Training Your Back

By Juan Rojas
This article originally appeared in the CPA Newsletter of January 2021.
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If I asked you, what is the ONE movement that would properly develop the muscles in your back to give you a nice aesthetic look, what would your answer be?
Some people may say deadlifts, some people may say pull ups, others may say rows. Who has the correct answer?
Perhaps all of them, perhaps none of them. Like most things when it comes to building muscle, It truly depends on an individuals needs.
Training your back is often misunderstood and I believe one of the major factors is because it is a body part we cannot see actively working. It is purely trained by feel. Although building your physique is all about having an intrinsic focus to contract and stretch muscles under load, very few people out there are true masters of this art. Before we delve into this too much, we need to learn the anatomy of the back.
The back is comprised of roughly 20 muscle pairs of which all have a different job. The main larger ones that we often focus on for aesthetics are:

• The trapezius, whose job is to stabilize and move the scapulae. Essentially the traps will be activated when one moves the shoulders in any plane when the spine is maintained neutral.

 

•  The latissimus dorsi, whose job is to extend and adduct the shoulder joint. This means the lat is fully stretched when we have our elbow overhead and slightly back, and fully shortened when we have the elbow tight to the body and behind the body.

 

• The rhomboids, whose job is to hold the scapulae onto the ribcage. They are activated dramatically when we stabilize the upper body and hold it in place during an exercise.

 

• The teres muscles which aid the lats and stabilize the shoulders. They help bring the elbow down and back when seeking a shortened position.

 

• The erectors which help stabilize the spine from the lower back to the upper back. They enable spinal flexion, extension and rotation.

 

• The rear delts to a degree (they are part of the shoulders but we often use them and see them when we train or display our back). The rear delts help bring your upper arm behind your body like when we are doing a rowing movement.

Now, why is this important to know?
Because different movements will influence the activation of specific muscles to a lesser or greater degree. Understanding what movements influence what muscles, will help us determine what exercises to pick for our own specific needs. Some of us want bigger lats to look wider; so maybe we need to focus on movements like pull downs, pull ups and pullovers. Some of us may be wide but need more lower and midback thickness to our physiques; perhaps focusing on rows and deadlifts may be a good idea. Maybe we look awesome from the waist to our midback but we have nonexistent traps and rear delts; so some sort of shrug work or rows with our elbows high will do the trick.
 
Some people walk into the gym without a plan and just pick the first 4 or 5 back movements that come to mind. This is not the proper way to go upon your training though as most of us have the goal of improving our weaknesses and growing the muscles that are necessary. Typically, what works well is a combination of movements that hit different muscles within the workout (or some people may choose to do it within the training week).
The way that I like to structure training for many clients that have a typical once a week back training split, is to pick 1 horizontal movement (ie. Rows), 1 vertical movement (ie. Pulldowns), 1 stabilization thickness movement ( ie. Deadlift) and 1 or 2 more less Central Nervous System taxing movements for the persons specific weak points.
Now, once a proper routine is made for your own needs, then comes the most important part that most people neglect. PROPER EXECUTION. Proper execution is important for any muscle you train, but back is one that I commonly see being done improperly. These are 6 major tips that will help you maximize your back training:

