’t occur during a sanctioned lifting contest, Connor’s deadlift exceeds her own all-time raw World Record of 192.5 kilograms (424.4 pounds) in the 47-kilogram weight class by 9.8 kilograms (21.6 pounds). Connor achieved that record mark at the 2021 USAPL Raw Nationals.
Not that it’s particularly surprising based on her consistency, but it’s generally been a steady year of excellence for Connor across the board.
On purely a training basis, it’s seemingly been nothing but raw milestone after raw milestone for Connor.
In May 2022, Connor deadlifted 195 kilograms (429 pounds) — 4.3 times her body weight of 45 kilograms (99 pounds) at the time of the accomplishment and two kilograms (4.6 pounds) above her current World Record. Then, in August 2022, the athlete showed off her leg power on the squat, notching a 152.5-kilogram (336-pound) PR. That mark eclipsed her official raw all-time competition best of 143 kilograms (315.2 pounds) from the 2021 USAPL Raw Nationals. Finally, in September 2022, Connor achieved a 190-kilogram (418.9-pound) deadlift for a double PR; a mark also five kilograms (11 pounds) more than her IPF World Record.
At the time of this writing, Connor doesn’t appear to have any plans for a powerlifting competition before the close of the 2022 calendar year. Connor’s probably earned the right to bask before her next potential wave of strength glory.
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Big basic exercises like the bench press, pull-up, and barbell row are great for building your back, chest, and even shoulders, but they might not suffice to fill your sleeves and build an impressive set of guns.
Training your biceps directly will not only contribute to specific muscle growth, but also joint health and performance. Traditional exercises like the barbell curl can usually target your biceps just fine, but if you want to take things to the next level and really focus on your upper arms, consider including the spider curl in your training regimen. (1)
Among the many curl variations that exist, the spider curl takes advantage of gravity, leverage, and arm position to emphasize the short head of the biceps and provide a unique stimulus, leading to more growth and bigger arms. (2) Here’s why and how you should use this special exercise.
The spider curl, sometimes called the reverse incline curl, gets its more visual name because the position in which you perform the exercise resembles the arachnid dangling from its thread. Indeed, the weight will be dangling from your arms, and you’ll use gravity and positioning to provide a unique biceps stimulus.
Step 1 — Set Your Bench and Get Into Position
Credit: Albert Solsona / YouTube
Set an adjustable bench at approximately 45-degrees, similar to an incline bench press. Grab a barbell with a palms-up grip and lie chest-down on the bench. Have your head and neck protrude over the top of bench and let your arms hang straight toward the ground.
Retract and depress your scapulae (pull your shoulder blades together and down) and maintain this position for the duration of the lift.
Form tip: Find a secure foot position so that you’re comfortable and stable on the bench, allowing you to fully focus on working your arms. This will depend slightly on your height, leg and torso length, and individual bench model. You may feel more balanced with a relatively wide stance or with your feet close together.
Step 2 — Curl the Weight Up
Credit: Albert Solsona / YouTube
Keep your upper arms vertical as you curl the weight up as far as possible without moving at your shoulder. In the top position, squeeze your biceps as hard as you can for a second. Keep your elbows pointing toward the ground the whole time.
Keep your wrists straight or bent slightly backward to maintain maximum tension on your biceps and prevent your forearms from taking over the workload.
Form tip: If your elbow shifts forward, you’ll reduce tension from the biceps by using assistance from your front deltoids (shoulders). You’ll also diminish the effective range of motion. The mechanics of the exercise already make it a relatively short motion, as there is limited tension at the bottom of the movement. If you start moving your elbows, you will lose even more tension at the top.
Step 3 — Lower With Control
Credit: Albert Solsona / YouTube
Slowly let the weight come down to the initial position. Controlling the eccentric (lowering) portion of the movement will prevent you from bouncing or cheating, which would make the exercise less effective.
By moving with control, you’re keeping tension on the desired muscle, leading to better results. Repeat for the desired amount of repetitions to complete a set.
Form tip: If your wrists or elbows are prone to tendonitis or pain, consider using an EZ-curl bar, as the slightly angled grip can be easier on the joints.
Spider Curl Mistakes to Avoid
Biceps exercises are often butchered for the sake of ego, leading to suboptimal results. Isolation exercises are technically easier than more complex multi-joint exercises, but that doesn’t mean you can just wing it carelessly. Avoid these common blunders if you want the biggest arms possible.
Going Too Heavy
There are big compound (multi-joints) exercises recruiting several muscle groups to move heavy weights. Then there are isolation (single-joint) exercises which focus on a single muscle group, typically with moderate weights to maintain targeted tension. Then, there are hyper-specific isolation exercises that focus on a particular “part” of a muscle group.
Credit: MAD_Production / Shutterstock
These laser-precision exercises are really not meant for moving heavy weight, but are instead best used to bring up a very specific muscle part or emphasize a particular head of a muscle. The spider curl is one of these detail-oriented exercises, as it focuses on the short head of the biceps.
Using heavy weights will defeat the purpose of the exercise because you will undoubtedly shift the workload to other body parts and encourage cheating.
Avoid it: Keep the weights relatively lighter and the sets relatively longer with more reps and a greater focus on squeezing your biceps. If you feel strong contractions someplace other than your biceps, consider using a lighter load.
Using Momentum
Because of your arms’ position relative to gravity, there’s very little tension on the biceps in the bottom portion of the lift. The effective range of motion is already relatively short, primarily the upper half to three-quarters of the curl. If you reduce the range even further by swinging the weight, you lose a lot of time under tension and skip one of the key elements to muscle growth. (3)
Credit: Be Better / YouTube
Moreover, if you swing your arms around to use more weight, you exceed your biceps muscular strength. This means that the additional pounds being lifted are stressing your connective tissues and joints more than your muscles, and you risk injuries just for the sake of ego.
Avoid it: Practice using a controlled tempo and, if necessary, an especially slower lowering speed. If you can’t perform the desired amount of repetitions without resorting to momentum, reduce the weight.
How to Progress the Spider Curl
The fact that your arms are hanging in the air during the spider curl might prove difficult for inexperienced lifters to coordinate at first. On the other hand, some hardcore gym-goers will crave a more difficult challenge for building their arms. Try these progressions exercises if you belong in either category.
Preacher Curl
The preacher bench is specifically designed for isolated biceps training. It mimics the spider curl mechanics by setting your arm at an angle and it focuses on the short head as well, but offer the advantage of a secured and supported position from the bench pad.
