Best Back Exercises: Powerful Pullups

Chisel Your Back

Use our pullup program to get a V-shaped body
By Carter Hays, C.S.C.S. menshealth

V is for Victory

The V has a grand lineage. For the Romans, it was a letter and a number, chiseled into marble for millennia. The V is flashed for victory and for peace. V8 juice is good for our bodies, V-8 engines are good for our souls. (Let's ignore V-2 rockets and VH-1.)

But back to that chisel. A V-shaped upper body conveys power in the boardroom as well as on the beach. You get that V by developing the latissimus dorsi, the largest muscle in your back. Pullups can deliver you to V-ness. They require strength, flexibility, and balance; they recruit muscles from your back, shoulders, arms, and core. Whether you call them pullups or chinups, they work.

Last year, I began training Mike, a man in his mid-40s who had never been able to do a pullup, and Zach, a 23-year-old who could easily do 15 repetitions but was dissatisfied with his back size. Each client used the following program, and each achieved his goal.


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