Cant Get a good work out for my lats

[peter03]

No matter what I do I cant feel any burn or pump in my lats.

today I worked my ass off trying to hit them as hard as I can but still no pain, no pump and no gain.

My gym has 3 types of lats pull down machine and I hit all 3 doing 3 sets on each 8-12 reps (failure). all I feel is a pump in my arm muscles. I even tried shocking them by pulling very heavy weight 1-3 reps and still nothing.

My question is when does lats come in to action as you are pulling the bar down on a lat pull down machine? Is it at the begining of pull down or the end? It seems my biceps are doing all the work!

ps.
I have tried the row machine, using free weight and nothing seem to work.

[Iwillcompete]

Back is one of my favorite body parts to hit.

I use to feel the same way, so then I learned the mind over mucle connection. Try this:

Do about 20% of you 1rm for about 10-12 reps, then move directly to another excersise.(commonly known as superset) do 5 sets then tell me how you feel.

Trust me , look at my lats and tell me what you think. I superset all the time.

[Bando]

Originally Posted by peter03

No matter what I do I cant feel any burn or pump in my lats.

today I worked my ass off trying to hit them as hard as I can but still no pain, no pump and no gain.

My gym has 3 types of lats pull down machine and I hit all 3 doing 3 sets on each 8-12 reps (failure). all I feel is a pump in my arm muscles. I even tried shocking them by pulling very heavy weight 1-3 reps and still nothing.

My question is when does lats come in to action as you are pulling the bar down on a lat pull down machine? Is it at the begining of pull down or the end? It seems my biceps are doing all the work!

ps.
I have tried the row machine, using free weight and nothing seem to work.

Your form is off. You have to concentrate on using your back and not your arms. Sounds like you are doing palms facing you? switch that up. For lats I do pullups, if you're not there yet try 1 arm dumbell rows on an incline bench, hard to make your arms do the work with that lift.

[namtrag]

wear straps, and use a grip with your thumbs not wrapped around the bar.

concentrate on pulling with the back

[asksmith]

Only back exercises I do are pullups, and many variations of them. Sometimes I'll do a set of pullups and superset it with a pulldown or row.

I do alot of variation, and use a dip belt. Wide grip, narrow grip, chin ups, alternating grip, offset grip, ropes, etc. Do some reps with the weight, then dump it, and crank out some just using your body weight.

I just enjoy doing pullups more than anything else. It's a Marine thing or something.

[Bando]

Originally Posted by Iwillcompete

Trust me , look at my lats and tell me what you think.

hell with that - post your arm routine, man oh man whatever you're doing there is working

[plmb1]

Originally Posted by peter03

It seems my biceps are doing all the work!

^^^^^^^^^is your problem.........learn to use your lats to pull with instead of your arms. Its also a mind muscle connection thing........it just takes practice...

[ironwill2008]

Originally Posted by peter03

My question is when does lats come in to action as you are pulling the bar down on a lat pull down machine? Is it at the begining of pull down or the end?

It's at the top of the rep (when the bar/handle/whatever you're gripping) is closest to your body.

It seems my biceps are doing all the work!

That's because they are. That must change, if you're going to develop your back muscles.

Back is a difficult muscle group to train; it's a large group, and you can't see it working, making a mind/muscle connection difficult to establish. Don't think about pulling with your hands; they're only hooks, used to pull the weight. Think about pulling with your elbows. During each rep, pull your elbows as far back as possible, and at the top of the rep, attempt to make your shoulder blades touch each other, in the middle of your back, by pulling your shoulders back, and sticking your chest out. Of course, your shoulder blades won't touch, but it's that movement, the shoulder blades moving together behind you, that makes your back muscles contract hard.

Cut your weights by 50%, and work on squeezing your shoulder blades together.

It is a real PITA trying to describe this on the 'netz. If we were in-person, we could sort this out in about 2 minutes.

[SP1966]

Originally Posted by ironwill2008

It's at the top of the rep (when the bar/handle/whatever you're gripping) is closest to your body.


That's because they are. That must change, if you're going to develop your back muscles.

Back is a difficult muscle group to train; it's a large group, and you can't see it working, making a mind/muscle connection difficult to establish. Don't think about pulling with your hands; they're only hooks, used to pull the weight. Think about pulling with your elbows. During each rep, pull your elbows as far back as possible, and at the top of the rep, attempt to make your shoulder blades touch, each other, in the middle of your back, by pulling your shoulders back, and sticking your chest out. Of course, your shoulder blades won't touch, but it's that movement, the shoulder blades moving together behind you, that makes your back muscles contract hard.

Cut your weights by 50%, and work on squeezing your shoulder blades together.

It is a real PITA trying to describe this on the 'netz. If we were in-person, we could sort this out in about 2 minutes.

