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You've probably heard it said
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that during pull ups and pulling exercises
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a wide grip is better for the back
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whereas a narrow grip is better for the biceps
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This is wrong
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it's caused by an improper
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understanding of biomechanics
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In this video
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I'm going to explain
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proper biomechanics of pulling exercises
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so that you can optimize your back and biceps training
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You might feel your back more with a wider grip
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and you might feel
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your arms more with a more narrow grip
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but feelings and objective muscle activity
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don't correlate very well
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as I explained in the previous video
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I think the study that best illustrates
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the effect of grip width is one by Anderson et al.
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that you can see here
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they looked at the effects
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of three different grip widths of pull downs
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so it was a very controlled study
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and they did 6RMs at each respective grip
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they measured the muscle activity of a lot of different muscle groups
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as you can see here
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and they found no significant differences
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not for the arms
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not for the Latissimus Dorsi
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not for the traps
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and not for the Infraspinatus
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Multiple other studies have also
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compared different pull down and pull up variations
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generally finding no significant differences
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For example,
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they've compared neutral and supinated grip pull ups,
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wide grip pull ups, neutral or supinated grip pull ups
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and in general
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these studies have found no significant differences
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in terms of either back or biceps activity.
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The Anderson study is by far the most
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well controlled one though.
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Of course, muscle activity as measured via
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electromyography
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is just muscle activity
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and it doesn't necessarily correspond with
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muscle growth
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We also have a study by Gentil et al.
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that found that pronated grip pulldowns stimulate as
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much biceps growth as supinated grip barbell curls.
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So there are two comparisons here
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grip width and forearm orientation
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Forearm orientation
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I'm not going to discuss in detail in this video
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I wrote an extensive article on that on my website that
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you can check out.
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Just like grip width, most research
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finds no significant effects of forearm orientation
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again it might feel like you train the biceps more
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you see it contract more when it's supinated
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but it's still an elbow flexor
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the body will recruit it
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specifically the motor cortex of your brain
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it will recruit the biceps
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whether it's supinated or pronated
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during any type of elbow flexion movement.
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In fact an argument can be made in light of the recent research
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of stretch mediated hypertrophy and findings that
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the biceps is better trained at long muscle lengths
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that pronating the arm
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like this, this is pronation, this is supination
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they show that longer muscle lengths
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are more effective to stimulate biceps growth
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and by pronating the arm
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you lengthen the biceps
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so an argument could actually be made that a hammer grip
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or even a pronated grip
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might be superior in some exercises for bicep growth
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Now as for the grip width
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this study lends
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strong credence to the idea that grip width is
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not a major determinant of bicep growth
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However, I will say that Paulo Gentil,
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the lead author of the study
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a Brazilian researcher
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has a very poor reputation in the scientific community
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the exercise science community
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He was associated
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it was not implicated
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but he was associated with
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Matheus Barbalho
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who had multiple papers retracted
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essentially for data fraud
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or at least very improbable data patterns
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as we have to politically correctly call it
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So take these findings with a little bit of grain of salt
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but there is also other research
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namely a study by Pompermayer et al.
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that's found that supinated
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shoulder width pulldowns and biceps
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ez bar preacher curls stimulate a similar level
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of muscle damage in the biceps
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So we have some convergence that
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the available research on muscle growth
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the lead researcher may not be entirely trustworthy
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it does converge with research on muscle damage
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and multiple studies on muscle activity
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Perhaps more importantly
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even, it makes biomechanical sense
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The idea that a wide grip is better for the back
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whereas a more narrow grip is better for the arms
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seems to be largely based on
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either a very specious
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superficial idea of biomechanics or feelings.
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it is true that the range of motion is decreased
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when you use a very wide grip
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but it only decreases range of motion
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in the contracted position
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which recent research finds
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may not actually be a big deal
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I’m not sure where the idea originally came from
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that the wide grip is better for the back
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and a narrow grip is better for the arms
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I think it is largely based on feelings
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the fact that we
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we see and feel the biceps more
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especially with a narrow
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supinated grip versus a wider pronated grip
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But with the proper understanding of biomechanics
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it actually makes sense that grip width
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doesn't have a significant effect
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on biceps recruitment
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and I think what most people when they
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feel the arms more
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they think the back must be working less
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but that's not true
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as I discussed in previous videos
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compound and isolation exercises
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on average in the literature
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have equal effects on muscle growth
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so it's not the case that just because you're
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training
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another muscle group as well
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that you're training the primary muscle group less
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there is no mutual exclusivity in the body
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the body can easily
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train two muscles at the same time
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especially if they are synergists
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or they have no competing functions
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So how do the biomechanics work during a pull up
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Well if you're doing a pull up like this
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then its actually not straightforward to see
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how the biceps is involved at all
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if your
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hands are inward of your elbows
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then it makes sense
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cause if this is the bar
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you're holding a bar and the biceps is flexing
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which is this movement
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then it's moving the bar down
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but if the elbow is directly below the hand
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and you're pulling straight down
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and the biceps is doing this type movement
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then the force is going sideways
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which doesn't appear to be helpful. Or does it?
