Running Header: MUSCLUAR ANALYSIS OF THE PULL-UP 1

Breakdown and Muscular Analysis of the Pull Up

Austin Tummons

MidAmerica Nazarene University

Professor Chris Crawford

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Introductions

Pull-ups are a fundamental and essential skill to most athletes that allow you to

strengthen your upper body as well as create balance and improve explosiveness. The

movement of the pull-up has always intrigued me as an athlete. As a soccer player one

of the main movements for strength we do is pullups. We do this a lot because it allows

us to get proportionally stronger with our bodies, it is not like football where our sports

require a ton of strength

and muscle mass to be

able to do what we do.

We are always running

around so a body weight

movement like a pullup is

fundamental and.

Another thing about the pullup is that it is very interesting to be able to progress a pull-

up to the point where you are able to do a muscle-up. I compared a muscle-up to a clap

push-up because they essentially do the same thing within their basic movement. Within

those simple and basic movements (push-up and pull-up), you try to create enough

force and energy to be able to get a more explosive movement to be able to project

your body farther then what those movements ask for. I have always wanted myself up

to the point to where I can be able to do a muscle-up, but I haven’t quite reached that

stage yet. Despite my slight failure, I have always liked to improve how many pull-ups I

can do, with or without weight. I found that I wasn’t really improving with body weight as
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much, so I started to add extra weight to myself to challenge myself more and be able to

improve just my body-weight pullups.

The movement for a pull-up is a close chained movement where the distal end of

the movement is fixed, the distal ends being the hands gripping the bar for a pull-up.

There are a couple of different variations of a pull-up, but I will be breaking down the

pull-up variation where your hands grip the straight bar with your palms facing away

from your body and your grip should be about shoulder width or a little wider. There are

also variations where you have a grip with your palms facing towards your body making

it seem like a bicep curl and variations where you don’t use a straight bar but and you

grip two separate bars with your palms facing each other. Your hand pronates halfway

to be able to grip the bar and do this variation of pull-up.

In the picture below, it shows the variations of pull-ups that I mentioned above. It also

shows within the picture the ways

in which each variation of pull-up

targets and effects different

muscle groups. For my topic

though, I will be going over the

wide grip pull-up that targets

more of the “LATS” or the

latissimus dorsi. There are also many different joints, muscles, and bones that help with

this movement.

Chapter 1: Anatomical Analysis

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Phase 1: Dead Hang

Phase one of the pull-up is a dead hang. When you are in a dead hang your

whole body is basically fully stretched. Your legs, arms, shoulders, and torso are in full

extension. Along with your body being in full extension gravity makes it go into even

more extension because the weight of your body is hanging from your arms and

shoulders along with your legs and torso.

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There are many different types of muscles, bones, and joints that are involved

within phase one of the pull-up. Some of the main

muscles are latissimus dorsi, deltoid, bicep, and

pectoralis major. In a dead hang all of these muscles

have an

isometric

contraction. The muscles are contracted

but the muscles are neither lengthened

nor shortened. These muscles are

contracted so that your body is stabilized

and not swinging everywhere which could lead to some sort of injury or straining of

muscles. Most of these muscles also have low involvement except for your deltoid

which has more involvement than the other three muscles but still has some sort of

involvement. The deltoid is slightly more involved because in the dead hang your deltoid

is at the most distal end of your arm, which means that it basically stabilizes everything

below your shoulders that is hanging onto it, and that is a considerable amount of

weight. There are also many bones and joints involved with a pull up. Some of the main

bones involved are the scapula, clavicle, humerus, radius, ulna, carpals, metacarpals,

and phalanges. Within all those bones there are many joints that allow movement to

slide across on and assist in movement. IN phase one of a pull-up, the dead hang, most

of the joints are not in use for the most part. For the most part the only joints and bones

in use within phase one are your hand joints and bones. Your carpometacarpal joints,

metacarpophalangeal joints, and interphalangeal joints are the main joints in use for the
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most part, and within these joints include the carpal, metacarpal, and phalangeal bones.

These joints and bones are mainly used to keep hold of the bar to do a pull-up and the

muscles used to grip the bar are flexor digitorum superficialis, flexor digitorum profundis

and the flexor pollicis longus (Ambike, Paclet, Zatsiorsky, Latash, 2014).

The shoulder is also a very important part of the dead hang. In a dead hand your

shoulder is completely flexed and may even be hyper-

flexed depending on the anatomy of your body. The

scapula is also tilted upwards and more superficial along the

scapulothoracic joint to allow for shoulder flexion. Along with

the scapulothoracic joint, the ball-and-socket joint of the

should is involved for shoulder flexion for the dead hang.

Phase Two: Loading/Up Phase

Phase two of the pull-up is the loading or up phase of the pull-up. During this

phase is when you are using all of your muscles to lift yourself up to the bar and get

your chin fully over the bar. In order to breakdown the pull-up we should first discuss the

proper way to do a pull-up. For a pull-up you need to have your arms in full extension,

anything other than full extension is not correct form and is “cheating” yourself from

correct form along with being lazy and not engaging all your muscles to do a proper

pull-up.

