One of the pieces of equipment that is rarely used in any gym is the pull up bar. Although the pull up bar is not the most popular it really should be. The benefits of pull up bars are many when it comes to developing upper body strength.
Excuses Given For Avoiding Pull Up Bars
So often the excuse that is given for someone avoiding the bar is that it is very difficult performing a single repetition.
A second excuse that is given is that working on back muscles is not too important.
Although it is true that performing one repetition can be difficult at first, the truth is the body adapts very quickly when it is forced to perform pull ups. If you can not perform pull ups you can always do chin ups exercises and develop more strength before doing pull ups.
It Is Important To Work On Your Back
Back muscles are very important in upper body strength and in body achieving upper body symmetry.
Have you ever seen a guy with a big chest but his upper body looked out of proportion? Well it is very likely that his shoulders and back were underdeveloped. Or have you seen a women with a fit lower body but a weak or too small upper body? Well, the back and shoulders were probably underdeveloped.
Having a well developed back gives an appearance of a strong upper body and the body then looks symmetrical.
How Does A Pull Up Bar Develop Upper Body Strength?
Although very often people find it hard to believe, pull ups exercises done on a pull up bar they develop overall upper body strength. As you perform pull ups you are forcing the body to adapt to to lifting heavy weight.
In order to lift the body up different muscles are engaged. Muscles like the biceps are secondary muscles being worked. The fact you are working on your back is also forcing your biceps to get a workout and thus develop more muscle. Another muscle group that is stimulated are the rear delts or rear deloids. This muscle group is part of the shoulders but it is a muscle group that ties in to the back muscles.
As you can see, this exercise gets several muscle groups involved and is in a way a "bigger bang for your buck."
How Often Should You Do Pull Ups?
I recommend doing back exercises once a week. If you want to do them twice in a week you should allow at least 48 hours between back workouts.
Pull ups should be done early in your back workout in order to get the most out of them. You should also do them before doing biceps if you happen to do biceps and back on the same day. If you do biceps before pull ups you will have a hard time lifting your body weight.
The number of repetitions I recommend is anywhere in the range of 8 to 10. If you can't up too high then you can simply do as many as you can even if it is only one or two reps.
So there you have it. Include pull up bar exercises and you will increase your upper body strength.