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and even worse
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if the elbow is more inward than the hand
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so the hand is like this
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then the elbow flexion force going like this
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would even theoretically be expected to move the bar up
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So what's going on
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well the problem is that this is only
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a biomechanical consideration of vertical forces, so
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Let me illustrate it with my amazing paint skills
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So here we have Hector
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Hector is doing pull ups
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and if you just look at vertical forces
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then he is pulling from two sides, right?
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and it's going straight down because it's
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that's gravity, gravity pulls straight down
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Now, you
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wouldn't be able to see how
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the biceps is involved at all because
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technically
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the axis of rotation
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the elbow is directly below the hand
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so there's no moment arm for elbow flexion
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In reality what's happening is that the biceps
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because the bar is fixed
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and you cannot move the bar
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the biceps is producing horizontal inward force
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which is like this
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Which means that the total resultant force factor of
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pulling down on the bar
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but also pulling inward into the bar
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creates a resultant force factor that goes
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somewhat like this
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And now u see that the moment arm on the elbow is actually positive
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because it's directly
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perpendicular to
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your axis of rotation to the resultant force factor, so
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there is a positive
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moment arm for elbow flexion
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and for the lats, for the shoulder
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here we also have
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a resultant moment arm
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If you were only considering vertical forces
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it would be longer
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you would think that it goes
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all the way from the shoulder to the elbow
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the moment arm on the lats
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and in general the back muscles that are producing
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shoulder aduction
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This tells us two things
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One it explains why the biceps is involved at all
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and two it means that biceps involvement,
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horizontal force production from the biceps on the bar
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reduces the moment arm for the back muscles
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for the lats in particular
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so the shoulder adduction moment arm
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And that means
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essentially that
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the biceps and the back are working synergistically
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to lift the weight.
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Now, that sounds super intuitive, right?
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If the biceps is more active
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the biceps is producing more force
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it makes things easier for the back
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essentially intuitively
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because you're pulling on a fixed bar and
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the elbow flexion force goes kind of inwards
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but the bar cannot move, it’s fixed
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that inward force
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essentially helps you pull yourself up
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It makes it easier for the back
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So one more time quickly
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to make sure everyone understands
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just looking at vertical forces
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there would be no demands on the elbow
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and the moment arm would be like this
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but that's not the case
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there is actually some horizontal force this way
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which means the resultant force factor
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goes kind of like this
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and there is actually
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an elbow flexion moment arm and an adduction
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moment arm like this
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So the
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biceps involvement makes things easier for the lats
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This knowledge of biomechanics
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also allows us to understand why rows
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especially with a dumbbell
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are not as effective for the biceps
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for example
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we have a study by Mannarino et al.