We can end this thread right here! Great post, as usual!!

[Bando]

Originally Posted by ironwill2008

It is a real PITA trying to describe this on the 'netz.

Originally Posted by SP1966

We can end this thread right here! Great post, as usual!!

X2, wish I could have laid it out like that, well done.

[thebigguy1]

Originally Posted by ironwill2008

It's at the top of the rep (when the bar/handle/whatever you're gripping) is closest to your body.


That's because they are. That must change, if you're going to develop your back muscles.

Back is a difficult muscle group to train; it's a large group, and you can't see it working, making a mind/muscle connection difficult to establish. Don't think about pulling with your hands; they're only hooks, used to pull the weight. Think about pulling with your elbows. During each rep, pull your elbows as far back as possible, and at the top of the rep, attempt to make your shoulder blades touch each other, in the middle of your back, by pulling your shoulders back, and sticking your chest out. Of course, your shoulder blades won't touch, but it's that movement, the shoulder blades moving together behind you, that makes your back muscles contract hard.

Cut your weights by 50%, and work on squeezing your shoulder blades together.

It is a real PITA trying to describe this on the 'netz. If we were in-person, we could sort this out in about 2 minutes.

Excellent response, as always!

Ron III----III

[Karl_Hungus]

Was going to post a response until I read Ironwill2008's post. He nailed it perfectly!

[IronCharles]

Originally Posted by namtrag

wear straps, and use a grip with your thumbs not wrapped around the bar.

concentrate on pulling with the back

Good points, here. Keep your thumbs on the same side of the bar as your fingers, this will help take the biceps out of the movement. Use your hands as hooks, with as light a grip as you can safely do.

And, everything in Ironwill's great post.

One thing I learned from watching the excellent Charles Glass videos on the SuperSite here is, when doing lat pulldowns, make sure your elbows are pointing forward at the bottom of the movement, and not behind you, as is very common. This takes the traps and rear delts out of the motion, and forces your lats to do the work.

[IronCharles]

It's been a while since I saw it, but I found that video. I wish I had a lot of money and lived in Cali, I'd love to get some training with this guy!

http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/glasscut4.htm

[peter03]

Great info guys. Next time I will try lower weight and focus on my lats to do the job. Looks like I have to train my brain to find the lats before I train the lats themselves.


As far as chin up/pull up goes I still cant do it without assistance. I weigh over 195lb with high BF% so I still have to lose 20-25lb and gain some strength to do a wide grip pull up.

[Zeke5]

If you're doing this with cable machines, try switching bars around. Based on ideas from my iPhone exercise app I stopped using the wide bar for lat pulldowns and started using the little "V" grip bar most people use when doing rows. And started using the wide bar for the seated rows instead of the little V bar.

It fries my lats. I'm sure my body will get used to this and I will have to change my workout around when I feel I am hitting a plateau, but for now it's working great!

Zeke

[IronCharles]

Originally Posted by Zeke5

If you're doing this with cable machines, try switching bars around. Based on ideas from my iPhone exercise app I stopped using the wide bar for lat pulldowns and started using the little "V" grip bar most people use when doing rows. And started using the wide bar for the seated rows instead of the little V bar.

It fries my lats. I'm sure my body will get used to this and I will have to change my workout around when I feel I am hitting a plateau, but for now it's working great!

Zeke

This is a wise strategy. Change your routine up periodically to hit the muscles in new ways and from all angles. My gym has 2 lat pulldown cable machines, and I'm always swapping out the various bars on them for my workouts. But everytime I walk in the gym on a new day, both machines have the wide grip bars hooked up. People are afraid of change, I believe. And you can tell it from their results!

[paolo59]

If you don't really concentrate on your back, you will indeed work out your arms more than your lats.

[bigrigfixer]

All great info for me to take to the gym tonight for my back workout. Thanks guys.

[silverlightning]

use straps and lower weight and pull with your elbows as far back(no pun) and squeeze.

[Bando]

Originally Posted by Zeke5

If you're doing this with cable machines, try switching bars around. Based on ideas from my iPhone exercise app I stopped using the wide bar for lat pulldowns and started using the little "V" grip bar most people use when doing rows. And started using the wide bar for the seated rows instead of the little V bar.

It fries my lats. I'm sure my body will get used to this and I will have to change my workout around when I feel I am hitting a plateau, but for now it's working great!

Zeke

Originally Posted by IronCharles

This is a wise strategy. Change your routine up periodically to hit the muscles in new ways and from all angles. My gym has 2 lat pulldown cable machines, and I'm always swapping out the various bars on them for my workouts. But everytime I walk in the gym on a new day, both machines have the wide grip bars hooked up. People are afraid of change, I believe. And you can tell it from their results!

