While I have well over 10 years of working-out under my belt, I was only able to do pull-ups within the past 12 months – wide, overhand grip pull ups. I had developed good upper body strength over the years when it came to lifting weights and blasting off 50 consecutive push-ups, but I couldn’t, for the life of me, pull myself up. I think my main fault was not actually making it an end goal and not practicing consistently. I just didn’t believe it was something I could ever do because it was so hard. But I decided to make it a goal and set my eyes on being able to complete ONE pull-up. On January 1, 2014 I couldn’t even do one. Within 6 weeks I got 2, then 3, then 7. Goal now is to do 10!!
Women in particular often lack upper body strength. To this day, there is still that false belief that lifting weights will make you “manly” and “bulky.” I’ll save that topic for another day! For this post, I wanted to share the benefits of building upper body strength and tips that have worked for me, to conquer and master the pull-up to get that #PullUpGameStrong!
Benefits of doing pull-ups:
- Improves posture
- Stabilizes and protects the shoulder joint
- Increases body awareness and improves control
- Improves strength which is transferable to other exercises and sports
- It is a multi-joint exercise that requires use of more than one muscle group and more than one joint. This will maximize caloric output and gain strength and muscle fast. Even your core gets a great burn!
- All you need is a bar! Go to the park, bus stop, install one at a doorway at home.
Tips to Accomplish Your first Pull-Ups:
- Work on pull-strength with exercises such as the lat pulldown, seated rows, and bent over rows, using different grips. This tip may or may not help you. Machines balance the weight for you and force you into fixed motions so the strength you build may not carry-over to pull-ups. I found it did help me but don’t rely too much on this.
- Perform assisted pull ups with a bar or resistance bands
- Get used to the grip, work on negatives, hang around for a while.
- Start with under hand or neutral grip chin-ups.
- Practice often. Set up a chin-up bar at a door way and try one pull-up every time you walk by. The only way to get good at pull-ups is to DO pull-ups.
- Believe. Age is irrelevant. Gender is irrelevant. Body-weight is irrelevant. If you want to do this, make it a goal and work for it!