With this equipment, there’s not much cheating possible. Use it to train with perfect your form and build a mind-muscle connection before trying the spider curl. Start with the more commonly used 45-degree pad and progress to using the vertical pad, just like the unsupported spider curl.
Spider Concentration Curl
If you’ve already mastered the barbell spider curl, you can try this upgraded dumbbell progression, also called incline concentration curl. For a nasty biceps pump, perform it like a standard two-dumbbell spider curl, but press the pinky-side plates of the dumbbells together and squeeze them as hard as you can the whole duration of the lift.
The short head of the biceps also contributes to bringing the arms together, so the isometric adduction (inward movement) will recruit this part of your biceps even further.
Spider Curl Benefits
You can count on arm-obsessed lifters to invent a myriad of biceps exercises, but they aren’t the product of vanity — each has distinct goals and benefits. The spider curl is specifically designed for aesthetic purposes with a laser-like precision, but that doesn’t mean only those with physique goals should include this movement.
Pure Biceps Training
The unique shoulder and arm position induced by this exercise is highly effective for developing a mind-muscle connection and isolating the biceps for hypertrophy. (4) If you recruit other muscles, your arms will start to sway and the mechanics will change. Also, you cannot cheat by swinging your body as much as with some other biceps exercises.
Credit: OPEX Fitness / YouTube
If you have lagging upper arms, this is a great way for you to accumulate quality volume without recruiting or fatiguing other muscle groups. (5) Isolation exercises are excellent for developing symmetry and an aesthetic physique.
Focuses on the Short Head of the Biceps
If you feel you’re lacking in the inner part of your biceps, give this exercise a go. Focusing on the short head of the biceps will increase the “width” of your arm and give the appearance of a fuller-looking muscle.
The spider curl will target this head more because of the arm’s position, in front of the shoulders. The short head of the biceps attaches at the front of your shoulder joint and can perform a stronger contraction when your shoulder is “relaxed” in the stretched position.
Joint Health and Strength
This exercise can be beneficial for athletes competing in strength sports, such as powerlifting or strongman/strongwoman by directly contributing to overall pulling strength. It may also help with elbow and shoulder joint health by reducing repetitive use strain from performing a limited number of biceps exercises.
Switching to the spider curl will provide variety and a different stimulus, resulting in less stress on your joints and efficient training with lower overall weight used. This can have restorative benefits, especially when performed for higher reps.
Muscles Worked by the Spider Curl
The spider curl has one primary goal: to increase your arm size. Let’s see how it contributes to this sought-after goal.
Biceps Brachii
The biceps is the biggest and most visible anterior arm muscle. It flexes the arm, supinates the wrist (rotates the palm upwards), and slightly contributes to various shoulder movements and stability.
Credit: Prostock-studio / Shutterstock
This muscle is composed of two heads, both attached to the radius (forearm bone). The long head runs on the outer side of the arms and is attached to the shoulder blade. The short head is on the inner side of your arm and also attaches to the shoulder blade, but directly from the front of the shoulder.
The spider curl emphasizes the short head because of the hanging arm position. The long head is in a “shortened” position and its involvement is limited in the stretched position.
Brachialis
This deeper muscle is located under the biceps brachii. It is the primary elbow flexor, being significantly stronger than the biceps itself and not involved in supinating or rotating your wrists. As such, it is recruited during any curl exercise. Increasing its size will result in a fuller arm and will also “push” your biceps upwards, making it appear even bigger.
Forearms
Several forearm muscles contribute to elbow flexion, notably the strongest of them — the brachioradialis. The spider curl will also make your forearms bigger, which can visually help to make up for a genetically “shorter” biceps with long tendons near the elbow. Training these muscles can also improve your elbow and wrist health and performance.
How to Program the Spider Curl
This exercise is not suited to heavy weights, so programming is quite straightforward. Get the most out of the spider curl using these repetition schemes.
Moderate Weight, Moderate Repetitions
This time-tested approach will yield a ton of results. It has been bodybuilders’ favorite for decades for a reason. Do three to four sets of eight to 12 repetitions for maximal muscle gains. This will provide training volume in the most effective hypertrophy range, driving muscle growth.
Light Weight, High Repetitions
Studies have shown that as long as you’re using 40% of your one-rep maximum and are taking muscles close to failure, you’ll reap effective muscle gains, so do not be afraid of going lighter sometimes. (6) Two to three sets of 15 to 20 repetitions will provide a great stimulus, and an intense burn, ideal for a finisher while also being easier on the joints.
Spider Curl Variations
Variety is the spice of life, and that also applies to training. If you don’t have a barbell or if you wish to provide your biceps a different training stimulus, try these variations.
Dumbbell Spider Curl
Using a pair of dumbbells instead of a bar can address imbalances between each arm. Because each arm is moving independently, you can’t use your stronger side to compensate for your weaker one.
This is the perfect variation if you have a blatantly weaker side or if you want the most symmetrical physique possible. It will, however, take a but more coordination and concentration to move the weights at the same time.
Cable Spider Curl
The spider curl is a great exercise to target the short head of the biceps, but it’s doing a poor job of training the lengthened position of the muscle because of gravity’s limited effective in the bottom position. Using a cable pulley is the solution.
Set up a bench at a low cable station to provide muscular tension for the duration of the lift. This boosts the muscle’s time under tension and increases the need for a controlled eccentric. You can also feel a greater stretch in your biceps.
Concentration Curl
This old school exercise uses the same general mechanics as the spider curl, with your working arm extended down, but you don’t need an angled bench. Grab a dumbbell and train one arm at a time. Lean forward and curl while being as strict as possible — don’t start swinging your torso.
This is a harder variation as you have to stabilize your body and really concentrate on your biceps. Some lifters claim it emphasizes the alleged biceps “peak,” but it will mostly provide good, focused work while isolate your biceps as much as possible.
FAQs
The spider curl is probably not the first exercise that pops in your mind when you think about biceps training, so that’s fine if you have some questions about this lesser known lift.
When should I do the spider curl in my workout?
Generally speaking, isolation exercises are best done at the end of the session. You want to start with heavy poly-articular (multi-joint) exercises like rows and presses when you’re fresh and can lift the most weight. Use isolation movements to finish your muscles and drive hypertrophy with less neural constraints. If you’re doing an arms-only session, keep this one at the end. The spider curl is one of the strictest exercises there is, focusing on a specific part of a single muscle group, where you can use the least weight. See it more as a “finisher.”
Will it build the peak of my biceps?
