Exercises to Build a Beastly Back
Exercises to Build a Beastly Back
Total 12-Week Program for Leviathan Lats
By Ron Harris
“Contests Are Won From the Back”
Even though most of you reading this don’t compete and may have no aspirations to ever do so, I am betting that you still strive to build the absolute best and most complete physique you are capable of. You’ve no doubt heard that opening quote about contests a zillion times before, but you may not truly comprehend its significance to all of us who identify as “bodybuilders.” I’ve attended hundreds of contests since my first wide-eyed day at the 1988 Fourth of July show at Muscle Beach in Venice, all the way from local affairs to the Mr. Olympia, Arnold Classic and various national events. One trend that becomes more and more evident, the further up the competitive ladder you get, is that most of the lineup looks pretty damn good from the front. You will see plenty of big arms, round delts, beefy pecs and even a good amount of meaty quads. Turn the lineup sideways, and now you notice that some of the men lack adequate front-to-back thickness, and many have hamstrings that you now see lag far behind their quads. Turn them all the way around, and now the glaring weakness common to so many is impossible to ignore: few have back development that’s even close to matching their front view. Width isn’t so hard to find, but substantial thickness is a rarity.
Even at the pro level, there aren’t a lot of truly impressive backs. As you might imagine, among the masses of lifters out there toiling away in the gyms of the world, anyone with a great back would immediately stand out as exceptional. Where do you fit into this conversation? I’m going to ask you to be honest with yourself right now. How is your back? Is it as developed as your chest, arms and shoulders; or is it behind, perhaps far behind? Whether or not you compete, you should want to maximize the width and thickness of your back for the simple fact that it screams rugged power. When you see a man with dense, thick slabs of muscle all the way from his sloping traps to his cobra lats and anaconda spinal erectors, it’s evident that he’s a hardcore beast. This isn’t some half-assed dweeb who does a few sets of bench presses and curls a couple of times a week to look good for the drunk chicks at the party or the bar … this guy is serious. He commands your respect, because you know nobody gets a back like that without pulling a lot of heavy iron and pouring out maximum effort for years. If you’re not that guy, don’t you want to be?
Why Are There So Few Great Backs?
There are a few main reasons most men never build their backs anywhere close to what they are capable of. One is the old adage, “out of sight, out of mind.” If you have small arms, a flat chest or even chicken legs, you are constantly reminded of your physique shortcomings every time you behold your reflection in the mirror. But if you have a back that looks as if you’ve hardly ever trained it, it’s easy to ignore. In fact, you would need to make an effort to find a dual-mirror setup where you can even see your back.
Another factor to consider is that unless you are a competitor and associate with other competitors, it’s doubtful that anyone even considers your back development or lack thereof. You may be complimented or jeered for your guns, your pecs or your wheels, but by and large, garden-variety gym rats don’t pay a whole lot of attention to the muscle complex of the back.
And that latter point leads us to the crux of the matter. Most guys just don’t put enough time and energy into their back training because it’s not as fun, and not as glamorous as the other “showy” body parts. You will often witness trainers who typically devote an hour or more and 20-plus work sets to areas like arms or chest, yet who feel satisfied with giving their backs just a couple of sets of lat pulldowns and cable rows. Over time, not only do their torsos show a major imbalance, with far more thickness and development in the front, but their posture will begin to slump forward, like an ape’s – their shoulder girdles having been pulled forward over years, with far more pushing movements than pulling.
Contraction, Contraction, Contraction
The irony of all this is that there are also a substantial number of trainers out there who are not guilty of
neglecting their backs, yet still don’t have the results they would like to show for it. They do the right exercises and put the time and effort in, but they never realize that they aren’t truly training their backs. As with the chest and shoulders, you must go through the arms to get to the back. The problem for many men is that their biceps and rear delts take too much of the stress, and not enough of it is applied to the actual lats. Without a powerful mind-muscle connection so that you can force the back to do the work, your back won’t be able to grow much.
So many of us are victims of our backs never receiving the proper stress. It was nearly 20 years ago that “Pumping Iron” era champ Kent Kuehn gave me a critical tip at Gold’s Gym in Venice. “Think of your hands and arms as hooks, and the real pull is coming from your lats,” he told me. That phrase about hooks stuck with me. Every type of pulldown and row should involve driving the elbows down or back, and pinching the shoulder blades together. But most importantly, the focus needs to be on contracting the lats, squeezing the lats. Will you always be able to do that? Not when you are pulling a heavy deadlift, no. But on just about every other back-training movement, it’s exactly what you should be doing. In just about every case, you will need to use less weight. But what does it matter if you are yanking up 405 in barbell rows, or jerking up 150-pound dumbbell rows, if your lats are crappy and shallow? Wouldn’t you rather use 315 and a 100-pounder and have a thick, rugged back that sets you apart from the herd?
Time to Specialize!
The most effective method for improving a lagging body part is to devote extra effort to it. When you combine that with a finite length of time, it creates a sense of urgency to do the best job possible in that limited span of weeks or months. In this program, you will train back twice a week, using two entirely different workouts, for 12 weeks. To be able to hit back twice a week, we need to consolidate somewhere. Let’s train triceps with chest, and biceps with shoulders for the duration of this program.
Here’s what the weekly split will look like:
Monday:
Back – deadlifts and free-weight rows
Tuesday:
Chest and triceps
Wednesday:
OFF
Thursday:
Back – chins, pulldowns, machine/cable rows
Friday:
Legs
Saturday:
Shoulders and biceps
Sunday:
OFF, repeat
In addition to using two different workouts, we will also be manipulating rep ranges and intensity levels to provide ever-changing types of stimulation for your back to adapt to and grow from.
What Can Be Done in 12 Weeks?
