Pull Up: A Complete How-To Exercise Guide

What exercise do you envision when you hear about someone in incredible shape? For me, it has always been the pull up.

Very few exercises challenge nearly everyone the same way pull ups do. And those who are able to perform the exercise well are usually incredibly fit.

And it makes sense as to why. To perform the exercise you must have complete control of your body as you fight gravity from a dead hang using nothing but your own strength.

The pull up is truly one of those exercises that no one bats an eye if someone struggles performing a repetitions. Whether you’re deconditioned or a professional bodybuilder, it takes technique and conditioning to be able to bang out a set of perfect pull ups.

With that said, I think it is an admirable goal to make pull ups part of your routine. Doing so has numerous benefits including increased functional strength, increased lean muscle mass, and decreased body fat.

In this article, you will learn how to perform the pull up, what muscle groups the exercise works, how to add pull ups to your workout routines and variations of the pull up. Let’s get started!

How to Perform the Bodyweight Pull Up

The pull up can be performed in nearly every setting which makes it a core exercise to learn how to perform. If you know how to perform pull ups, you always have an exercise that trains the foundational movement pattern known as the vertical pull.

Pull ups can be performed in a gym setting on pull up bars or power racks, at parks on swing sets or straight bars, and at home on affordable options such as door mounted pull up bars and power towers.

To perform the pull up:

  1. Begin by identifying a stable bar to perform the exercise.
  2. Reach up, step up on a box, or jump up to grab the pull up bar.
  3. Begin in a dead hang position with an overhand grip wider than shoulder length.
    • It is preferable to keep your legs straight and leg muscles engaged keep a straight torso. If you are taller, you can bend your knees and cross your ankles behind you.
  4. Brace your core and engage your scapula to begin the pull.
  5. Using your hands as hooks, focus on pulling your chest to the bar primarily through engaging the posterior muscles of the back.
  6. Once you are nearly level to the bar, slowly reverse the movement controlling your bodyweight to the starting position. It is important to completely control the descent of this exercise to avoid possible injury.
  7. If performing multiple repetitions keep your scapula and core engaged throughout the set. Avoid prolonged dead hang at the bottom position, kipping or excessive motion throughout the rep, and abrupt dropping from the top position.
  8. Repeat for the desired number of repetitions.

What Muscles Are Targeted When Performing Pull Ups?

The pull up trains the vertical pull movement pattern which is necessary to engage the muscles of the back during your workouts. Primarily the exercise targets the lats, teres major, rhomboids, traps and biceps.

Since the exercise is truly a full body exercise, you will also hit all of the muscles of the core. You even hit your chest to a slight degree and depending on how engaged you keep your legs throughout the movement, you’ll indirectly hit those too.

As I said in the intro, this exercise is a true feat of strength and conditioning. There’s a reason why it was heavily featured in any training montage you’ve seen in 80s movies.

How to Add Pull Ups to Your Workouts

Pull ups are challenging. That’s why they’re often featured in the front portion of workouts for most people. However, for those who are in truly amazing shape, you might decide to use pull ups as a finishing exercise to completely gas your lats. Where you place workouts in your workouts will be highly individualized. However, in this section, I’ll try to provide some general recommendations.

For those who perform full body workouts, the pull up can be placed wherever you’re comfortable with it in your workouts. Since most full body workouts will be compound exercise heavy, it’s generally best practice to include the exercise that challenges you the most toward the front of your workout program.

For those who perform upper/lower splits, the pull up is a great exercise to include first or second in your upper body workouts (assuming you train back first). Some folks enjoy a heavy horizontal row to warm up the posterior muscles prior to performing their main vertical pull. Others may enjoy using pull ups as their first exercise to get warmed up before a weighted exercise.

If you’re performing push/pull/legs workouts, the pull up will be best added to your pull workout days. Again, it’ll likely be the first or second exercise performed depending on your condition level and skill at performing them.

Lastly, for those of you who perform bro-split workouts, the pull up can really fall anywhere during your back day. For those who can perform the exercise well, you may include it first and add a weighted chain to increase the effort of the exercise. For those who struggle with the exercise, you may perform it as a finisher and only perform the eccentric portion of the exercise.

Pull up reps and set schemes will also depend on your proficiency. Sets can range anywhere from 2-5 sets and rep ranges from anywhere between 2-15+ reps. For those who get really good at pull ups, it’s generally a good idea to begin adding weight via a belt or weighted vest once you’re able to perform sets of 15 with perfect form.

Pull Up Variations

There are so many different pull up variations, it’ll be hard to include them all in this article. So, I will provide you with the ones that are generally the most helpful to add to workouts. I will put them in an order of easiest to hardest. Some of the easier variations are great if you are new to pull ups and want to build the movement skills to perform them unassisted.

Once I have more exercise guides added to the website, I will link to them for these variations.

  • Scapula Retractions
  • Eccentric Only Pull Ups
  • Resistance Band Assisted Pull Ups
  • Neutral Grip Pull Up
  • Chin Up (underhand grip pull up)
  • Weighted Pull Ups
  • Towel Pull Ups
  • L-Sit Pull Ups
  • Archer Pull Ups

Conclusion

The pull up is an awesome exercise that can take a while to master. But don’t let that discourage you from adding them into your workout routines! So many people struggle at performing this exercise so don’t let the fear of looking foolish prevent you from beginning to use the movement to build serious back muscle and strength.

The pull up, or one of its variations, can be added to nearly any style of training. Rep ranges and set schemes can be modified to accommodate where you are today and increased as you improve with the exercise.

If you have any questions about pull ups or anything mentioned in this article, leave a comment below. I’d be happy to answer your questions.