Not specifically. It will improve your biceps as a whole, but if you want to target your biceps “peak” (the part of the biceps the grows vertically and gives a taller appearance to the muscle), you have to target the long head of the biceps and hope your genetic lottery will yield the results you’re after. The spider curl focuses on the short head, making your arms relatively more impressive from the front because it contributes to “width” more than “peak.” Couple it with an exercise that emphasizes the long head, like the incline dumbbell curl, for complete biceps development.
References
Wiesinger, H. P., Kösters, A., Müller, E., & Seynnes, O. R. (2015). Effects of Increased Loading on In Vivo Tendon Properties: A Systematic Review. Medicine and science in sports and exercise, 47(9), 1885–1895. https://doi.org/10.1249/MSS.0000000000000603
Kassiano, Witalo1; Nunes, João Pedro1; Costa, Bruna1; Ribeiro, Alex S.1,2; Schoenfeld, Brad J.3; Cyrino, Edilson S.1. Does Varying Resistance Exercises Promote Superior Muscle Hypertrophy and Strength Gains? A Systematic Review. Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research: June 2022 – Volume 36 – Issue 6 – p 1753-1762 doi: 10.1519/JSC.0000000000004258
Burd NA, Andrews RJ, West DW, Little JP, Cochran AJ, Hector AJ, Cashaback JG, Gibala MJ, Potvin JR, Baker SK, Phillips SM. Muscle time under tension during resistance exercise stimulates differential muscle protein sub-fractional synthetic responses in men. J Physiol. 2012 Jan 15;590(2):351-62. doi: 10.1113/jphysiol.2011.221200. Epub 2011 Nov 21. PMID: 22106173; PMCID: PMC3285070.
Calatayud J, Vinstrup J, Jakobsen MD, Sundstrup E, Brandt M, Jay K, Colado JC, Andersen LL. Importance of mind-muscle connection during progressive resistance training. Eur J Appl Physiol. 2016 Mar;116(3):527-33. doi: 10.1007/s00421-015-3305-7. Epub 2015 Dec 23. PMID: 26700744.
Schoenfeld BJ, Contreras B, Krieger J, Grgic J, Delcastillo K, Belliard R, Alto A. Resistance Training Volume Enhances Muscle Hypertrophy but Not Strength in Trained Men. Med Sci Sports Exerc. 2019 Jan;51(1):94-103. doi: 10.1249/MSS.0000000000001764. PMID: 30153194; PMCID: PMC6303131.
Thiago Lasevicius, Carlos Ugrinowitsch, Brad Jon Schoenfeld, Hamilton Roschel, Lucas Duarte Tavares, Eduardo Oliveira De Souza, Gilberto Laurentino & Valmor Tricoli (2018) Effects of different intensities of resistance training with equated volume load on muscle strength and hypertrophy, European Journal of Sport Science, 18:6, 772-780, DOI: 10.1080/17461391.2018.1450898
Originally Posted At: https://breakingmuscle.com/feed/rss
Some strength athletes are seemingly just born to lift incredible amounts of weight. In the sport of powerlifting, superstar Kristy Hawkins might be one of them. This multifaceted competitor, who also owns a Ph.D. in chemical engineering and has competed on bodybuilding’s Ms. Olympia stage, can count on yet another impressive feat in the gym.
On Nov. 16, 2022, Hawkins shared an Instagram clip of herself squatting 265 kilograms (584 pounds) for a two-rep personal record (PR) during a training session. She wasn’t done. As Hawkins wrote in the caption of her post, she “felt like it was a good time” to go for broke and try and break the 272.5-kilogram (600-pound) squat barrier. The athlete hit said milestone with ease for another PR. Hawkins wore a lifting belt and knee sleeves for both of the massive squats.
While unofficial because it didn’t occur on a sanctioned lifting platform, Hawkins’ squat portends the athlete potentially making history the next time she competes. As the current squat World Record holder (262.5 kilograms/578.7 pounds) in the 75-kilogram division, Hawkins could extend her record mark and become the first Women’s competitor in her category to squat at least 600 pounds in an official contest.
Not by coincidence, Hawkins is preparing for a competition in December 2022, but at the time of this writing she hasn’t clarified precisely when or what that contest will be. She may well distinguish once more with her leg strength at said event. Considering she’s also the 75-kilogram deadlift World Record holder (275 kilograms/606.2 pounds) and has been smashing that pulling mark in other training sessions earlier in 2022, there could be a reality where she’s seeing more than one record falling very soon.
Dating back to mid-April 2017, Hawkins has won 11 straight powerlifting competitions. With the sorts of numbers and lifts she regularly shares on her social media, that kind of consistent excellence probably shouldn’t be a surprise.
Here’s an overview of Hawkins’ all-time raw competition bests:
Kristy Hawkins (75KG) | All-Time Raw Competition Bests
Squat — 262.5 kilograms (578.7 pounds) | World Record
As has usually been the case for Hawkins throughout most of her career, 2022 has been productive in a training and competitive sense. With one more contest on the horizon, it certainly feels like Hawkins might be saving her best for last.
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For over 16 years, Nick Best was a fixture on the competitive strongman circuit. As a simultaneous powerlifter for much of that time, he developed a reputation for being one of the more versatile strength sports athletes of his era. In at least one competitive avenue, the 54-year-old athlete is formally drawing the curtains.
After finishing in second place to Mark Felix in the Masters (50-plus) World’s Strongest Man competition during the 2022 Official Strongman Games (OSG) in Daytona Beach, FL, on Nov. 13, 2022, Best did something a little out of the ordinary. He left his performance shoes behind, revealing he would beretiring from strongman competition.
In a post-competition interview from the livestream, Best was understandably emotional over the weight of his decision. He had nothing but kind words for a rewarding endeavor of which he had dedicated himself to for years.
“Thank you all so much,” Best said. “I love this sport with all my heart, and it’s been a wonderful ride.”
The 2022 OSG was Best’s first strongman contest since an appearance at the 2020 World’s Strongest Man (WSM). After an unfortunate lat muscle tear in April 2021 that temporarily derailed much of his training and competitive plans — a second-place result in his strongman swan song roughly just a year and a half later is commendable.
According to BarBend, while Best is retiring from full-time strongman contests, he did not rule out featuring as a professional powerlifter or any future singular attempts at breaking a strongman record. One-off short strongman events aren’t out of the question either, depending on what is detailed. Best noted he will be participating in an undisclosed full powerlifting meet in May where he wants to become the oldest man ever to record a 1000-kilogram (2,204-pound) total.
