What is a good lats exercise at home?

[weights_fan]

Hi all,

I'm getting more in to weights at the moment, from a background of running and triathlons (with only fairly infrequent endurance weights training). I've got a gym membership but every now and then I do a workout at home. I want to include lats in my training, and I've got dumbbells with adjustable weight but no pull-up bar or anything. Also I can currently only lift about 32kg in my assisted pull-up at the gym (2 sets of 12 reps at that weight) - yes I'm a girl!

Any ideas on exercises I can do to strengthen my lats at home? Or should I just bite the bullet and get to the gym?

[Diab0lic]

You're always going to get the best lat workout at a gym. Lats are not particularly easy to hit at home if you don't have a cable machine and can't do pullups/chinups. Since you say you alternate your workouts between home and gym, I'd just work in your lat workouts to when you are at the gym and do other stuff at home.

Anyway, here's a fairly comprehensive list of lat exercises, most of which require equipment of some sort

http://www.exrx.net/Lists/ExList/BackWt ... chor125439

[mike27]

db pull over

1 arm db row

chins in a tree/door frame

bent db row

a bit limited, but do-able for sure

[weights_fan]

Diab0lic - Wow, that is one comprehensive list! Do you alternate which ones of those you do? Like one week you'll work lats by doing a pull up, the next week doing a close grip pull down?

mike27 - Admittedly I had to have a look at this

to know what a dumbbell pullover was! :oops: But good to know. I'll definitely try that. Also I didn't realise rows worked the lats.. but I guess that's a good general back exercise?

Sounds like I should head to the gym but if I'm really stuck then I've still got options at home. Thanks!

[FellowshipOfTheRon]

also if you cant do a full pullup at home, you could start by using a chair to get up and slowly let yourself down on the bar

[Diab0lic]

Diab0lic - Wow, that is one comprehensive list! Do you alternate which ones of those you do? Like one week you'll work lats by doing a pull up, the next week doing a close grip pull down?

Not usually, I'll stick with one for a while (couple months at least) so I can see the progress I'm making with that lift. TBH I pretty much only do wide grip pull ups when it comes to pullups/chinups. I do a warm up set on the pulldown machine, do a set of bodyweight pullups and then start adding plates.

And yeah it's a good website. If you click on each exercise there is mroe detail plus a gif of someone doing the exercise with proper form. Much more on there than just weight lifting exercises too

[Diab0lic]

Diab0lic - Wow, that is one comprehensive list! Do you alternate which ones of those you do? Like one week you'll work lats by doing a pull up, the next week doing a close grip pull down?

Not usually, I'll stick with one for a while (couple months at least) so I can see the progress I'm making with that lift. TBH I pretty much only do wide grip pull ups when it comes to pullups/chinups. I do a warm up set on the pulldown machine, do a set of bodyweight pullups and then start adding plates.

And yeah it's a good website. If you click on each exercise there is mroe detail plus a gif of someone doing the exercise with proper form. Much more on there than just weight lifting exercises too

[Dinahlady]

I recommend getting a pullup bar like the powerbar you can take up and down in like 10 seconds. I'm a girl and even though I can't do many pullups It's really easy to do negetive reps using a pullup bar because when its hooked on a doorframes its not that high you just do really slow negetives - just jump up and let yourself go down really slowly.

You'll seriously feel it in the morning and you'll see your strength and ability to do pullups increase really quickly!

http://power-bar.co.uk/

Seriously this was like the best thing I ever bought to use at home.

I don't know if they will ship to NZ maybe they have something similar here??

[Diab0lic]

Yeah you can get those here. Beware that the doorframe ones do sometimes catasrophically "fail" although the design you posted is probably safe. I dunno if I'd trust it with my 110kg ass (especially after watching that ouch video on here the other week :pfft: )

I'd personally go for one of these (as long as you have a proper beam to bolt it to in your garage or something) but it may be overkill for you

Or, you could do what I used to do and just go outside and do pullups on a tree :nod:

[FoTwenny]

Head down to your nearest primary school and do chins on the monkey bars. It's what I do.

[weights_fan]

I can't bolt anything anywhere unfortunately, I'm in a rental. Looks like a good bar though. I'd definitely be doing only negative reps like DinahLady on that for a while though if I got it!

Don't think there are any monkey bars close, might have a look around at some trees.

[M.T]

these fullas are cheap as chips, check out trade me picked one up for $30 or there abouts. http://www.sears.com/shc/s/p_10153_12605_SPM1057957401P?sid=IDx20101019x00001a&ci_src=14110944&ci_sku=SPM1057957401

Mine doesn't really support me anymore though handy to have around the house put some bets on how many chins my mates can do on the piss etc.

http://www.trademe.co.nz/sports/exercise-equipment-weights/other/auction-441456430.htm