The Chin-Up is unquestionably a great back exercise...one of the best.

And it's one of the basic movement patterns for your back training. If you want a great back, you've got to do chins.

That being said, the Chin-Up can get boring, especially if you do a lot of them and locking yourself into the same position on the bar can put stress on the shoulder joints.

That's where THIS version of the Chin-Up comes in.

It's the same basic movement pattern but with a twist...instead of holding onto a straight chin-up bar, you're going to be gripping on the ends of two Olympic barbells set up on the rails of the power rack.

There are two reasons why this is so good...

The first is that the ends of the Olympic bars are fatter...which is going to work your grip TREMENDOUSLY while you're doing the exercise.

Fat bar and fat grip training is incredibly effective for developing grip strength and if your gym doesn't have fat bars (or Fat Gripz, of which I am a BIG fan, btw), this is a GREAT way to get the benefits regardless.

The second reason is the neutral grip positioning...it's actually a healthier position for your shoulders than either the supinated or pronated grips. And because there's no bar in front of you, you can choose your own path of movement up in between the two bars.

Here's the setup:

Set the rails on the rack as high as you can set them, then put two O bars on the rails. In my rack, I have to do the exercise with my knees bent so I can get the full range of motion.

Load ONE end with a plate or two...enough to counterbalance your bodyweight.

Grip onto the ends of the bars, where the plates normally go. Don't grip right out near the ends...that'll increase the leverage of gravity on the bars and if you don't have enough weight on the other ends, you could tip the bars. Gripping in a bit closer is ideal.

Then just pull yourself straight up from there into a neutral-grip chin-up.

That's it!

You'll most likely find with this fat-grip setup that grip strength is your limiting factor. If you keep up with this exercise and really work your grip to the point where it's NOT the limiting factor anymore, you'll have made some serious progress in your grip strength.

Want more back exercises like this? Click here.

Nick Nilsson
The Mad Scientist of Muscle

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