The Pull-Up... My Take on Why Women Should Do Them!

Why the pull-up? Well why the hell not! One exercise movement that works just about every muscle in your body. Ladies, want some killer arms, back, abs, shoulders, and lats with little effort... let me introduce you to the pull-up! If done well you will work all these muscle groups and more. Why spend all your time on machines at the Globogym isolating muscle groups when you can work them all at one time and get some cardio in at the same time? Yea... I don't know either, so what are you waiting for?

So yes, I'm a crossfitter and yes this is where I learned, fine tuned, and most of the time, execute my pull-ups. However, I also have a 24 Hour Fitness membership. Once to twice a week I go there to get in other workouts. I get the wide variety of stares all the time when I go to 24 Hour and work pull-ups into my workout. It's quite uncommon to see a woman doing strict or kipping pull-ups (Yes I'll tell you the difference in a second) on the rig rather than on a machine. But I do it because I get more benefit in less time... and that's exactly what I don't have a lot of is TIME. So I get in, get it done, and get out!

So I think I've pretty much covered the "why" to do pullups, but just awesome muscles aren't the only benefit of the pull-up. Things like just upper body strength in general, grip strength, core stength, body awareness, the ability to strictly pull yourself up, and more are many of those benefits! More importantly than the "why" is the "how." Many crossfitters give Crossfit a bad wrap because they get excited about learning a new movement. The athlete moves on to the next level of some exercise without building the necessary strength to adequately move on to something more advanced. If a pull-up progression is done well you will not have shoulder tears, pain or "man arms."

So where do I start? The strict pull-up is the best first starting spot. Now, keep in my mind I'm talking about a Pull-up. Not a "chin-up." In military training the grip is reversed to a curl grip like seen below.

There is nothing wrong with that method and that reverse grip has many benefits. For the purpose of this blog, I'm talking about a pull up with a wide grip, lats and traps activated and thumbs wrapped around the bar (something I'm still working on myself.) Like pictured below.

Or, one better, the image of Demi Moore doing pull-ups, sit-ups and one arm pushups in her bunkhouse at night in her movie "G.I. Jane" from 1997. In the movie she made miraculous improvement, quite literally over night. Though we aren't any G.I. Jane's, we can still do pull-ups and get her toned arms with a little hard work!

Her thumbs aren't wrapped around the bar.... this is quite literally what I look like. The struggle is real!

Staci, I can't do a strict pull-up! I know, neither could I when I started. Now when I say a strict pull up, I'm talking a dead hang from the bar, engage muscles, and then pull yourself up until your chin is above the bar. So if you can't do that yet, you will need to start with a band. Either loop the band through and over the bar, or put your feet on a band that’s stretched across the j hooks to put your foot in and help assist you with building muscle capacity. This will add assistance while you work on strict pull-ups. Start with a larger band and as you build capacity, gradually decrease the band size. Like pictured below.

Another way to work in endurance and the pulling motion with cardio, would be to practice jumping pullups from a box or the floor. This can be done at the very beginning of starting to work on pull-ups. These two differentiations alone would get you going in the right direction of "amazing arms" in a jiffy!

Once you've progressed to the part of being able to do at least one strict pull-up without the assitance of a band, you are now ready to start learning kipping pull-ups and then potentially butterfly pull-ups. Both video linked below. I am not a Crossfit coach or a certified trainer so I don't feel like it my place to "coach" someone on how to do it. However, the meaning behind this post is strictly to talk up the pull-up and why women should do it!

Kipping pull-up- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r45xLlH7r_M

Butterfly pull-up- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OenVG15QMj8

You can either take my word for it or just try them, but I'm a firm believer that pictures are worth a thousand words. So I'll end with this... I have two friends who recently were in a competition. Both women are moms of children under 6 and are "everyday" ladies. However, both are amazing at Crossfit and are fit. Pictured below are these two ladies in the midst of doing pull-ups, from that competition. (Photo credit to Frederico Jones Jr.) Thank you Liana and Alina for allowing me to share these! Check out those amazing arms, lats, back, and trap muscles!! I think the photos speak for themselves. Pull-ups too, can be your friend!