Weight Training Advice
Upper Back Bodybuilding Workouts
nothing will add more to upper body thickness and width like intense upper back bodybuilding workouts.
Since you are shooting for building both width and thickness when you train your upper back, there are two main types of exercises you will need to do. Pull-up and pulldown style exercises will help build the lats (the large winged shaped muscles on the sides of the upper back) for more width, while rowing exercises will help build more thickness. For optimal muscularity, both types of exercises should be part of your upper back bodybuilding workouts.
There are a variety of ways to perform pull-ups and cable pulldowns. You can use underhanded or overhanded grips that range from close together to wide apart. To me, the best forms of pull-ups and pulldowns are close-grip, underhanded grip ones and wide-grip, overhanded ones. You should do a variety of these exercises during your upper back bodybuilding workouts. Whenever possible, you should do pull-ups rather than cable pulldowns, as moving your body through space is a superior way of doing this type of exercise. Of course, some of us can't do very many pull-ups. Fortunately, many gyms have assisted pull-up machines these days. For either pull-ups or pulldowns, you will want to pull until the bar is in front of your neck or touches the upper chest. Behind the neck pull-ups and pulldowns should be avoided, as they can put your muscles in more of a position to injure yourself.
Rows also allow for a ton of variety in your upper back bodybuilding workout routines. You can do them with free weights, cables, or machines. Using free weights for rows is preferable, and you can do them with a barbell or dumbbells. The bent barbell row is a great exercise for building upper back thickness, and is done by bending at the waist (keeping the lower back arched) and pulling the barbell to your abdomen area. You can use a variety of grips when rowing, and can try T-bar rows - which are done by loading one end of a barbell and lifting that end with a close grip. Dumbbell and cable rows are also excellent.
You should regularly make changes to your upper back muscle building workouts to keep them from becoming stale. Since there is so much variety when it comes to upper back exercises, this should be easy to do. Switch the exercises you do, or change the way you grip the weights. You can also change rep ranges from workout to workout.
Train hard during your upper back bodybuilding workouts and avoid overtraining to build muscle. You can try some high intensity techniques to make your workouts harder. You don't have to do a lot of sets and exercises during each workout if you train hard enough. Make sure your muscles are fully recovered before doing another upper back workout.
Here is a sample upper back bodybuilding workout:
2 sets of close-grip pull-ups or pulldowns
2 sets of barbell rows
2 sets of cable rows
2 sets of wide-grip pull-ups or pulldowns
1 high rep or drop set to finish with a pump
This is a basic workout, but should do the job no matter your level of experience. Just make sure to make regular changes.
It won't be long before you build more width and thickness through your upper back if you follow these tips.
As one of the largest muscle groups of the body, the upper back is very important to train if you are into bodybuilding. You may not be able to see them when you are training them (besides the lats), but