Given the extended time he spent as a competitive strongman, Best can count on plenty of highlights on his strongman resume.
Among the potentially more notable achievements, Best won the 2009 Jesse Marunde Memorial Invitational, as well as the 2016 Masters (40-plus) World’s Strongest Man and the 2016 Giants Live North American Open contests. From 2010-2020, he was a mainstay at the flagship WSM, notching his best-ever result of sixth place in 2010 and once again finished in the top 10 in 2017.
While Best refocuses his energies outside of major strongman contests, this likely won’t be the last anyone in the strength sports community hears of the icon. For a dedicated and experienced athlete like him, it might just be the beginning of the next promising phase of his overall competitive career.
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Shaun Clarida had a fascinating conundrum heading into the 2022 Mr. Olympia. By winning the 212 Olympia title in 2020, the athlete has a permanent berth to compete in that respective division at the prestigious event every year should he so choose. However, with a Men’s Open win at the 2021 Legion Sports Fest, he could’ve theoretically made the shift to compete in the Open next month. He has now officially put all questions to rest about where he’ll feature on Dec. 16-18, 2022, in Las Vegas, NV.
On Nov. 16, 2022, Clarida revealed he would stay in the 212 division at the 2022 Mr. Olympia in a video on his YouTube channel.
According to Clarida, the main reason he will return to the 212 division is that he wants to earn a second 212 Olympia title. The athlete maintained that his loss to Derek Lunsford in 2021 (who has since, ironically, transitioned to the Men’s Open division) afforded him the appropriate “motivation” to return and potentially re-earn his place at the top of the 212 mountain.
As he would further outline in a Nov. 16, 2022, Instagram post, Clarida wrote he “would have loved to battle it out with the big boys in the Open” but that he has “unfinished business” in the 212 division first.
With Lunsford officially out of the 212 competitive category in 2022, a friendly rival Clarida may have to overcome instead is Kamal Elgargni. The 50-year-old Elgargni is another former 212 champion (2019) and, per NPC News Online, has never finished outside of the top three in the division at the Olympia. He will likewise be trying to reclaim his former 212 glory in December.
All around, the 2022 Mr. Olympia is shaping up to be a doozy of a contest across various divisions. While Clarida will face a tall order to finish his journey back up to the 212 summit, he can rest assured he likely won’t be the only bodybuilding star battling through a gauntlet of talented peers. Perhaps bowling through a gifted field will make finally completing the “unfinished business” even more gratifying for him.
Morning is a sacred time for me. When our kids were still living with us, morning was the only time I had totally to myself. It allowed me to get the day started on my terms, set the tempo for the rest of the day. The kids are out on their own now, it’s just me and my wife, but the morning remains crucial to the rest of the day. Every morning is a blank slate. Every morning you get to start over, the promise and potential of the near future filled to bursting.
And so my early morning routine is the foundation of my day. Without it, the day just doesn’t “take.”
If you want to be “agile” and “intuitive” in your life, a morning routine helps. You need the foundation from which to leverage your talents and express your intuition and dynamic capacity. If your mornings are slapdash and all over the place, you’ll have trouble venturing out into the world and conquering your goals. A child needs security to grow. You need a morning routine to excel.
Here’s my early morning routine.
Go to bed between 10 and 11.
A morning routine starts with your nighttime routine. As I’ve said many times before, getting to bed at a good time—around 10, but no later than 11—while maintaining proper sleep hygiene practices so that you get enough sleep and wake up with energy and vitality is essential for a good morning. So your morning routine begins the night before. You have to get a good night’s sleep if your early morning routine is going to help you.
Wake up at around 7.
I wake up around the same time every day—mostly because I’m so religious about getting to bed at a good time. Seven o’clock is my typical wake up time. This allows me to get to bed between 10 and 11 and still get all the sleep I need. I’m in bed by 10, and usually earlier, but I’ll read in bed. Sometimes I go out fast, other times I stay up and keep reading. A 7 AM wakeup gives me breathing room at night.
Waking up at the same time every day is essential. For one, you don’t need an alarm. You just wake up because your body knows, and it’s much easier this way. Two, waking up is the start of your routine. Everything hinges on wakeup occurring at the same time. If you wake up at 5 one day and 8:30 another, it’s difficult to plan any kind of consistent morning routine.
Get sun in my eyes.
Sun exposure early in the morning—sunrise, ideally—helps your circadian rhythm hew to the rhythm of the day. It “tells” your internal clocks that it’s morning, that it’s time to get moving, that it’s time to build and go.
I’ve always made it a point in my adult life to live in places that get ample sunlight year round. Earlier in my health journey, this wasn’t a conscious decision. I didn’t know about the intricacies of circadian rhythm and natural light exposure, but I knew I liked sunlight, liked being warm, and liked spending time outside. So before I even knew what it was doing for my health, I was getting sunlight every single morning.
This doesn’t mean stare into the sun. Don’t do that. It means be outside with your face directed toward the sun, indirect light piercing your eyes and acting as a circadian zeitgeber that sets your clock. Also, you don’t have to have visible sunlight. The clouds can be out. It can be raining or even snowing, and the sunlight will still get through to your circadian clock. The point is getting outside to get full natural light.
Have coffee, heavy cream, and a spoonful of sugar.
Then I brew my coffee. Always in a stainless steel French press using fresh ground beans, always with heavy cream and a spoonful of sugar. Yes, plain white sugar, to cut the bitterness. Often I’ll take my coffee outside in the sunlight.
Do Sudoku, the NY Times crossword, and read the paper.
Although the science on “training the brain” with crossword puzzles and math games like sudoku is inconclusive, I don’t care. I notice a big difference when I do the games and when I don’t. There’s something missing when I don’t do it. A fluidity, a sharpness of thought. My writing and creativity are all worse on days I don’t get to the puzzles.
I also read the paper. Yes, the physical newspaper made of paper. Everything about the newspaper experience—the crinkle, the way you have to *pop* it to straighten it out—is soothing and it’s still my favorite medium to read the news. “Don’t believe everything you read” goes without saying, of course. I consider this an essential part of my morning routine.
Engage in a little friendly competition.
The latest addition to my morning routine is a friend and I started a competition about six months ago. We do it every day. Every morning, we play the word games World, Quordle, and Sedecordle.
