Small Lats

[jose24034]

What’s the best way for me to hit my lats while not hitting my traps at all or very minimal trap involvement. My lats are very small compared to my overdeveloped traps and I really don’t like the look. Any suggestions? thanks.

[unity]

are you referring to your mid/lower traps? are you looking for more lat width or depth? more info, possible pic needed.

[EiFit91]

What’s the best way for me to hit my lats while not hitting my traps at all or very minimal trap involvement. My lats are very small compared to my overdeveloped traps and I really don’t like the look. Any suggestions? thanks.

Hard to completely isolate muscles.

What's your pullup strength? Number of reps or number of reps with added weight?

Also post a picture of your lats, it's possible they aren't as small as you think.

[EliKoehn]

Hard to completely isolate muscles.

What's your pullup strength? Number of reps or number of reps with added weight?

Also post a picture of your lats, it's possible they aren't as small as you think.

Also, I think perhaps more than any other muscle, the lats lose apparent size the higher one's bodyfat level, since the fat stored around the waistline and lovehandles removes the taper which would otherwise be visible.

[BeginnerGainz]

Just learn to bias them in your pulling movements.

-Neutral spine
-Neutral grip (not really a fan of supinated grips for most pulls, chins are fine)
-Don’t start the movement with scapular retraction, think humeral depression
-Too much shoulder flexion the lats start to lose leverage and therefor tension
-If your arm travels behind you body, then it is no longer lats, they extend the shoulder and return it to neutral

I have all the back exercises in my program (and how I program for others) as upper back or lats and the difference is grip, upper arm position and angle of pull.

[xsquid99]

As others have mentioned its hard to isolate the two, but some of my favorite exercises for specifically targeting the lats are:

- straight arm pull downs on the cable machine
- rows (dumbbell, seated cable, yates, pendlay, etc)
- lat-pulls & pull-ups

[ChunkBuster]

I like chest supported row. Also pull down machine of your gym has one. I prefer this to kat pull down.

[Casca]

As others have mentioned its hard to isolate the two, but some of my favorite exercises for specifically targeting the lats are:

- straight arm pull downs on the cable machine
- rows (dumbbell, seated cable, yates, pendlay, etc)
- lat-pulls & pull-ups

Came in to say this. I use it to supplement my front lever training. I like using the heaviest band I can pull fully down to waist 'standing' on my knees, pull down and then lower butt to heels and then slow controlled eccentric back up. Starting position is arms straight over head slightly behind body. Also use an easier band that I can do the full range seated butt on heels or floor. I do it one arm at a time and both at same time.

[Ironface]

All I do for back is deadlifts, rows and pull-ups.

It’s not even close to lagging.

For strictly lats, pull-ups/chin-ups and basically any vertical pull will hit them hardest on a per-set basis.