My new trainer is a competitive BB'er and when he wrote down my recommended routine for these and cable pushdowns he emphasized various grips. New types of sore with these new grips I've found.

[Mark1T]

All Back exercises are not "pullups"-type movements. Implement T-Bar Rows, DB Rows and other BB Rows to thicken the Back.

[BuckSpin]

Picked up this tip from Victor Martinez (not in person, unfortunately):

SHELLS

SHrug - start the lift/pull here, not with your arms (which as namtrag said should be strapped in with a thumbless grip to make them "hooks" to pull with)

ELbows - pull your elbows down along the ROM

LatS - Focus HARD on using these to pull with

This should be a fluid motion, not a 1-2-3 ROM. Just focus hard....

It very well could be your body posture as well. Don't turn lat exercises into some form of a row.

[BuckSpin]

Originally Posted by Mark1T

All Back exercises are not "pullups"-type movements. Implement T-Bar Rows, DB Rows and other BB Rows to thicken the Back.

FWIW, Lo DB Rows are, for me, almost entirely lats. Hi DB Rows are definitely thickeners. Plus depending on elbow positioning any row can be a brutal lat lift/back widener.

[beachguy498]

I never was a believer in the mind-muscle connection until I gave it a go. It works so well with lat exercises and really helped me isolate them to get max out of them.

I'll also go slow with a full ROM and hold it for a 2-count at the bottom. I'm doing a 5 x 5 type routine with them going with a heavy amount of weight. I'll increase the weight on the last 2 sets if I'm having a real good lat day.

BG

[Alex_RC]

Originally Posted by IronCharles

It's been a while since I saw it, but I found that video. I wish I had a lot of money and lived in Cali, I'd love to get some training with this guy!

http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/glasscut4.htm

I will definitely be putting some of these practices to use. The Chest clip really opened my eyes to things I am doing wrong (using more delt than chest on incline DB, for one thing). much appreciated, thanks and repped.

[BlondeAmazon]

Originally Posted by bando

your form is off. .

ding ding ding ding!

Originally Posted by ironwill2008

Back is a difficult muscle group to train; it's a large group, and you can't see it working, making a mind/muscle connection difficult to establish. Don't think about pulling with your hands; they're only hooks, used to pull the weight. Think about pulling with your elbows. During each rep, pull your elbows as far back as possible, and at the top of the rep, attempt to make your shoulder blades touch each other, in the middle of your back, by pulling your shoulders back, and sticking your chest out. Of course, your shoulder blades won't touch, but it's that movement, the shoulder blades moving together behind you, that makes your back muscles contract hard.

Cut your weights by 50%, and work on squeezing your shoulder blades together.

and a big ol bingo on this

[Old-Time-Lifter]

Originally Posted by ironwill2008

It's at the top of the rep (when the bar/handle/whatever you're gripping) is closest to your body.


That's because they are. That must change, if you're going to develop your back muscles.

Back is a difficult muscle group to train; it's a large group, and you can't see it working, making a mind/muscle connection difficult to establish. Don't think about pulling with your hands; they're only hooks, used to pull the weight. Think about pulling with your elbows. During each rep, pull your elbows as far back as possible, and at the top of the rep, attempt to make your shoulder blades touch each other, in the middle of your back, by pulling your shoulders back, and sticking your chest out. Of course, your shoulder blades won't touch, but it's that movement, the shoulder blades moving together behind you, that makes your back muscles contract hard.

Cut your weights by 50%, and work on squeezing your shoulder blades together.

It is a real PITA trying to describe this on the 'netz. If we were in-person, we could sort this out in about 2 minutes.

Originally Posted by SP1966

We can end this thread right here! Great post, as usual!!

Originally Posted by Bando

X2, wish I could have laid it out like that, well done.

Originally Posted by thebigguy1

Excellent response, as always!

Ron III----III

Originally Posted by Karl_Hungus

Was going to post a response until I read Ironwill2008's post. He nailed it perfectly!

Originally Posted by IronCharles

It's been a while since I saw it, but I found that video. I wish I had a lot of money and lived in Cali, I'd love to get some training with this guy!

http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/glasscut4.htm

Originally Posted by BlondeAmazon

ding ding ding ding!



and a big ol bingo on this

All the above........

I'm a believer in mixing up my back work alot. I wish I had a fully equiped gym so I could mix it up even more.

Also, I like to flex my back ocassionally during the day just to really drive home that mind muscle link. Good Luck.

[AKMass]

I found this bb.com article and associated vid to have some really good insight for training back/lats...

http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/glasscut4.htm

Ditto on using your hands as hooks and keeping the thumbs out of the grip.

[bassing68]

1 arm dumbell rows helped me strength the lats to do other things and make the mind body connection.