In the up phase most all of your muscles in your upper body is used. Your

latissimus dorsi, biceps, trapezius, pectoralis major, deltoid, triceps, and forearms are all

in use one way or another. Your lower body is also involved with the up phase of the
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pull-up. Your hips and your glutes maximus help your lower body by keeping it

stabilized and prevent it from swaying. As mentioned, as well as shown above, the wide

grip pull-up has more of an emphasis on the lats rather than the biceps or middle back,

which is what the underhand (chin up) and neutral pull-up focus on. The middle and

biceps are also worked in the underhand pull-up, but the focus is your latissimus dorsi

and during a pull-up the latissimus dorsi are shortened performing a concentric

contraction. The biceps along with your deltoid

and whole upper back perform a concentric

contraction because those muscles are

shortened, but these aren’t antagonists

necessarily, but they are synergists, working

together with the latissimus dorsi to perform up

phase of a pull-up. There are also many more

muscles that help with the up phase of a pull-up

that are synergists. Some synergists that have an

isometric contraction include brachioradialis, brachialis, glutes maximus, and your

abdomens. These muscles are mainly there to help in the up phase of a pull-up by

keeping your body stabilized and sway free. There are also some other synergists and

those are the pectoralis major and deltoid and these are a concentric contraction

because they are shortened but are still synergists.

Bones in the up phase of the pull-up are mainly the humerus, radius, ulna,

carpals, metacarpals, phalanges, scapula, and clavicle. When you are going up during a

pull-up, the angle between the humerus and the radius and ulna gets smaller. The
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scapula adducts as well as depresses. Your shoulder also is in full extension before the

up phase of a pull-up but when going up the shoulder in the ball-and-socket joint is still

flexed but not as much. The rest of your body basically either stays straight or your

torso stays straight while your legs are bent to prevent them from touching the ground.

Phase 3: Unloading/Down Phase

When analyzing and breaking down the down phase of a pull-up, it is safe to say

that it is basically the opposite of the up phase of a pull-up. Your elbows go from flexed

to extended and your scapula go from depressed and adducted to abducted and rotated

upward. Your forearms and your hand stay in the same position as they have been

throughout the whole motion. The muscles in your forearm that grip the bar are all in an

isometric contraction not shortening or lengthening at all. Most all of your muscles such

as latissimus dorsi, biceps brachii, pectoralis major, and deltoids all have an eccentric

contraction where they are still contracted but are lengthening out to a dead hang.

Obviously, the end of the down phase of a pull-up is transitioning back into a

dead hang. With the dead hang you are in full extensions with everything above and

including your torso. This part of a pull-up has all the muscles involved in an isometric

contraction as mentioned before.

Chapter 2: Common Problems

When we are looking at a pull-up, we can easily find errors or cheats people use

to do more pull-ups then they normally would be able to with normal pull-up form. One

main problem that is probably obvious because you may or may not do it, but one of the
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main problems is when you don’t extend low enough or pull high enough to get the full

rang of motion. This is a big problem because everyone wants to push out as many pull-

ups as possible and this is easily done by not getting full range of motion. When you

don’t have full rang of motion when doing a full and complete pull-up, you are

essentially robbing yourself of full effectiveness and complete muscular balance and

gain. If getting full range of motion is hard for you, try using a band to do assisted pull-

ups (Kamb, 2016).

Another error that people make when doing a pull-up is that people don’t engage

their shoulders throughout the whole pull-up movement. People tend to not engage their

shoulders and keep them back because they are compensating for the strength that

they do not have. Your shoulder is then rolled forward because of strength deficiencies

and this can lead to rotator cuff problems later on in the future. Along with your rotator

cuff, this can also cause problems straining or spraining other tendons, ligaments, and

muscles right there and then. One of the main solutions to this problem that I see is to

imagine you have a pen on your back and try to squeeze it as much as possible with

your scapula and trapezius muscles. In other words what you want to do is you want to

pull your shoulders down and back before bending your elbows. Not doing this can also

lead to weakness over time and more prone towards injury in the shoulder region.

Another main one that is seen a lot is using momentum to do a pull-up. A strict

and textbook pull-up requires no momentum and therefore one with momentum would

be classified as an error

and wrong form. Using

momentum is often
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referred to as kipping, which is seen mostly within the world of CrossFit. Cross fitters

use kipping as a technique to be able to do as many pull-ups as possible with as little

energy and strength as possible. Cross fitters use momentum or kipping because most

workouts that they do require more from you than just being able to do a single pull-up.

In crossfit usually it is many different movements put together and you try to do as many

as possible within a certain time limit or you have to do several different things and you

have to get it done as quick as possible to get a good time. When you are doing a

normal pull-up, it is usually a very controlled motion where there is no momentum.

