I can only do the minimum requirment of 3 pullups...is it better to do the pullups and use help with the chair or does the bands. Also im doin some of the workouts at the gym and i wanted to know if the lat pulldown works the same thing like the bands. I want to find the best results for my back and i need to know what equipment is best to reach the goal.

The real deal if you can. 3 today, 4 in a couple of days. 10 in a couple of weeks!!! BRING IT... You can do it...

Similar question, but not quite the same... Is it better to just do your max without a chair (mine's 2-3), or use the chair and crank out 10 or so? In other words, is it better to work to failure with help, or no help? I figure with a chair you're at least getting more reps at full range of motion, even if they're not as difficult. If our goal is to bulk up, we should be shooting to fail somewhere between 8-10 reps right? For me, that's only possible if I'm using a chair right now. Or does that failure rule not apply to pullups?

Thoughts?

I'm currently on day 2 right now, so I'm no expert, but I'll tell you what I do to have another idea out there.

I can do 8-10 right now if I'm going completely to failure, but what I did yesterday was 5 or 6 to pace myself. Then I used the chair to get up, and did negatives the rest of the time. Just slowly lowered myself each time. I've read that negatives are a good way to work up to doing pullups if you can't do one, so I figure they'd be a good thing to do when you're too exhausted to do anymore.

I am a little later down the line. I started able to do 8-10 in the first rounds, and 4-5 in the later ones. Over time I have built up to 15+ per set through the entire workout. I did not use a chair to help out, but I am sure it would not hurt and could possibly accelerate things a bit. I just did not feel comfortable with the foot on the chair and I was constantly worrying about it falling out from under me.

Bottom line... You will improve either way!

try to go for the real deal i.e. body weight pull up, when you can no longer pull yourself up use the chair and do negative as explained above.

the lat pull down is OK but most people will tell you that it's for warm up (i don't agree). there are some pull ups you'll have trouble with e.g wide pull up. in this case if you use the lat pull down as an alternate just have half your body or a weight that will bring you to failure around 15 reps

I haven't started the program yet, but it might be a good idea to do all of the above--really get that muscle confusion going for ya!

Hi All,

Just my two cents' worth here. I agree with Les' comments about the lat pulldowns. I've never been a big pull up person, primarily because I've struggled for over 35 years at being able to do them. The lat pulls are a great way to get your big back muscles in gear BUT form isn't quite as critical as it is for the pull up. Maybe a better way to look at it is that you can "cheat" easier on a lat pull than you can on a pull up. At least, I always could.

For me, that's one of the big attractions to P90X. I really feel as if I'm going to finally break through on an exercise that I've struggled with all these years. I purchased a free standing pull up power tower and they're delivering it tomorrow. I've been using the bands that I've looped over an I-beam in the basement. I'm doing two of the 50 pound bands and one of the 20 pound bands (I think that if you double the bands you get double the total lift, so I'm lifting somewhere like 240 pounds doing the pull ups with the bands). Now, I hope to be able to convert that over to the pull ups on the tower where I can't really cheat on form and where I can succeed once and for all.

I'm still too fat and today's my birthday so I'm one year older. And I'm getting airborne if it's the last thing I do!!

Sparta-bound!

Kevin