The BEST back exercises doing pull ups for beginners (instructional)

According to the statistics I've been reading, the amount of people who suffer from daily or reoccurring back pain, lower back strains or posture related issues, is absolutely STAGGERING.

It isn't hard to imagine given the sedentary living so many people chose for themselves, but the injuries often occur when we are attempting to do something, or be active.  Whether we are in the work place or trying to enjoy life activities.

So while the medical industry and care giving specialists are kept busy in rehab and physio to try and get these people back up to speed, I want to focus on how we can AVOID getting there in the first place.

I call this a state of READINESS.  Being in the type of physical fitness condition that allows you to most likely avoid these really necessary and debilitating back injuries and discomfort.  Think of the millions of hours of wasted time and fun that is lost by people and back pain.  It's just sad.

Questions to ask yourself:

1. Do you do regular exercise?
2. Does that exercise involve stretching and strengthening your back?
3. Did you know that both stretching and strength training are equally important?

You may have heard how incredible pull up exercises are for your overall upper body development but especially addressing the points above.  

If you can't achieve 5 or more full body pullups, then you may need to learn by doing assisted pullups.   The best way to do that is with an adjustable bodyweight exercise bar as offered by this company SoloStrength.  They have exercise programs for beginners and very advanced bodyweight only resistance training and it's an awesome home gym or professional training studio gym equipment options.  

Let me know what you think of these options and look forward to my reviews in coming posts...

Have a great day and be "back strong"!

New Adjustable Anchor for TRX bodyweight exercise trainer pull up bar

I have just experienced the most amazing fusion of exercise equipment and training I've had to date.  I have been talking about the SoloStrength adjustable pull up bar home gym system now for awhile, but have just had the opportunity to try it combining some different exercise tools.

On the system today we used smart toner resistance bands by Twist Conditioning,  BOSU, some stability balls and weighted vests for combination exercise programs.   IN a word, it was AWESOME!

Whether our beginners were playing around on it or we were doing really advanced bodyweight training exercises, this combination of tools absolutely left nothing to want....pull ups, self spotted pull ups, wide grip pull ups, abdominal exercises for pull up bars, reverse crunches for abs, back rows, biceps exercise, triceps work, calf raises, combination compound exercises, and all the TRX exercises we could thing of!  What an awesome tool!



What I am most excited about is that this company is offering a door frame mounted version that only requires 5" of space!  That's the most potent and versatile home exercise system I've ever seen in my life, and the least amount of space required.  I put on a video below I found that shows a lot of the exercises but this company also has their home exercise workouts videos to look at and seem more current.

Let me know what you think!  I can't wait to get back on this system!

Have an awesome day!

A better P90x chin up bar - Try and adjustable pull up bar as option

If you are a fan of how Beachbody fitness and the p90x and insanity programs use bodyweight exercise to really push you to your maximum fitness levels, then you just might love what I came across today.

I add the P90x program to my exercise routine from time to time.  I honestly don't have the time to really do the program too regularly, but I find that I like variety a lot more in my type of exercise.  Too much of a good thing sometimes...

But one thing I absolutely do agree with about the program, is how it integrates and centres around bodyweight based resistance.  The less fuss and muss with plate or cable weight machines and equipment, the better as far as I'm concerned, and I know  a lot of my clients feel the same.

So the topic of pull up bars and home gym equipment came up recently at an event I was hosting, and I was asked about the pull up bars on the market, which pull up bars were the best for home and commercial environments, and what I thought of the P90X chin up bar quality.  Was it really safe?  Was the main question and concern.  I found a photo to include here to give you an idea of how it attaches to the door frame.

Now I don't know if you have ever tried or used one of these door frame mounted pull up bars before, but to say they feel anything but safe would be a more accurate description than any other I could offer, and frankly, my safety is worth more to me than the risk that I personally feel comes along with these type of pull up bar options for chin ups and wide grip pullups.

If you have a space you can certainly avoid the safety concern by solidly anchoring a fixed pull up bar, but then you are usually restricted in one form or another by the height option you have to deal with, and having a willing partner to allow you to put holes in the ceiling, wall, wherever you are anchoring it.

There is also the matter of self spotting to progressively build strength on your pull ups and chins exercises.  One set of thinking will have you use a chair or some other prop to use a leg to raise yourself up, but I don't like this at all, it's awkward, and hard to really focus on the movements and keep your alignment correct while self assisting for the pull up movement.

A much better pull up bar option that I found that addresses both a safer door frame mounted pull up home gym system, and total height adjust ability to more easily self assist your progressive strength improvements, is the SoloStrength FRAME door mounted adjustable pull up bar home gym system.


I have not yet had the opportunity to really get into this product for an equipment review which I love to do, so I'll try and contact the company and get a first hand account but from what I see I really like that it addresses all the main interests I would have for an awesome all in one home gym product that gives you the versatility to not only do full body exercise programs, but great stretching and flexibility support, and from some of their training videos I was just looking at, using other exercise accessories like BOSU and exercise balls, TRX even and resistance bands, this thing has a virtually compacted an entire gym full of exercise equipment in less than 5" of space off the door frame.  It doesn't look to restrict any door function, and the bar they say sits above the door frame, so pretty much hides away when you don't need it.  That sounds convenient to me, and I'm really excited to take it for a test drive.

I think this would also be an ideal piece for suggesting as I did, on my post about doing abs exercises with pull up bars.  This is an exciting new piece of exercise equipment for home and commercial gyms and I think you will hear a lot more about this product line in the coming months.