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that found
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that supinated dumbbell curls
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stimulate considerably more biceps growth,
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about two fold as much
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literally double the growth pretty much
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compared to supinated dumbbell rows
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In general
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rows don't appear to be very good biceps builders
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that muscle activity levels
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muscle damage levels in multiple studies is quite low
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as opposed to
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pull down and pull up movements
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and that's due to lower demands on elbow flexion
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but the general knowledge of grip width
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if you're doing a barbell row
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for example
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with a medium versus slightly wider grip
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is likely very similar
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Big difference with rows though
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is that when you use a wider grip
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often
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they don't just use a wider grip
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but they also move the elbows up
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and if you are rowing with the elbows below
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the shoulders
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the lats are quite involved
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because there’s shoulder extension taking place
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When you move the elbows up
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you essentially eliminate the shoulder extension demand
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and when the elbow comes at shoulder height
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there's no more shoulder extension
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which means that the lats have very little work
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the lats can technically help
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but they have super
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super super weak leverage
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for pure horizontal shoulder flexion
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so in general
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when you do a high row type movement like this
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shoulder pulls
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face pulls high rows
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then the lats are
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mostly out of it and you are isolating the
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the middle and lower traps and the rear
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deltoids primarily
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Demands on the biceps are going to be quite low
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and they're going to be even lower if
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you have a dumbbell or a loose implement
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because like I said
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the horizontal forces that works well
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when the implement that you're pulling on
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like a barbell or a bar
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it cannot move
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because then that force is effectively used to
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it's like because you cannot
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bend the bar
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it's helping you pull yourself up or pull the weight down
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When you have a dumbbell
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that's impossible because horizontal force
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production would actually move the dumbbell
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This is actually very similar
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for those of you who watched my video
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on the effect of grip width
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on bench press muscle activity
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it's a very similar story
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If you haven't watched it
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I highly recommend
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watching that because you'll also see
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how there are a lot of myths on
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the effect of grip width on bench press muscle activity
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just like here for back training
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Now there are a few more details
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you should be aware of when interpreting this research
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one is functional differentiation
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just because total muscle activity levels are similar
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with wider vs
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more narrow grips
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and total muscle growth
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and muscle damage might also be similar
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That doesn’t mean that it's the same in all the muscle fibers because
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muscles have different muscle fibers with different
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leverages in different positions
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which means that during different movements
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you can train
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different muscle fibers a bit more or a bit less
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this is usually not a matter of pure isolation
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but you can emphasize certain muscle fibers over others
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In the case of the lats
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we have clear evidence of functional differentiation
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The lower fibers of the lats
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they as you can see in this image here
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they run more outward
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so they are involved very much in shoulder adduction
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which is like a pull up or a pull down movement
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elbows out to the sides and moving in this
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plane of movement
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The fibers more at top
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are more effective during shoulder extension
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cause they wrap around
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the body more and come to the front
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so the lower fibers are more like this
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and the upper fibers
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they wrap around
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the shoulder more
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which means that during a chin up movement
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or in general more narrow grip type movement
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you will, theoretically
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train the upper lats a bit more
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and when you do a wide grip pull down type movement
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you train the lower fibers a little bit more
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now I say theoretically because
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these differences in muscle activity are mostly
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apparent with submaximal muscle contractions
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Now, there is a school of thought in exercise science that
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the body will match the leverage with muscle activity
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however when you're training close to failure
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with maximal effort
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then generally the body will recruit all muscle fibers
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regardless of how poor the leverage is
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because it's simply all hands on deck
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So what does this
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all mean for your training program design
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Here are 4 practical lessons
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we can take away from all this knowledge
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First, vertical pulls are generally effective
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biceps training volume
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whereas horizontal pulls generally aren't
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especially not if they are
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performed with dumbbells or other free
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loose implements like single cable handles or rings
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Second, muscle activity per se during
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either horizontal or vertical pulling movements
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probably has little effect
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on the ratio of back to biceps activity
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it has essentially no significant effect
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in most research on the recruitment of the lats
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the biceps or pretty much any other muscle group
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at least within
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practical ranges that people will ordinarily use
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During rows
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however a wider grip in practice
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often means that the elbows go up
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and when the elbows reach shoulder height
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there is no more shoulder extension taking place
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and it largely takes the lats out of the movement
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so regular rows train the entire back
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maybe not optimally
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that's another story
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but they train pretty much all the back muscles
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but when you do a more high row type movement
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you isolate the upper back
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specifically the rear delts
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the mid and the lower traps more
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Three, even though there's no significant effect
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on muscle activity
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there are still effects on the ranges of motion
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the muscle length experienced and
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the stresses imposed on the joints
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specifically in this sense
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I think that very wide grip pulling movements
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especially vertical pulls like pull ups
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are not very useful for most individuals.
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They cause a lot more shoulder issues
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and when you go out to extremely wide grips
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there might become a negative effect
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on biceps recruitment.
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At some point
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the horizontal force production is
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not going to be able to compensate for the
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simply low demands on elbow flexion
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plus for the lats
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you're actually not stretching the lats as much
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when you use a super wide grip because you want to
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you want the arm to go up a lot
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that stretches the lats more
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to get stretch mediated hypertrophy
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So in this sense of super wide grip
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I think it's kind of the worst of all worlds
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and it doesn't have a
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great place in most training programs.
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That said, lesson four
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It can still be useful to have
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different types of pulling movements such as uh
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chin ups and pull ups in the same program
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because of functional differentiation
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they target different muscle fibers in the lats
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theoretically at least. All right
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I hope this helps
00:14:43
you optimize your pulling exercises
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and your training program design
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if you like this type of content
00:14:48
I'd be honored if you like and subscribe
