Pull-up Ladder

by Royce Grace
(San Antonio)

This workout is a basic ladder, but it is an easy way to get in a bunch of pull-ups and still have a good time.

It can be done by yourself, but it is best done with two or more people. I read about it in a training book written by Pavel.

Let's assume there are three people working out. Athlete 1 does a pull-up and gets off the bar. Athlete 2 and athlete 3 follow suit.

The next round athlete 1 does two pull-ups and athlete 2 and 3 complete two pull-ups as well. By everyone using the same bar, it allows a bit of rest time for the athlete to recover.

The athletes continue to increase the number of pull-ups by one repetition each round.

Eventually, an athlete will not be able to complete a round. That athlete is finished and the other two athletes progress with more repetitions.

Finally, only one athlete can complete the round, and he/she is the winner. If that wasn't enough, you can start over at one and complete the ladder again.

So if you get to do 10 pull-ups in a round, you would have completed 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1= 55 pull-ups. It is way more enjoyable than 3 sets of 10 and you end up completing much more work.

You can change it up by having rounds increase by 2 or 3 repetitions instead of one if you are more advanced. So the rounds would look like 2, 4, 6, 8, 10 or 3, 6, 9, 12.

Anyway way you manipulate the rounds, one thing is for certain. After doing this pull-up ladder a few times a week, you'll have a new personal record in pull-ups in two months. Or at least I did.

Royce

Note from Dr. Dan

Royce,

Great idea for a really challenging workout. Having a little friendly competition can always help you reach new highs.

Of course this could be used in all sorts of ways. If you can't do pull-ups you could do pull-downs on a machine.

Or you could apply the idea to any other resistance exercise, like push-ups or bench press or knee bends or...

Dr. Dan