Fixing Lat Pulldown Mistakes for Building a Wider Back

Описание: Building a wider back can be a challenging and frustrating process, but here's the good news - it's probably just some small problems with your lat pulldown technique that can be easily fixed.
So let's jump right into what I think is the single biggest problem when it comes to building a bigger and wider back and some adjustments that we can make to your lat pulldowns to correct it.
Most of our classic back exercises are what's called the compound movements, meaning we are moving at more than one joint, both the shoulder joint and also at the elbow - which means that we are using multiple muscles at the same time. In a lat pulldown, we are using the lats and the terrace major at the shoulder and at the elbow joint we're using the biceps. Now both the lats and the terrace major attach on our upper arm bone called our humerus. Now in the lat pulldown, we're also using our biceps because we are getting flexion at the elbow. Now, generally speaking, the more flexion at the elbow or movement at the elbow that you're getting, the more you're engaging your biceps.
So here's a really simple test to see if you're using way too much biceps in your lat pulldown. I want you to do a set of lat pulldowns to failure, and I want you to become really aware through this set of where you feel it more. Are you feeling a deep burn and contraction in the lats and having them fatigue first? Or are your arms fatiguing first? Even if you're getting a good contraction in your lats, like most of us, you're probably still using way too much biceps. And this right here is the single biggest reason why most people have a hard time building a wider back.
Now, if you're to watch most people in the gym doing a lat pulldown and you stood at their side, you would probably see them starting with their torso upright in the beginning, and then to initiate the movement, they would lean back, creating momentum and simultaneously pulling the bar to their chest. Now, if you were to move behind them and observe, you would see that there's a lot of movement at the elbow and a lot of movement at the arms and very little movement at the shoulder, which is no wonder why so many people struggle building a bigger and wider back.
So let's talk about some small adjustments that we can make to our lat pulldown technique to minimize the engagement of the biceps and maximize the engagement of both the lats and the terrace major. First thing, we need to keep our torso more upright throughout the entire range of motion. When you see people leaning back, they are making their lat pulldown look more like a back row and they're engaging more of their trapezius and other muscles in their upper back as opposed to their lats. When we do this, we're using momentum instead of using slow controlled contractions in the muscle. When you see people swinging back and forth in their lat pulldown, it's a clear indication that they're using way too much weight.
The first step to doing our lat pulldown the right way is to initiate the movement by pulling our shoulders down as opposed to thinking about pulling our arms down. Next, we want to put our focus on our elbows and not our hands. What we want to do is bring those elbows down and towards our sides and a smooth, rounded, arched path, as opposed to focusing more on our hands where we have a tendency to pull straight down in a linear path.
Here's a little mental trick that a lot of experienced lifters use,when doing a lat pulldown or even in rows, and that is visualizing that your hands and your forearm are just a giant hook connecting the bar to your elbow. This will help you focus on pulling those elbows down, not your hands, and using less biceps and putting more focus on your lats.
So everything we've talked about so far, all these principles apply the same to free weights, machines, cables. But when you're trying to learn better mind, muscle connection and get those deep contractions, I actually prefer doing my back workout with resistance bands. With resistance bands, I have a lot more freedom for different hand positions and angles and exercises to find that perfect art path that we talked about, to get those good contractions in the lats.
So there you have it. Quick recap. Number one, I want you to use a weight that you can actually control to keep that torso upright through your range of motion. Also don’t forget to initiate the movement at the shoulders, not by leaning back. And lastly, focus on pulling those elbows down and not your hands. I'm James Grage. Make sure to, like, subscribe and share this with someone who you think might benefit from this and keep coming back for more content just like this, on how to maximize your resistance bands workouts.