We do all three each day and score them to see who gets the lowest score. The base score is arrived at by adding up the numbers in Quordle. Then, you get to subtract or add points based on your scores in Sedecordle and Wordle. In Wordle, you subtract however many guesses you have left. So, one point for every guess remaining. With Sedecordle you get to subtract three points for every guess remaining, or you add one point back for every word left on the board. You have to understand the games, but it is pretty challenging.
At this point in my life, it is counterproductive to compete on a physical level with anything significant at stake. This is the new challenge. This is the new competition. It’s a great way to begin the day.
Eat breakfast, or not.
Most days, I fast til 1 PM (after my late morning workout). On days I don’t fast, I’ll have something light. Lately it’s been soft boiled eggs or scrambled eggs with kale in butter. I eat breakfast if I’m hungry and feel like eating, usually while doing the mental games. I fast if I’m going deep into work mode and really trying to hit flow state.
Get “easy” work wins.
I’ll do the nuts and bolts stuff for a half hour to an hour: answering emails, taking or making calls, checking social media to see if I need to respond to anything. These are things that don’t take much active brainpower. You simply have to “do them.” I’ll often do a quick scan of Twitter or Instagram to get a “bird’s eye view” of what might be transpiring in the world, what people are worried about, what fitness or nutrition developments are coming to a head.
Getting these easy wins out of the way sets a good tone for the rest of the day.
Take a 15 minute movement break.
After emails and calls, I step outside for a quick movement break. This is to get the blood flowing to the brain, warm up my body, lubricate my joints, and prepare for the real work to come.
Sometimes it’s a quick jog down to the beach for a plunge and swim.
Sometimes it’s a quick jog down to the beach for a few short sprints.
Sometimes it’s 15 minutes on the slack line.
Sometimes it’s just a few sets of trap bar deadlifts, push-ups, and pull-ups.
The point is to get some light physical movement, preferably outside, before the real mental work commences.
Deep creative work.
When I write articles, I’ve already done the research the day before or days previous. I have a mental skeleton of the post erected in my mind, with tabs and links open to all the supporting evidence, so all I have to do is write. Flesh it out. Thus, it becomes an exercise in creativity that I can flow through, rather than having to stop every five minutes to check my work and read studies. Of course, if the situation calls for it I’ll stop and read research, but I do my best to avoid that so I can focus on the writing itself.
If I don’t have to write any finished pieces, I may go for a walk with my phone and bang out a rough draft using voice to text. Voice to text is invaluable for me—great way to jot down thoughts and ideas, which walking often stimulates. I’ve “written” entire posts and Sundays with Sisson newsletters on walks. I’ve come up with business ideas that turned into business realities. I keep working as long as it keeps flowing. It might be two hours. Might be one. Might be four. But it usually lasts at least two hours.
Movement, training, and play.
Usually I’ll go to the gym, both for training and socializing. Get a quick, hard, efficient 30-45 minute strength training session, hang out with the regulars, banter a bit, catch up. It’s a good atmosphere to push yourself while keeping things light and fun. I’m not doing any PRs (personal records) at this point. I’m just getting in to hit my muscles, strengthen my bones, and gird my connective tissue so I can keep playing and staying active doing the things I truly enjoy. Anti-aging.
The social aspect is just as important as the physical aspect. I spend so much time on devices that I need that face time (not FaceTime).
If I don’t go to the gym, I’ll go for a paddling session or hit the fat tire bike on the beach. I’ll often do this with my wife or a buddy, again getting that social time. Whatever I do, the block of time after my deep work time is for staying active—both physically and socially.
After that, I break the (usual) fast with lunch and get on with the rest of my day, which often looks very different day to day. But that AM morning routine leading up to lunch is non-negotiable and rarely changes.
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There aren’t many muscle-building or strength-focused training programs that leave out the traditional lat pulldown. Many effective workouts include this classic, and for good reason.
Pulling in a vertical pattern strengthens your back, shoulders, and arms, while also building the muscles that support and stabilize your shoulder blades. This maintains healthy joint function which, in turn, keeps your entire upper body strong.
Credit: Tom Wang / Shutterstock
However, the lat pulldown isn’t enough to build thickness in your entire back and it’s not the only way to keep everything strong, healthy, and balanced. Eventually, you need to make some adjustments. Over-focusing on classic straight bar lat pulldowns without any change in angles, grip, or technique won’t be enough to for complete development.
If you know which muscles and attributes you’re looking to address, you can wisely choose the right exercises for better results. Here are 12 of the best alternatives to build a bigger, stronger, more complete back.
“Scapular control is as cool as a really wide back,” said no person ever. Maybe you don’t do standard pulldowns to target the muscles that control your shoulder blades, but the basic movement does train muscles that control and rotate them. Pulling the bar behind your neck creates an even more efficient path.
Why Use the Behind-the-Neck Pulldown
By slightly altering the mechanics and path of this vertical pull, you train the supporting muscles of the shoulders and shoulder blades through a more complete range of motion. If you have suitable shoulder mobility and can perform the motion without pain, pulling behind your head allows you to target the muscles that rotate and lower the shoulder blades.
The kicker here is that when your shoulders and scapulae (shoulder blades) are well-positioned, with the behind-neck movement, your body can create higher levels of strength and develop more noticeable upper-back muscle.
How to Do the Behind-the-Neck Pulldown
Set up on a lat pulldown machine as you normally would. Use a long bar attachment and grab it with an overhand grip beyond shoulder-width. Sit with your arms straight overhead and shoulders “shrugged” up. Keep your forehead, chin, and sternum in line as you lean slightly forward. Let your arms be pulled slightly back, in line with your hips. Keep your body forward as you pull the handle down. Ideally, aim to touch the bar to the base of your traps, near your neck, but pull to a comfortable depth based on your overall mobility.
Think about trying to shrug your shoulders “down”as you bend your arms and drive your elbows down. In the bottom position, squeeze your shoulder blades down before straightening your arms and controlling the weight up. Let your shoulders rise as the cable pulls you into a controlled overhead lat stretch. Start with light weight and a full range of motion, and increase slowly without sacrificing form.
Rhomboid Pulldown
This movement may feel a little funky at first, but it’s a simple and effective way to shift focus from your big lat muscles to the smaller muscles of your upper and mid-back. To do these, you’ll use close or neutral-grip attachment and a very specific body angle.
Why Do the Rhomboid Pulldown
The rhomboids are deep muscles between the shoulder blades that pull your upper back together. If these supportive muscles don’t function well, there’s a good chance you will eventually deal with some shoulder dysfunction, pain, or injury. The rhomboid pulldown targets these muscles while also building muscle in the center of your mid-back, which for many, is lacking thickness and development.
