Upper back Workout

By using this grip, I feel you can use heavier poundage while stimulating the back more efficiently opposed to the traditional way.

This machine works very well as a first exercise for a back routine because of how it stretches your whole upper body, especially the lats. I feel that this exercise serves as a good warm up exercise to get your back ready for heavy lat pull downs and bent rows.

This exercise should be preformed for 3-4 sets with reps ranging from 15 down to 8. These should be performed using maximum intensity striving to use the heaviest weights possible while staying in that range.

EXERCISE 2

The next exercise for the upper back is pulldowns using a slightly wider than shoulder width grip (not at the bent portion of the lat pulldown bar). There is no additional benefit by extending your hands past the straight part of the lat pulldown bar, it just provides additional strain on your rotator cuffs, and this could lead to problems when you start using heavier weights.

I feel that this is a very effective exercise to use after performing the pullover machine. This exercise works the upper portion of the back very effectively, while really putting an emphasis on the lats. During this exercise you should stick out your chest and keep your lower back tight and straight to really squeeze the back while bringing the bar to your chest.

This exercise should be preformed for 3-4 sets for a rep range of 8-12. On any lat pull exercise (or any back exercise for that matter) form should never be sacrificed to use more weight on an exercise, strict form is the only way to effectively hit your back and feel it being worked.

EXERCISE 3

Following the lat pulldowns I will perform an additional exercise to work the same area with a different variation. Close grip pulldowns, using two single hand cables preferred. These are more of an isolation exercise where less weight will be used, and the main importance will be to bring the handles all the way down and try to pull them apart for a maximum contraction.

Throughout this movement you should try to keep your back as straight as possible while pulling the handles to the upper portion of your chest. This will effectively target the middle region and the lower lats.

For this exercise since it is more used for a touch up for the previous exercise the sets can be reduced to 2-3 but the reps should be kept in the same range as before.