wide grip or close grip for lat pull downs?

[LeeJunFan]

just started training again and was wondering what was better for my lats on the pulldown, by better i mean that wide V shape, i tried both ways tonight and am i right by saying close grip uses biceps more? anyway, i actually felt a burn in my shoulders when i did wide grip, i thought shoulders were used for pushing movements not pulling, i did some researching earlier and found the bent over row to be considered one of the best for the back, what is your number 1 lat exercise? any thoughts would be apprciated, thanks!

 

[ExtraMile]

my number one lat exercise is wide overhand grip chinups

its hard to say what my number one back exercise is though, either chinups as mensioned above or heavy deadlifts.

 

[LeeJunFan]

i've never been very good at pull-ups, at my best i could only manage 2 or 3 using a wide grip, which way would you suggest i go about building up to doing sets of 8-12 or even more?

1. do them with no assist but only manage 1 or 2 and just try and get the number up week by week OR
2. do sets of 8-12 with assist and lower the assist week by week,

what differences would these methods achieve?

thanks

 

[kawikaratekid]

Wide grip pulldowns focus more on the top portion of the v shape....Close grip works more for the bottom of the lats where they attach at the waist. Doing both would be the best. If you can only do two or three wides do that for three sets to failure. Than do the wide grip pulldowns on the machine with strict form. Focusing on pulling the bar with your back and holding the contraction at the bottom for a two count. Do this with the close grip also and you'll really feel the burn. This should get your reps up a lot faster...

 

[kawikaratekid]

Doing them with assist and lowering the weights will help also...Same as the pulldown on the machine basically

 

[lookinfit75]

In an article I read a while back, Dorian Yates claimed to have never done a wide grip anything for back in his entire career as an Olympia champion and he's considered to have one of the most impressive backs ever in BB history so take that bit of info for what it's worth. He said that the wider grip compromised the biceps and since the bicep was the weak link in the equation it would be better to put them in a possition where they can be stronger and therefore pull more weight.
If a stronger, bigger, and thicker back is what you are looking for, then heavy assed deadlifts and heavy assed bent over rows is the way to go. As soon as I decided to fully embrace those exercises and do the bent over rows like Dorian Yates says to do them (at a 70 degree angle, not fully bent over like the tradional movement is done), my back started to grow and with that my strength in all other lifts including bench and squats started growing stronger as well.

 

[LeeJunFan]

thanks for the replies, so the 70 degree angle is only a slight bend instead of say a normal bend of around 50 degree, i wonder why that works better, i will give that a go next time.

 

[Peterlumberjack]

i agree with 75, i think i read the same article. i used to do pulldowns with my hands at the very ends of the bars, but i switched to only slightly wider than shoulder, and ive been getting a lot sorer in the correct area of my lats.

 

[joe d]

heavy lifts are what build a back period. use a variety of deads, rows, chins. you need to find what works. lookinfit said it pretty good but you also have to keep in mind that yates and his training works are focused on the high level athlete. your average joe would not be successful pounding the shit out of his muscles weak after weak. you can use these lifts in your training but you have to figure out how much you need.

 

[ExtraMile]

i've never been very good at pull-ups, at my best i could only manage 2 or 3 using a wide grip, which way would you suggest i go about building up to doing sets of 8-12 or even more?

1. do them with no assist but only manage 1 or 2 and just try and get the number up week by week OR
2. do sets of 8-12 with assist and lower the assist week by week,

what differences would these methods achieve?

thanks

personally I built my chinning strength up by doing this: First i started with a grip only a little outside shoulder width and I only pulled my eyebrows to the bar, so didnt go all the way up, when I first did these I managed about 8 or 9, when I got to 12 I moved my grip out a bit and like that I only managed like 8 or 9 again, like before I built up to 12 reps. When I could do that I started getting my mouth to the bar and again reps dropped to 7 or 8. Im still building it up from there, once I managed 10 or 11 reps but now as Im gaining bodyweight I usually can only do 8 or 9 like this as my first set before I have to kick my feet a bit. I think my next step after 12 reps like this will just be more reps, the grip Im using now makes me lats and upper back sore as fuck so I dont need to change it, eventually I would like to do sternum chins though but they are along way away.

You could do that method or you could do lots of sets (5-8) or low reps (2-4) if you cant do that just use an easier grip like a shoulder width neutral grip or soemthing and build it up or do a similar movement with less weight like rack chins, pulldowns or assisted chins...