Improving Pull ups

(Vladaar Malane) #1

Any gurus here on improving pull up numbers?

I seem to be stuck at 5 to 6 pull ups. Which lately is aggravating the muscle on my upper forearm. Which could be tennis elbow, or whatever. It’s not throbbing afterward like some with tennis elbow get, but I feel it when I am doing pull ups. I’ve been reducing that the last few weeks with the youtube physical therapist video I found on massaging it, which seems to help. What can’t you learn on youtube. LoL.

I don’t think the lingering tennis elbow injury is my weak point though, it is actually getting better. I switched over to calisthenics a few weeks ago from free weights to avoid all these joint/tendon injuries my age seems to be inviting. I think it is more the scapula muscles in the back.

Anyway, maybe too much background info in the first place, but I’m thinking my problem might be that I am only doing pull ups once a week when I work my back. It could be that to break through that pull up barrier, I need to start doing it twice a week, so I plan on trying that. Also adding at the end of some of my other work outs some bar hang time, where I just activate my scapula muscles up and down and side to side. I should say that I already do single jump pull ups after my regular sets of pull ups, and Australian pull ups as well on my back day. Which are supposed to be tips on increasing pull ups. I’m a very impatient guy when it comes to seeing results. LoL.

I have searched youtube and came up with http://armstrongpullupprogram.com/ which is supposed to increase your pull ups. But that’s a 5 day a week pull up program. I might try it if what I said before doesn’t work or if someone else doesn’t have better advice.

(Andy Hanson) #2

Following this. I would love to be pumping out 5 to 6 pull-ups! I’m at one right now, which isn’t too surprising given my weight and lack of strength training over the last twenty years. This week I put a pull up bar in my garage and would like to eventually get to twenty pull-ups.

(Vladaar Malane) #3

Me too, 20 is my goal.

I am doing this right now, but like I said I think I need to start doing pull ups twice a week now for getting beyond 5 pull ups.

(Vladaar Malane) #4

I’m also going to start implementing this. I like the chart idea if it gets results.

(Ohio ) #6

hi. My first post here. I never could do pull-ups in my 20s and most of most of my 30s. Until fat adaption…the way I see most ppl doing pull ups is wrong including record holders.
*First you must tie your rips in with your breath. So even you are only doing 5-6 rips, if they are tied with 5-10 second inhalations & exhalations that’s much better than doing a dozen or so rips.
*Second: Shoulder rotations/finger stretching while holding yourself with the opposite side. Tie this in breathe as well. Feel your lungs stretch on the hanging side ( Covid19 recovery advice here too). Rips between rotations.
*Finally get creative, I do flips, numerous ab crunches, think yoga when on the bar. I have the bar between the toilet and tv/bed so I get rips in like clockwork. No hour of the day is off limits. I feel like I must do pull ups every hour or so just to keep the blood flowing!!