How to Do the Rhomboid Pulldown
Grab the a close-grip attachment with your palms facing each other. Lock your legs under the pads, but lean your torso back to create a roughly 45-degree angle between your upper body and the floor. Pull your hands to your sternum and allow your elbows to flare out at a 90-degree angle to your shoulders. Keep your trunk braced and stable as throughout the exercise.
In the bottom position, think of pulling your shoulder blades together and your shoulders down to the ground. Control the weight on the way up, but keep your torso angled backward for the entire set.
Stiff-Arm Pulldown
This single-joint (isolation) exercise is arguably better at building lat thickness than traditional pulldowns because the work it done only by the lats with minimal assistance from the shoulders and arms.
Why Do the Stiff-Arm Pulldown
The stiff-arm pulldown, also known as a straight-arm pushdown, is great at building lat size and general mobility because the muscle has to overcome resistance through a long range of movement. You need to control the resistance through a long arc that puts your lats in a significant stretch toward the top. This is one of the few exercises that actually strengthens shoulder extension (raising the arm) along with training your shoulder blades to slide downward into a stable position.
How to Do the Stiff-Arm Pulldown
Attach a straight bar or rope to a cable near the top of your head. Stand tall, grab the bar or rope with your elbows slightly bent and your palms facing down (on a bar) or facing each other (with a rope). Maintain a bent-arm position as you “sweep” the attachment toward the top of your legs.
At the bottom, imagine pulling your shoulders behind your torso before you let the weight pull your arms back up. Control the weight and let your arms come all the way up for an active stretch at the top.
Lying Cable Pullover
Dumbbell or kettlebell pullovers are sometimes used as an alternative to pulldowns or, more specifically, an alternative to stiff-arm pulldowns, but expecting people to do those free weight exercises light enough to limit the contribution of the chest, arms, and shoulders is like asking them not to look at themselves in the mirror after a good arm pump. Lying cable pullovers are a more effective way to emphasize the contraction of the lats and other back muscles with relatively light weight and high tension.
Why Do the Lying Cable Pullover
This exercise gives you all the same benefits of stiff arm pulldowns — increased lat recruitment with limited additional muscles — while also increasing the duration that the muscle held under tension. And the longer the muscle is contracting under tension the more muscle and strength can be built. (1)
How to Do the Lying Cable Pullover
Lie on a flat bench with a cable set slightly above head-level. Use a rope attachment to allow for more range of motion. Grab the rope with your hands facing each other. Maintain a slight bend in your elbows and pull the rope toward your legs while keeping your lower back flat against the bench.
Keep your hands facing one another and try to touch your pinky fingers to the floor. In the bottom position, squeeze your shoulders together and think of pushing your triceps through the floor before controlling the resistance all the way back. Let the resistance pull your arms as far back as you can tolerate, above and behind your head.
Crossed Band Pulldown
This movement is perfect for using resistance bands rather than a cable machine because the tension of the bands combines with the long range of motion to target the smaller muscles of the back. The crossed band pulldown can also be called a “banded rhomboid pulldown” because it works those smaller upper back muscles similar to a rhomboid pulldown.
Why Do the Crossed Band Pulldown
By pulling the bands in a cross-body motion, you are training the muscles that move and support the scapulae with a specialized effort you wouldn’t be able work with cables. These supportive muscles not only keep your shoulders functioning properly, but they provide the stability needed to build high-level pressing and pulling strength, and they contribute to unique thickness of the back musculature.
The resistance bands allows for more tension at the end range (peak contraction), which is where most people need to build more scapular control. As you pull the band, it becomes more challenging and the muscles have to create more tension, compared to steady resistance with cable pulleys.
How to Do the Crossed Band Pulldown
Anchor two resistance bands to the top of a squat rack, pull-up bar, or other high and stable structure. Space the bands to be just outside the width of your shoulders. Grab the left band with your right hand and vice versa, and sit on the floor between them.
Keep a neutral spine, not arched or rounded, and pull the bands across the front of your body. Try to drive your elbows toward the floor behind you. Hold and squeeze the contacted position for one second before controlling the bands into a stretched position with straight arms.
Supinated-Grip Pulldown
To keep your shoulders healthy and your upper back strength balanced, you need to do vertical pulls with your palms both facing away (pronated grip) and facing toward you (supinated grip). The supinated-grip pulldown, or “chin-down” (as opposed to a bodyweight chin-up), is a great option to build this supinated-position strength whether you can do chin-ups or not.
Why Do the Supinated-Grip Pulldown
This hand position doesn’t magically make it a biceps-only exercise. This grip variation trains the connections between the biceps, delts, and upper-back muscles differently from a pull-up or pulldown. (2) It also builds more balanced upper back stability and more shoulder mobility.
How to Do the Supinated-Grip Pulldown
Use a straight bar attachment and set up just as you would for a standard pulldown. Grab the bar with palms facing you and hands placed right at or a little wider than shoulder width apart.
Pull the attachment down by driving your elbows to the ground and try to touch it right below your collarbone. Squeeze the elbows down before controlling the cable back up.
Weighted Pull-Up
Most don’t think that pulling exercises that target the upper back should ever really be loaded heavy, but that line of thinking is a big mistake.
If you’re looking to build your back as big as you can, you need to combine high-rep sets with heavy weights. The weighted pull-up is an extremely effective, if slightly advanced, way to get the job done.
Why Do the Weighted Pull-Up
Pull-ups are typically done to build muscle size using only your body weight for as many reps as possible. But they can and should sometimes be loaded as heavy as possible and performed in rep ranges as low as three to five per set. This will expose you to new types of muscular stress that leads to muscle growth.
How to Do the Weighted Pull-Up
Take an overhand grip with your arms at, or just a little wider than, shoulder-width. Pull from a straight-arm hang to your chin or neck reaching bar-level. Warm-up with bodyweight-only sets and then add a weight using either a dip belt or a weighted vest. Start with a weight that you know you can do at least five reps with.
Perform multiple sets of three to five reps, adding just a little weight after each set. When you reach a very challenging weight and feel like you can only grind two or three reps, stick with this weight and try to do two to four more sets.