Although kipping can be efficient for cross fitters, it is often harmful for non-cross fitters

because it can lead to injury.

People for the most part don’t know how to properly do a pull-up and that’s why

they are not doing it correctly. Another reason might be because they do not want to

look like a wimp that cannot complete that on repetition. People also just don’t have the

initial strength to do a pull-up so they cheat and have bad for which can lead to further

problems. This are small and minor problems though that can be easily fixed with the

right information given out and awareness to the fact of what the person is doing to do a

pull-up incorrectly.

Chapter 3: Prescription for Error Correction

There are many different methods and strategies for error correction and

progression of a pull-up. For error correction the main thing that you need to do is you

need to go back to the basics. We go back to basics for progression and error

correction because that is most of the time where some of these problems come from.

You learn to do it a certain way the whole time you’ve been doing it but eventually you
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may reach a plateau where there is no progression and this sort of thing may come from

error when learning the basics or lack of focus on the basics. I have read and watched

about athletes that couldn’t progress anymore and most of the time it was due to not

focusing on the basics that they learned before or due to lack of a basic skill.

For some people they have a problem with one of probably the simplest parts of

a pull-up which is gripping and holding onto the bar. Their

grip strength is not strong enough yet to hold their body

weight up for very long. A quick and easy fix for this is to

practice dead hangs. You can practice dead hangs and

after you can hold a dead hang for 10-15 seconds you

should be good to progress on. The next progression is a

static elevated hold which is where you are all the way up

in the pull-up and you try to get to the point where you

can hold it for about 10-15 seconds. The static elevated

hold is meant to built strength and balance in a pull-up. The next progression is

something called a negative pull-up. A negative pull-up is a slow and control version of

the unloading/down phase, or eccentric portion, of a pull-up. This is the easiest part of a

pull-up, but it can help you maintain correct form while building strength and stabilization

throughout the movement. Next step in progression is doing assisted pull-ups. You can

perform assisted pull-ups by either using an exercise band and tying it around the bar

and putting your feet at the end of the loop of the band and ding it that way or if you go

to a gym they sometimes have assisted pull-up machines where you can adjust the

amount of weight it helps you with and progress that way. Either way will work fine as
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long as you have full and complete range of motion for your pull-up. Practicing good

form is essential to getting good at pull-ups because you are trying to build a solid

foundation for pull-up progression. You should progress your pull-ups to the point to

where you need as little assistance with the band and when you don’t need very much

help you should be good to moving on to a normal unassisted pull-up. When doing a

normal pull-up make sure to practice good form and try to stay away from cheating your

sets and repetitions because these types of things can lead to injury and problems in

the future (Speakman, 2019).

Without doing correct progression and form we are prone to many injuries also.

One of the main injuries mentioned is injuries associated with the rotator cuff. Many

causes of injury to the rotator cuff is when you don’t have the proper strength and

stability to lower yourself from a pull-up and this can be bad because you can stress

your rotator cuff by causing eccentric overload. We lower our self to fast and with no

control so your rotator cuff gets strained slightly and those small strains overtime can

build up and cause problems in the future with loss of range of motion and immobility in

the shoulder. This is one of the many reasons why you should have correct pull-up

form.

Conclusion

Pull-ups is a fundamental and essential exercise for most athletes because of

what it offers. Pull-ups offer the ability to create balance, strength, and stability in the

upper portion of your body. It also requires balance and stabilization between your lower

and upper body because when your lower body is not stabilized it sways around which

is not something that we want within a pull-up. I feel like this has helped me a lot for
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future studies and for my career. This gave me insight into how a movement is broken

down and what we can do to improve and fix a movement. I picked a fairly simple

movement like a pull-up, but I think it helped me because it allows me to look at other

movements and know the different stages, whether they are simple or complex. This will

also allow me to better improve how I go abut working out, because as an athlete I

workout a decent amount, so understanding why good form is essential to progression

is something that I now understand and can do a better job about it in the future. All in

all, this was a helpful assignment for me as a kinesiology major and as an athlete

because I am allowed to look at it from those two perspectives and understand it into

different backgrounds.

 Ambike, S., Paclet, F., Zatsiorsky, V. M., & Latash, M. L. (2014, January 31).

Factors affecting grip force: anatomy, mechanics, and referent configurations.

Retrieved from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4013148/.

 Kamb, S. (2016, October 12). 5 Common Mistakes When Doing a Pull-Up.

Retrieved from https://www.nerdfitness.com/blog/5-common-mistakes-when-

doing-a-pull-up/ .

 Mehdi. (2018, November 11). How to Do Pullups with Proper Form: Full Guide.

Retrieved from https://stronglifts.com/pullups/#gref .

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 Speakman, D. (2019, September 16). Pull-Up Guide and Progression Plan -

MYPROTEIN™. Retrieved from https://us.myprotein.com/thezone/training/pull-

up-mastering-progression/ .