Pullup Push - Double the Pullups: Military or Law Enforcement Fitness - Navy, Army, Coast Guard, Marines, RECON, SEAL, Ranger, Police, FBI

Double your Pull-ups - Try the Pull-up PUSH Workout!

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This week, getting better at pull-ups is the subject of many people’s concern. As with the Pushup-Push Workout (linked below), this idea makes little sense physiologically, but it works. You never want to have an extended period of repeating the same exercises day after day, but you can do this workout for ten days, rest for three or four days of no pull-ups – then test on day 14 or 15. There you will find your increase to be as high as 50-100% from your previous max pull-ups. Here is the question from a Marine Reservist wanting to max his PFT of 20 pullups.

Where can I find your pull-up routines outlined? I am stuck at about 7 pull-ups and would like to get to 10-12. pullupdown.jpg - 7810 Bytes pullupup.jpg - 12078 Bytes

Pushup Push

PT Pyramid

Pull-up Article

Since the unbelievable success from the Pushup – Push Workout where people doubled their pushups in two weeks, I did the same test with students young and old with similar success on pull-ups. This workout works best on folks you can do 3-10 pull-ups. Many raised their pull-ups to 10-20 in two weeks.

Here is what you need to try for a two-week period:

Do your regular workout program, but for 10 straight days do an additional 25-75 pull-ups

Take your current pullup max effort score and multiply by 5. That is your daily number of pullups. So if you can do 10 pullups in one max rep set and fail at 11, then you need to do 50 pullups a day in a total repetition count of your workouts.

ODD DAYS: Supersets OR pyramids:

These are your normal pullup workouts and your goal pullup number is to be completed in a single workout period. Shoot for several max rep failure sets in this workout to push your maximum efforts. I like to take my goal number and try to achieve that number in as few sets as possible. 5-8 sets is a good goal. The fewer sets you have to do shows that you are building muscle stamina and endurance. To get better at pullups, you have to turn a traditional strength exercise into an endurance exercise - especially if you want 20+ reps.

EVEN DAYS:

Do your total maximum pullups x 5 anyway you can throughout the day and NOT in a single workout. Do small repetition sets until you reach your goal pull-up number in non-failure sets.

Rotate for the next ten days from odd day workout options and even day pull-up supplement, then take three-four days off from doing ANY pull-ups. Test on day 14-15 and let me know your results.

Sample Routine if Current Max is 10 reps	Pullups per Day
Day 1 - Regular Upper Body Workout = total pullups should be 50 reps	at least 50 reps
Day 2 - Do 50 reps spread throughout the day (Sub-Max rep sets)	50 reps
Day 3 - Regular Upper Body Workout = total pullups should be 50 reps	at least 50 reps
Day 4 - Do 50 reps spread throughout the day (Sub-Max rep sets)	50 reps
Day 5 - Regular Upper Body Workout = total pullups should be 50 reps	at least 50 reps
Day 6 - Do 50 reps spread throughout the day (Sub-Max rep sets)	50 reps
Day 7 - Regular Upper Body Workout = total pullups should be 50 reps	at least 50 reps
Day 8 - Do 50 reps spread throughout the day (Sub-Max rep sets)	50 reps
Day 9 - Regular Upper Body Workout = total pullups should be 50 reps	at least 50 reps
Day 10 - Do 50 reps spread throughout the day (Sub-Max rep sets)	50 reps
Day 11,12,13	Rest Days
Day 14	Test Day

I am trying this for some female Marines at this time with the Flexed Arm Hang (FAH). If you want to try the same but applied to the FAH, here is what you do:

Do 25 or 50 or 75 seconds of FAH in as few sets as possible on ODD Days and add supersets of FAH for TEN sets of 15-30 seconds. NOTICE: USMC will be changing its requirements on females and taking out the flexed arm hang in 2013.

See press release: No more Flexed Arm Hang for USMC-wide in 2014.

Good luck with the Pullup-Push Workout. Push yourself and you can quickly perform better on your pull-up test. You can fit this type of program into your present workout plan by just adding 25-50 pullups on your rest days so you do a ten-day routine of pull-ups.

Keep in touch and let me know if I can help you or visit the StewSmith.com Fitness Store for more ideas on workout plans to help you ace your fitness test / lose weight / etc.

Thanks for the e-mails. Keep them coming at stew@stewsmith.com.