Mechanical Drop-Set Pull-Up
It’s important to do vertical pulling exercises with a variety of hand positions – overhand, underhand, and neutral-grip. Each grip is mechanically different in terms of difficulty and muscle recruitment, and this can be exploited to do more quality volume, which results in greater strength and muscle growth. (3)
Why Do the Mechanical Drop Set Pull-Up
A pronated (palms away) hand position is most challenging and prioritizes the lat muscle and upper back. A supinated (palms toward you) hand position is slightly easier and emphasizes the biceps and shoulders, and a neutral position (palms facing each other) offers the greatest leverage and is least challenging, recruiting the brachialis and shoulders. (4)
A “mechanical drop set” is a specialized technique that allows you to do as many reps as you can with the most difficult hand position. This causes the emphasized muscles to work hardest. You then continue to add more tension to the same muscle groups with a supinated grip, and finally using neutral-grip hand position. In total, you are able to do more volume than you could normally achieve using exclusively any one grip.
How to Do the Mechanical Drop Set Pull-Up
Take a shoulder-width overhand grip on a pull-up bar and lift yourself from a straight-arm hang to your chin near bar-level. As you reach muscular fatigue, let go and reset your grip to take a shoulder-width underhand grip. Continue performing additional repetitions until you reach fatigue again. Let go and finally take a neutral (palms facing) grip. Continue the last phase of the set with more reps.
One effective approach with this method is to pick a pre-determined rep count for each hand position. For example, if you can do five standard (overhand) pull-ups, you may choose to do two or three reps of each grip. This increases your pull-up volume significantly because you end up doing a total of six to nine repetitions instead of only five.
Inverted Row
The inverted row is often done with your body parallel to the floor, with your feet elevated to make it a true horizontal rowing motion. While this is a great variation to build the entire mid-back and lats, doing these at a 45-degree angle with your feet on the ground may be an even more efficient way to strengthen your back muscles similar to a lat pulldown.
Why Do the Inverted Row
This is a great option to replace or add more bodyweight movements. Strong or experienced lifters tend to neglect bodyweight training, maybe throwing in a few push-ups here or there, but that’s short-sighted. Bodyweight pulling movements, in particular, demand trunk stabilization and good scapular control which carry over to strength and stability in nearly all exercises.
If you can’t do bodyweight pull-ups, you need to find other ways to train your pulling muscles. The 45-degree inverted row uses your bodyweight to build strength and muscular coordination. This moderate angle makes it a different and effective way to strengthen the scapular muscles and still build the lats, comparable to a traditional pull-up or pulldown.
How to Do the Inverted Row
Set a barbell on a rack somewhere around ab-height. You can also use a Smith machine. You may have to adjust this higher or lower once in position depending on your arm length. Grab the bar with an overhand grip, with your arms a little wider than shoulder-width. Slide your feet out until your body is at roughly a 45-degree angle with the floor.
Keep your legs straight and pull yourself toward the bar. Aim to touch your chest to the bar before lowering under control and repeating for the set number of reps.
Ultra-Wide Grip Bent Over Barbell Row
The wide-grip barbell row might be one of the best exercises to increase thickness in your lats and traps while building strength that carries over to other big lifts. If you see someone who does this exercise often, heavy, and well, you can count on them having a big and powerful back.
Why Do the Ultra-Wide Grip Bent-Over Barbell Row
The ultra-wide grip row not only makes your lats wider, but it builds thickness in the mid-back better than many other exercises. The challenging wide grip also taxes your forearm muscles, making them bigger while building a stronger grip. The bent-over position requires your hips, trunk, and hamstrings to stabilize you body and create tension to support the weight. This total-body recruitment makes you stronger for pretty much anything else in the gym or on the field.
How to Do the Ultra-Wide Grip Bent-Over Barbell Row
Stand over a barbell with your feet hip-width apart. Hinge forward at the hips, squat down, and grab the bar with a palms-down grip as far wide as your grip will allow. The bar should be difficult to hold, but be sure you can keep it in your hands for the entire set. Stand straight up with the bar in your hands and your arms straight. Slightly bend your knees as you hinge from your hips.
Keep your knees slightly bent and bend forward until your back is close to parallel with the ground. Hold this position with your elbows locked and keep your back flat and your abs braced. Row the bar toward the bottom of your sternum. Control the weight back down to a straight-arm position, and repeat for repetitions.
Landmine Row
The landmine row can train the lats more without causing, or worsening, any potential shoulder problems because it places a unique demand on the body compared to other barbell or dumbbell exercises. The angle and leverage of the landmine create a different stress on the muscles and joints. It allows the lifter to adjust their body position and change the pull of the weight.
Why Do the Landmine Row
This exercise is done using a “v-bar” attachment, which requires a neutral-grip. This helps you contract your lats through a full range of motion while allowing the shoulder blades to move into a natural position. This not only helps to reduce shoulder pain but also reinforces and builds the shoulder-stabilizing muscles.
Because landmine row moves though an arc range of motion rather than a straight line, it creates different leverages for your muscles. For that reason, the weight typically feels heavier at the bottom and lighter at the top, which is the opposite of most exercises. This “reversed” strength curve means that the landmine row can train the lats differently by placing them under greater tension at the bottom position.
How to Do the Landmine Row
Put one end of a barbell in a landmine unit, or in the stable corners of a squat rack. Attach a neutral-grip v-bar handle around the free end of the barbell just below the collar. Straddle the bar, squat down to grab the handle, and stand up supporting the bar with straight arms. Make sure your back is almost completely parallel with the floor and your legs are slightly bent.
Row the bar up and try to touch your wrists somewhere between the bottom of your sternum and your abs. Lower the weight by straightening your arms under control. Try not to “hitch” or bounce as you lift the weight. The more strict the movement, the better it is for building muscle and strength.
Single-Arm Face Pull
Standard lat pulldowns are usually done in hopes of building wider backs, but it’s not really just about building back width. You need to build muscle on your upper back and across the backs of your shoulders, as well. There are more focused ways to develop these key areas than just using the simple pulldown.
Why Do the Single-Arm Face Pull
The single-arm face pull targets the rear delts (back of the shoulder) and the upper and inner parts of your back. These muscle groups not only need to be strong for optimal shoulder health and stability, but they need to be well-developed if you want your back to look as thick as possible.
Training one are at a time helps you narrowly focus on properly moving your shoulder and shoulder blade. Single-arm exercises like this also train your trunk to resist rotation so, as an added benefit, you’re also training core stability.
How to Do the Single-Arm Face Pull
Attach a single handle to a cable pulley at forehead-height. Grab the handle palm-down with one hand. Straighten your arm and step back until the cable slightly pulls on the weight stack to lift it up. Stand tall with your knees slightly bent and your feet about hip-width apart.
