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Strength Training
Most Pull-up Failures aren’t Strength Problems
Why your grip quits before your back gets a say
I watched a guy jump up, grab the bar, and drop straight back down after about two seconds. He shook out his hands and said his back must be weak.
His back was fine. His grip gave out before his back got involved.
The pull-up is a full bodyweight lift
A push-up moves roughly two-thirds of your body weight through your arms and shoulders. A pull-up moves nearly all of it. There’s no floor to push off of, no incline to reduce the load. You’re hanging in the air, pulling your entire body up to a bar, and every ounce of that has to move through your hands, forearms, lats, and upper back at once.
Grip goes first for most people. Your forearms fatigue before your lats get a real chance to fire, and once your grip loosens, the rep is over regardless of how strong your back is. The guy who dropped off the bar wasn’t weak in the muscles that do the pulling. He never got far enough into the movement for those muscles to matter.
Where it actually breaks down
For most people over 50, the pull-up fails in one of three places, and it’s rarely the one…
