There are a lot of guys who boast good biceps or big breasts, but nothing will distinguish a practicing athlete from others like beautiful deltas. To work out the deltoid muscles, the barbell pull to the chin is most suitable. The main thing is to do it technically correctly in order to get the full benefit from the exercise and limit the risk of injury.
The barbell pull to the chin is a basic exercise, the work of which is aimed at developing the middle and posterior bundle of the deltoid muscles. The exercise sharpens and draws the shape of the muscles, making a clear transition between them. The importance of working out these particular beams is very great: in all presses, only the front part of the deltoid head works, which automatically makes the middle and back lagging behind.
Many athletes purposefully work to exhaustion with the front delta, hammering into the middle and back. The result is an imbalance in body proportions, the middle of the back is drawn as deeply as we would like. To be the owner of well-developed shoulders, they must be developed from all sides.
Technique for performing the barbell pull to the chin
The barbell pull to the chin, although very difficult, is quite traumatic exercise, since it requires a wide range of motion in the shoulder joint (one of the most fragile joints in the body).
As in any other exercise, before performing the barbell pull to the chin, it is necessary to carry out a high-quality warm-up of the arms and joints of the upper shoulder girdle so as not to tear the muscles and pull the tendons.
- Take the barbell with an upper grip and hold it on lowered straight arms so that the bar touches the front of the thighs.
- Keep your back straight with a slight deflection in the lower back (to relieve the load from the lumbar spine), the chest with a "wheel", the shoulder blades are directed towards each other.
- Bend your knees slightly to relieve stress on your kneecaps.
- Take a deep breath and, pointing your elbows to the sides, not back, begin to lift the bar straight up to your chin.
- When lifting, the bar should almost slide over the athlete's body from the hips to the chin.
- At the top, raise your elbows as high as possible (above your shoulders anyway).
- At the peak of the summit, exhale and, for a two-second pause, tense the trapezium and deltas as much as possible.
- Take your time, lower your hands with the projectile to the starting position. It is very important not to "throw" the barbell down, but to smoothly lower it in a controlled manner.
To prevent injury and maximize the effect of exercise, it is imperative that you adhere to the correct technique. You can independently control the technique if you observe yourself in the mirror. Therefore, as a rule, all gyms are equipped with large, human-sized mirrors.
The weight of the bar being lifted is of great importance. It is determined individually, depending on the preliminary fitness of the athlete. Even trained athletes begin work with minimal weights to hone the ideal technique and gradually increase the load over time. Too much weight will not allow you to raise your elbows as high as possible.
You need to work with such a weight so as not to resort to cheating even on the last repetition. As the saying goes, it is better to prefer quality over quantity.
Grip width
There are constant discussions about which grip is the most correct - narrow or wide?
The fact that an extremely narrow grip pumps traps well is not entirely true. Yes, the load on them will increase, but the biomechanics of the exercise forces you to limit the weight of the bar. Even shrugs will work an order of magnitude more trapeziums.
A tight grip increases the risk of injury to the shoulder joints. If you grab the bar with a very narrow grip, the range of motion will be limited due to the fact that there will be a fight against provocation to push your elbows forward. The bony elements of the shoulder joints will come closer to each other, and when using this grip option, the load on them will become critical. Therefore, even a perfectly observed technique may not save you from injury.
A wide grip is considered to be much safer than a narrow one. The load during its implementation is shifted from the trapezium and anterior bundles of the deltoid muscles towards the middle heads of the deltas. For maximum workout, you need to take a bar slightly wider than your shoulders and train in a high-intensity multi-rep mode. A good alternative is a pronated medium grip that is about 5 x 7 cm narrower than shoulder width. This grip is better than any other for maximum elbow lift and does not interfere with maintaining the correct trajectory of movement.
Athletes who need to pump the muscles of the trapezoid use barbell pulls to the chin with the body tilted forward in their arsenal of exercises. When doing them, they simply tilt the torso forward a little. The front beams of deltas and biceps will participate in the work, but the main load will fall on the middle part of the trapezoid, which is what I want to achieve.
The subtleties and secrets of pulling to the chin
Athletes who have had shoulder injuries should either refuse to perform this exercise or include it in training very carefully and only with small weights. This is due to the fact that when pulling to the chin is performed, the muscles of the articular bags of the shoulder are actively involved in the work due to the removal of the hands from the body.
When working with large weights, you need to reinsure yourself and use wrist belts. At first glance, an ordinary accessory will take the strain off the forearms and transfer them to the required muscle group.
The deltoid muscles respond much better than everyone else to their regular workout. The result of pumping muscles will be noticeable as soon as you start to engage in them. The effectiveness of the training will increase even more if the chin pull is done in combination with other exercises (various presses) on the deltoid muscles and trapeziums or if you use the linear alternation method in training.
Video about the technique of pulling the bar to the chin (Denis Borisov):
