If you look through the muscle magazines you will see some of the worlds top ranked bodybuilders of the day and yesteryear and you are going to see them in one setting or another doing some form of a rowing exercise. They all do it because it will make you grow more lean muscle mass. Now, before I lose anyone who may be thinking they do not want to grow or get big muscles let me stop here and explain something.
Using the word grow is relative to what you are looking to do. You grow in many ways and the control of what type of muscular growth you get is going to be related to:
- What type of moves you use
- What you eat
- How much you eat
- How much weight you use
- How you implement your rest
- Supplements you take or don’t take
And many other variables, so when you hear the word “grow” don’t start putting up walls and rejecting information. To burn fat, you must first grow some lean muscle mass to burn fat and help keep it off. To get that shapely, toned body you’ve been thinking you would like to have, you will have to grow some lean muscle mass. This is good growth we are talking about. Besides that, many people have been trying to get big bulging muscles for years doing all manner of things and still haven’t arrived. So, getting “too big” is a lot harder than some might think and not something you will need to worry about right now. First, let’s get in shape and or make some progress in our fitness program.
There are many types of rows and many diverse pieces of equipment as well as hand positions, elbow positions, postures and pausing flexes as well as stretches that will make a difference in the development of your back. Let’s get started talking about some of those and what they can do for you.
The Underhand Grip Row is the row of choice when you’re looking to add serious depth to your back. This exercise allows you to squeeze your mid-back and upper back better because you have a slightly greater range of motion. It also really hammers the lower lats, a weak area for most folks.
I like to use one-arm overhand-grip dumbbell rows and they are very effective for what I use them for which is more range of motion and to work in more middle and upper lats and use less biceps in the process. It’s a great finishing exercise. Use a more moderate weight than with some other moves for good clean form. I demonstrate this move in my exercise video today. Don’t get hung up on doing the same things over and over, keep it changing.
Some believe that cable rows are superior for etching detail into your mid-back because of the constant tension, AND it will allow you to build in more detail to the mid-back; I am one of these people. There is one hundred percent tension throughout the move. When you change the grip and/or the bar you use, it will also change the muscular emphasis. If you put a manageable amount of weight on the stack and concentrate fully on squeezing at the end of the move, you’ll notice that with the back and forth motion you get a positive and negative contraction on each rep. Use a wide grip to target the lats and upper back, work on keeping your body upright, squeezing at the top of the move and allowing yourself to get a good, wide stretch at the bottom of the move (watch for the video demonstration of this in the near future).
There are so many variations of the row; honestly a row is a row. But, as I said earlier hand position and equipment used to get the various positions will change the emphasis and effect on the muscle. One very effective and popular row is the T-bar Row where you can use a wide or narrow grip that is know as a neutral grip. When you do not have a lot of equipment at your disposal you can use a bar bell with one end placed in the corner and a close grip handle to wrap underneath the bar to make your own T-bar. With this narrow or neutral grip you target more mid-back, middle lat and rear delt tie in. Try them all so you can see what works best for you. We are all different and respond differently to changing and experimenting. Trying different things and keeping things changing in even the smallest ways will produce noticeable results. When you get into a rut by doing the same things all the time, you will see the hard work you put into your workouts become fruitless.
Over the next couple of weeks I will be showing some of these exercises in my videos and going into some detail about the benefits as well.
Thanks for stopping by Getting Fit the Wright Way again this week!
WW.
