Resistance band assisted pullups are a great tool to get your first bodyweight pullup if you have a good selection of bands and a pullup bar. But if you are like me you don’t have a selection of bands lying around the house. You might have only one loop band or an adjustable band with handles. Resistance bands provide most assistance on bottom of the movement and little to none on the top. This makes training a bit more difficult if you lack strength in the top position. That's why I prefer the rack pullup progression with a bar or rings [LINK] since you get more resistance at the bottom of the pullup with this progression. But this does not mean you can’t progress to a full bodyweight pullup with resistance band assisted pullups. You’ll just have to lower the assistance from the resistance band as you get stronger.
How to adjust resistance with a single band
Usually the resistance band is directly wrapped around the pullup bar. But depending on the height of the attachment point and length of the band you might not get optimal assistance for your needs. That's why it's important to be able to adjust the distance from the anchor point. For this purpose you can use a strap from gymnastic rings or from a suspension trainer. Or you can use a piece of strong rope and tie the resistance band to the rope and the other end to the pullup bar. Make a loop from the rope and attach it to a pullup bar the same way you would attach a looped resistance band. Then attach the resistance band to the rope.
If the assistance is too low you can use a double loop on the band. You have to try for yourself to find the proper settings for your resistance band and pullup bar height. If you have gymnastic rings you can attach one ring to the resistance band so you can easily fit your feet into the band without using your hands.
It's easier to put your foot through a gymnastic ring than through a resistance band alone. Also the support is more stable. |
You can use straps from gymnastic rings or a piece of strong rope to adjust the level of assistance. You don’t have to own a set of bands since you can scale the assistance linearly. |
Here is how to perform the resistance band assisted pullup:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5rR_bzBc1NA
Rep range
You can use the normal 6-12 rep range that I promote for progressive bodyweight training. This means when you can do 12 good reps you need to make the exercise harder. Increase the length of the strap attached to your resistance band to make pullups harder. Or remove bands if you have an adjustable resistance band with handles. If you find that you can do less than 6 reps with the harder variation build up to 15 reps first with the previous difficulty.
Have fun progressing towards your first pullup with the resistance band assisted pullup!
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