5 ways to improve your pull-ups

The lat pulldown has become more popular around gyms than the pull-ups. The reason is simple, pull-ups are freaking hard and most people cant do them well or just cant do them at all. Here are some ways to change that.

1) Lose excess weight/body fat-You need to be strong and lean to do pull-ups. The heavier you are the harder its going to be to excute obviously.

2) Do not train to failure-When your doing pull-ups if you always train to failure you end up with horrible sloppy reps and you just dont gain a benefit from it. In fact going to failure on pull-ups often tends to lead to decreases in strength and mass gains for reasons unknown, it just happens.

3) Elbows towards your sides-Think about driving your elbows down and back to really bring the lats into play and therefore avoid relying mostly on your biceps.'

4) Improve your grip strength- the stronger your grip the better your pull-ups will be. You can build grip strength by doing more deadlifts and reverse curls or by using fatter barbells. You can also do wrist curls and other exercises geared towards grip strength.

5) Train with different ranges-To do a bunch of pull-ups you need both strength and endurance. Make sure you lift with low rep ranges for strength and high rep ranges for endurance. You can use bands as assistance for the pullups if need be.

Random thoughts

• There are a bunch of programs that work for a while but then eventually everything becomes stale. You need to make sure you are changing your workouts. Change exercises, programs, and methods.

• If your trying to get faster then work your hamstrings and glutes. If your trying to better your vertical then work on your quads.
  

• I love beets. They are low in calories and fat, but are high in fiber and vitamins and minerals. So Eat some!
  

• If you have no specific training goal in mind try to mix up your routine every4-6 weeks. Do weeks of strength, metabolic ( fat loss ) and hypertrophy to get the benefits of every type of training.

• Plyometric training and lifting with heavy heavy loads is hard on your central nervous system and can really beat down your body. Limit these types of workouts to 1-2x a week.
  

Get a butt! Top 5 glute exercises

1) Full squat-This is the king of butt exercises end of story. You must get into a full deep squat which is thighs parallel to the ground to give your glutes the most work.

2) Deadlifts-If the squat is king then deadlifts are right behind in terms of effectiveness for the glutes. The key is to make sure you push through your heels on every rep to activate the backside of the body. If your doing stiff leg deadlifts you can achieve more glute activation by adding some extra bend in your knees.

3) Bulgarian split squats-A variation of the squat that is great for the glutes. Checkout my old post for the proper technique. http://h4training.blogspot.com/2010/03/eom-bulgarian-split-squat.html

4) High step ups- Proper box height should have your knee resting at a 90 degree angle. I believe you can go with an even higher box every now and then to thrash your glutes even more. When doing the step up make sure to push through your heel of the foot that is on the step. All of the work should take place from the leg that is on the box.

5) Hip thrusts- This is a great exercise that trainer Brett Contreras has made popular. The key to this is to focus on squeezing the glutes throughout and not allow your back to do the work. Watch this video to get all the details. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hCm-70-9_XE

Ladies....5 reasons why you WONT BULK UP

This is a post for all the women out there. I cant stand when I hear some woman tell me she doesn't like to do weights because she gets big easily. If you can pack on muscle and get big that easy then please contact me asap because I want to know your secrets. Lets face you are not going to bulk up and here is why.

1. Women don't have the testosterone levels men have-depending on what you read some say women have only 10-20% of a mans testosterone level. Due to the higher levels men are more likely to be able to put on muscle mass and at a more rapid pace.

2. You wont get bulky but in fact get more toned- Since the testosterone levels are not present to give women big muscles you will simply get more of a lean muscular look. Toning comes from stripping the fat away from the muscle and therefore enhancing its appearance. Celebrity women have toned muscles because they lift weights and eat right.

3. Getting big takes years and years of training for men let alone women- You will not get huge from starting to weight train overnight. Even if you lift weights for several years you wont achieve what your gender counter parts can achieve.

4. Bulking up is calorie dependant- Often times women associate getting bulky from starting to lift weights but this is generally caused from a poor diet and them gaining fat. A low calorie healthy nutrition plan plus weight training will produce a lean individual.