1. Stabilize- The back can handle large loads, this means it is very easy to allow the body to “loosen up” and start putting the tension onto other muscles or joints if we are not careful. Whether you are doing a pulldown, a pull up, a deadlift or a pullover, you want to focus on keeping your core nice and tight and stabilizing the abdominals and the upper back by creating tension there. This will allow the muscles to transfer as much energy as possible to moving maximal loads as opposed to having weaknesses in the chain that will lead to submaximal tension in the muscle.
2. Tempo- Unless you are a master of contractions and have been doing this for decades, the majority of people I see in the gym have not mastered execution enough to crank out reps at the tempos I see. The majority of the time they are using momentum and are cutting their results short by not exposing the muscle to enough time under tension. For the majority of the people who may be struggling to build their back, I recommend a 2 second pause at the contraction, a 3-4 second eccentric, a 2 second LOADED stretch (NOT RELAXED) at the lengthened position and an explosive but controlled concentric.
3. Grip- If you have a lagging back, you most likely have lagging forearms and/or grip strength (this is not scientific but just an observation). Most people will say “get a pair of straps” if your grip sucks. I am of the opposite thought. If your grip is not good, strengthen it by ditching the straps for a while. You may have to lower the weights initially, but see it as taking one step back to take 5 forward. Many studies show that your grip strength is directly correlated to your central nervous system efficiency. The harder you grip, the more the muscle fibers that will be activated, and the more stabilization you will create. Try going for a very heavy set of bench presses and completely relax your grip. Now when it gets hard, squeeze that bar as hard as possible and tell me how you feel.

Once you improve your grip strength through ditching straps for a few months and working on grip movements, slowly introduce straps again to perhaps your heaviest set of deadlifts or barbell rows while still focusing on gripping that bar as hard as possible. That is when you will really notice your progress skyrocket.

1. Use a full range of motion- This does not need to be done in 1 specific workout but can be done throughout your training week. Especially with back, it is hard to find 1 exercise that will properly load the full stretch and the full contraction of the proper muscles. What this means is that you want to methodically pick the right exercises to be able to do this in. Perhaps you can focus on fully shortening the lats by using a cable pullover but this movement does not fully stretch the lats. Then later in the workout you can utilize a weighted pullup where you focus on loading those lats in the fully lengthened position overhead. This is how you want to start thinking of your back training. “How can I tax these fibers optimally?” as opposed to “how can I get this weight from point A to point B?”
2. Do not be afraid to use machines- We always hear that the most muscle growth you will get is from free weight movements. I do not disagree with that at all, but I do think machines have their place. Especially in back training. There are some brands out there that are properly designed to hit the back with the descending strength curve that involves most back movements. All this means is that the movement feels easier in the stretched position and gets substantially harder in the contracted position. In order to fully tax these fibers, certain machines will give you more load in the stretch and as you reach the shortened position the load gets lighter but the tension on the muscles is maximized as opposed to not even being able to access this range.
3. Leave the ego at the door- It is not about the weight, but it is about how you do the movement. Completely forget there is a weight in your hands. Before you do any movement, think about, what does the muscle I am trying to work actually do in terms of its range of motion? The goal is to do the movement while focusing on shortening and lengthening that muscle and there just happens to be a weight in your hand. Too many people are focused on moving big weights, that they never properly load the muscles and fail to see results. By following the tempo I mention above consistently, you will be forced to use weights that may not be as heavy as you swinging weight around, but will be the best bang for your buck in terms of results.

 
Remember, transforming your physique is all about having an intrinsic focus. Bodybuilding is about giving the body the internal stimulus to change. Try giving this back routine a try for a few weeks while focusing on improving the weights, the reps or the form for a few weeks. Make sure to take before and after pictures to let me know how it worked for you!
 
Vertical movements:
Wide grip pull ups
Underhand grip pulldowns
Rack chin ups
Medium neutral grip pulldowns
Pullovers
 
Horizontal movements:
Barbell rows
Chest supported rows
Machine rows
Cable rows
45-60 degree Incline Bench Shrugs
 
Stabilization thickness movements:
Deadlifts
Mid Shin Rack pulls
Barbell Hyperextensions
 
Type of movement
Exercise
Sets and Reps

Horizontal
Chest Supported Dumbbell Rows
3x12,10,8*

Vertical
Underhand Grip Hammer Strength Pulldown
3x12,10,6-8*
 

Stabilization Thickness
Banded Mid Shin Rack Pulls
4x4-6 increasing weight until 1 top set is reached*
 

Less Taxing Movement Focusing on Weak Lats
Machine Pullovers
1x12-15 to failure +20 second break and go to failure+20 second break and go to failure again.
 

  *Only Last Set of every exercise is taken to pure failure unless otherwise stated.