I’m not going to tell you that you will go from a shallow, narrow back to looking like Dorian Yates from the back in three months. That’s preposterous, and I hope you all recognize muscle takes time to build. But you can and certainly will make substantial improvements to your overall back development with 12 weeks of such intense focus on it. Should you desire, you can take a few weeks to return to hitting back just once a week before getting right back on this program. If the rest of your physique is far ahead of your back, I would highly recommend that course of action. As I said in the intro, even if you have no interest in competing, a back that resembles a mountain range will mark you as exceptional, and will imbue your physique with an aura of raw power that few others have. Chances are that a lot of you out there have the potential to craft a seriously impressive back. It’s just never had the chance to grow. Now is the time to make it happen!
The 12-Week Program
Deadlifts and Rows*
(Weeks 1-3 and 7-9)
Deadlifts
6 x 15, 12, 10, 8, 6, 4
Barbell Rows
4 x 8
T-Bar Rows
4 x 8
One-Arm Dumbbell Rows
4 x 8
Dumbbell Shrugs
4 x 10
*Warm-ups are not shown. Always warm up as much as needed before starting your work sets.
Chins, Pulldowns, Machine/Cable Rows
(Weeks 1-3 and 7-9)
Chins
4 x 10 (add weight if needed)
Wide-Grip Lat Pulldowns
4 x 10
Seated Cable Rows
4 x 8
Close-Grip Pulldowns
4 x 10
Machine Row With Chest Support
4 x 10
Deadlifts and Rows
(Weeks 4-6 and 10-12)
T-Bar Rows
4 x 10-12
Barbell Rows
4 x 10-12
One-Arm Dumbbell Rows
4 x 10-12
Rack Deadlifts
5 x 12, 10, 10, 8, 8
Shrug Machine Upright Rows/Shrugs*
4 x 10+10
*Lean slightly forward and pull the handles up toward your armpits, then stand up straight and perform shrugs.
Chins, Pulldowns, Machine/Cable Rows
(Weeks 4-6 and 10-12)
Chins
4 x 10 (add weight if needed)
Wide-Grip Lat Pulldowns
4 x 12 + 3-4 top partials*
Supported T-Bar Rows
3 x 10-12 + 10-12 (hold each contraction for a beat)**
Close-Grip Pulldowns
4 x 12-15
Machine Rows With Chest Support
4 x 10
Machine or Cable Pullovers
4 x 12
Superset with
Seated Cable Rows
4 x 12
*After hitting failure at 12 full reps, continue with three to four reps from the stretch position up top to just above your eyeline.
**These are three drop sets. The weight shouldn’t be very heavy here anyway, so you might use two 45s for the first part of the set, then peel a 45 and use just one for the remainder.
4 Bonus Tips for a Beastly Back!
1. Use Wrist Straps
The back is a large, powerful complex of muscles that includes the latissimus dorsi, the trapezius, the spinal erectors, as well as the smaller muscles of the upper back such as the rhomboids, teres major and teres minor. In comparison, your biceps and your grip strength are relatively weak, and as such will often be a weak link and a serious limiting factor in back training. For instance, it’s very common that your grip will go on chins or rows well before your lats have truly fatigued. Don’t be one of those macho tools who insists on relying on pure grip strength. If you do, you will only be screwing yourself out of being able to use heavier weights on your back exercises, as well as taking your sets to true failure.
2. Vary Your Angles of Attack
Because the back is such a complex muscle group, it needs to be worked from a variety of angles for optimal development. In addition to using different angles of pull, such as vertical, horizontal and others in between, you should also use wider and closer grips and different hand positions. Just to use chins as one example, sometimes you should do the standard, overhand chin using a wide grip, while other sets should be done with a shoulder-width, underhand grip or a neutral (palms facing each other) hand position. All cable movements, such as lat pulldowns and cable rows, can be done with a myriad of grip attachments. Don’t get stuck using the same exact grip width and hand positions all the time. Mix them up and shock your back into new growth!
3. Never Round Your Lower Back
Deadlifts, barbell rows and T-bar rows are excellent basic movements that will slap thick beef on to anyone’s back when done properly. They can also lead to catastrophic injury when sloppy form is used. The most dangerous thing you can do is to allow your lower back to round in a convex shape as you pull a heavy deadlift or row. It’s a surefire way to tear your spinal erectors, herniate one or more disks, or all of the above. Take care to always maintain a very slight arch in your lower back, and keep that area tight rather than allow it to relax at any point in the rep.
4. Flex and Stretch Your Back
A final tip that will lead to greater gains in your back is to flex and stretch the back at every workout. You can do this between sets, or wait until the end of the session. Strike and hold both the rear double biceps and rear lat spread poses several times, really trying to feel the muscles contract. This will enhance your mind-muscle connection, allowing you to get more out of all your reps and sets.
Two types of stretches should be done as well. The first is simply a dead hang from a chin-up bar for 30-60 seconds. Don’t allow your shoulders to completely relax, but do make sure your lats get a pronounced stretch. Then, grab hold of any vertical support, one arm at a time with your hand at shoulder level, and gradually pull back until you feel that side of your lat stretch. Hold it for 30-60 seconds. These stretches will help you increase your range of motion, and many believe they also facilitate the expansion of the tight fascia tissue that binds and encases all of our skeletal muscles, allowing for more growth to take place.
Ron Harris got his start in the bodybuilding industry during the eight years he worked in Los Angeles as Associate Producer for ESPN’s “American Muscle Magazine” show in the 1990s. Since 1992 he has published nearly 5,000 articles in bodybuilding and fitness magazines, making him the most prolific bodybuilding writer ever. Ron has been training since the age of 14 and competing as a bodybuilder since 1989. He lives with his wife and two children in the Boston area.
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