

That’s where doing both a vertical and a horizontal pulling movement comes in: they complement each other and together work more muscle fibers in your lats (and your back in general) than either one does on its own. Your lats, and other back muscles.īut, your lats have a wide origin, which means that for optimal training, you should probably train your lats in more than just one direction of pull. Vertical pulling allows your lats a greater range of motion and is more in line with the muscles’ attachment points.

In the lat pulldown, your lats likely get a slightly better training effect than in rows because of how the lats’ origins and insertions are positioned. Since muscles contract by shortening, you can generally assume that the back muscles in line with your pulling but on the other side of the joint are the ones worked the most. These differences arise due to the different directions of pull. RowsĮxercises like lat pulldowns and rows have more in common than not, but there are still some differences. Examples: barbell row, dumbbell row, cable row.īack extension exercises mainly train your lower back and your glutes, but what about the two pulling movements? What’s the difference between vertical and horizontal pulling exercises? Muscles Worked in Lat Pulldowns vs. Examples: pull-up, lat pulldown, chin-up. Examples: deadlift, Romanian deadlift, back extensions.
Single arm cable lat pullover how to#
If you’ve read my article on how to train your back muscles, you know that my favorite recipe for working all your back muscles is picking one exercise from each of the following three categories: This article will briefly examine the differences in terms of what muscles these exercises work. What’s the difference between pulling movements such as pull-ups and lat pulldowns compared to rowing movements such as barbell rows, dumbbell rows, and cable rows?