Keep your palm facing down as you pull the handle toward your ear. Think “chicken wing” to keep your elbow high and pointed out. Focus on pulling your shoulder blade in toward your spine. Hold and squeeze at this end position for one second. Don’t let your shoulder shrug upward. Control the weight back without letting it pull your shoulder too far forward as your arm straightens.
Benefits of Lat Pulldown Variations
There are three basic reasons to include this vertical pulling motion in your training: muscle size, muscular strength, and musculoskeletal health. Whichever reasons are on your goal list, there are plenty of effective movements to get the job done.
Increased Muscle Recruitment
Many people want to build their lats thicker and wider. Bigger lats give an athletic look many people want. Whether it’s on a bodybuilding stage, at the beach, or just for your own personal physique goal, a well-developed back includes wide lats as well as a solid upper and mid-back.
The lat pulldown, on its own, isn’t sufficient for targeting the multiple muscles involved in building complete back size.
Improved Strength Development
The more overall back strength you have, the more weight you can lift. Back strength is essential for a strong, stable upper body. This strength and stability carries over to big lifts like the deadlift, when maintaining proper position for efficient technique.
Ivan Kochergin / Shutterstoc
A stronger back even carries over to lower body exercises like the squat, to help your upper body transfer power from your legs through your core and upper body.
Joint Health
Healthy, well-functioning shoulders and shoulder blades (scapulae) are essential for any lifter. If you press weights overhead (up), you need to pull weights down. Basic muscular symmetry helps to reduce the risk of shoulder and upper body injuries. (5) Vertical pulling trains coordination and control between your shoulders and the scapulae, and it reinforces the postural muscles surrounding your scapulae and the entire middle back.
Get Down with All the Pulldowns
The lat pulldown is one of the most popular vertical pulling exercises for building muscle and strength. It’s an effective and time-tested exercise, but you still need to stress the upper and mid-back muscles with different angles and demands to create a maximum training effect. You can’t haphazardly add variations and hope for the best, because that can be a counterproductive waste of time. Review the exercises above, figure out which suit your specific needs, and plug them into your training plan. Soon enough, you’ll have all the variety you need for a well-rounded, and well-widened, back.
References
Burd, N. A., Andrews, R. J., West, D. W., Little, J. P., Cochran, A. J., Hector, A. J., Cashaback, J. G., Gibala, M. J., Potvin, J. R., Baker, S. K., & Phillips, S. M. (2012). Muscle time under tension during resistance exercise stimulates differential muscle protein sub-fractional synthetic responses in men. The Journal of physiology, 590(2), 351–362. https://doi.org/10.1113/jphysiol.2011.221200
Lusk, S. J., Hale, B. D., & Russell, D. M. (2010). Grip width and forearm orientation effects on muscle activity during the lat pull-down. Journal of strength and conditioning research, 24(7), 1895–1900. https://doi.org/10.1519/JSC.0b013e3181ddb0ab
Leslie, Kelly & Comfort, Paul. (2013). The Effect of Grip Width and Hand Orientation on Muscle Activity During Pull-ups and the Lat Pull-down. Strength and Conditioning Journal. 35. 75-78. 10.1519/SSC.0b013e318282120e.
Plantz MA, Bordoni B. Anatomy, Shoulder and Upper Limb, Brachialis Muscle. [Updated 2022 Feb 22]. In: StatPearls [Internet]. Treasure Island (FL): StatPearls Publishing; 2022 Jan-. Available from: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK551630/
Drigny, J., Gauthier, A., Reboursière, E., Guermont, H., Gremeaux, V., & Edouard, P. (2020). Shoulder Muscle Imbalance as a Risk for Shoulder Injury in Elite Adolescent Swimmers: A Prospective Study. Journal of human kinetics, 75, 103–113. https://doi.org/10.2478/hukin-2020-0041
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In terms of accomplishments and influence on the sport of strongman, few athletes could compare to the exploits of Brian Shaw and Eddie Hall. Both are former World’s Strongest Man (WSM) champions, both plan to continue to plug away in various strength endeavors as competitors, and both seem to have no long-term desire to rack their circus dumbbells any time soon. A recent training collaboration between the pair might be a tacit acknowledgment they’re aware of their impact on strength sports overall.
On Nov. 13, 2022, Hall posted a video on his YouTube channel where he and Shaw ran through a challenging shoulder workout together. Hall traveled from his native United Kingdom to join Shaw for the session at the latter’s home gym in Fort Lupton, CO.
Here’s an overview of the shoulder workout Shaw and Hall tag-teamed together at Shaw’s home gym.
Seated Overhead Press
Shaw and Hall began their shoulder routine with a few sets of a seated overhead press. The athletes did not use traditional dumbbells, instead electing to utilize Rogue Thompson Fatbells — which resemble bowling balls with a handle in the hollowed-out center. The pair began with a weight of 53 pounds in each hand on the first set before gradually transitioning to a final set of 150 pounds per hand.
Given that Fatbells require the athlete to put their hands “inside” the weights, so to speak, some might consider them more challenging to train with. This sentiment appeared to apply to Hall after his first experience with the implements.
“Gotta say, never touched them [the Thompson Fatbells] before,” Hall said. “We did five sets, but I feel like we did ten sets. It’s that much harder to stabilize.”
Seated Machine Shoulder Press
Staying seated, Shaw and Hall next performed some sets on a seated machine shoulder press. The athletes began with just one 45-pound plate on each end of the machine and worked to a final set of 450 pounds for 10 reps (five 45-pound plates on each side).
Cable Rear Delt Flye/Single-Arm Dumbbell Lateral Raise Superset
Once they were finished with pressing movements and variations, Hall and Shaw closed their shoulder workout with demanding supersets, pairing a rear-facing shoulder flye in a cable crossover machine with single-arm dumbbell lateral raises. Once the two reached the final set, Shaw ensured he performed at least one more rep (13) than his friendly peer in Hall (12).
Having formally stepped away from strongman after a victory in the 2018 Britain’s Strongest Man (BSM), Hall will return to the sport at the 2022 Giants Live World Nation on Nov. 26, 2022. Hall will be the captain of Team UK, opposing Robert Oberst’s Team USA, in the contest that will take place in Liverpool, England.
Meanwhile, Shaw hasn’t outlined any upcoming competitive plans at the time of this writing. The legendary strongman appears to be focused on bolstering his own YouTube channel with noteworthy strongman content — along with other usual media appearances — first and foremost for now.
One thing does seem certain as Shaw and Hall once again go their separate ways — when these two have a strength meeting of the minds, a lot of weight will be flying around.
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