Can Women do Pull ups?

Can women do pull ups?
Yes they (YOU) can!

Ever been impressed by other women doing pull ups, but think “no way could I ever do that?”

Pull ups are possible for YOU. Yes you. Even if you have no weight training experience, you are currently overweight, or you’ve never hung from a pull up bar in your life.

Maybe you are afraid to fail, or maybe you have flashbacks to your last middle-school physical fitness test, but women can definitely do pull ups.

It takes special work and preparation to get your first pull up as a woman. But if you are willing to put in the work, it is possible for you! 

Why is it harder for women to do pull ups?

Let’s face some hard truths first. Pull ups are usually harder for women than they are for men.

To start off, women typically carry around more essential fat — 11-13 percent versus 5-8 percent for men. Typically, women have a higher total body fat percentage than men. Holding on to more fat will make pull ups harder, since fat is essentially dead weight with no contractile capacity.

Additionally, women typically have smaller shoulder girdles and less muscle development in their upper bodies. Women have fewer androgen receptors in their upper body compared to their lower body. Most female trainees are going to have an easier time developing strength and size in their lower bodies than their upper bodies. Even so, women are generally smaller than men, and have less muscle mass when they start training. Additionally, women cannot physiologically support a huge amount of muscle growth, partially due to their frame size, partially due to their levels of hormones such as testosterone (much lower than men). Strength trained females are usually still smaller, and weaker, than strength trained males.

Because men are bigger and have more total muscle mass, they are usually absolutely stronger.

Because men also usually have a lower body fat percentage than women, they are usually also relatively stronger.

Unfortunately, It is rare to see a woman banging out pull ups in any commercial gym, hell to be strength training at all.  (The recent growth of crossfit, resurgence of bodybuilding, and increased popularity of some of the other barbell strength sports has changed this as well.)

Finally, fewer women participated in sports where they had to do pull ups or perform weight training exercises as kids (gymnasts usually the only exception here). This lack of specific training can be a huge disadvantage for adult women. 

Fortunately, you can overcome all of these challenges so you can do pull ups.

How do women overcome these disadvantages to pull up strength?

You definitely can build the strength to do pull ups, but it will take time, dedication, and properly addressing your diet and training.

1. Most women need to lose some body fat. The combination of good diet and a proper weight training program will be the most efficient way to do this.

Don’t rely too much on cardio–weight training should form the basis of your strength training routine and will help you build the strength to do pull ups (more on that to come). 3-5 times per week of each cardio and strength training will be plenty, depending on your initial strength and fitness level.

Diet

Make whole, nutrient dense foods the basis of every meal and snack. Consume some protein at each meal–foods like chicken breast, lean steak, pork, Greek Yogurt, Eggs and Egg Whites, Protein Powders and the like. Eat a variety of veggies and fruits in different colors and focus on eating till you are satiated. Eat slowly and drink enough water. 

This should be enough for 99% of women to lose body fat at a steady rate.

(If you are a super advanced trainee, or the “simply eating better” approach does not create meaningful fat loss for you, start tracking your calories as well as your protein intake, to make sure you are creating a small calorie deficit so your body has no choice but to rely on stored fat for fuel.)

Avoid starvation or crash diets at all costs. These will deplete your energy and will make training and improving your pull up performance nearly impossible. So make sure you are eating enough quality calories to work hard at your pull ups.

If you want to learn more about the advanced nutritional principles for pull up performance, click here.

The programs I created below for you will require some serious energy to power through, so make sure you give your body what it needs!

Upper Body Mass

I would even say women need MORE volume, intensity and frequency of upper body training to help close the gap. Strength work is great, but even bodybuilding work (sets of 8-12 work great) will help women put on the muscle mass in their upper bodies needed to move their own body weight.

Women need to train their lats and biceps, as these are the prime movers in the pull up. Women also need to strengthen their lower traps, rhomboids, and lower back muscles–the spinal erectors–as well as the external oblique muscles, and the muscles of the forearms. And finally, you will need strong glutes and rectus abdominis muscles to be able to hold your body in a good position and generate tension throughout the movement.

Now, how do you train to get the strength to accomplish your first pull up? (Skip to the end for a complete 3 month pull up program).

You train your entire upper body, as well as your core and glutes!

Judging from my experience working with female personal training clients, most of them have NEVER weight trained before and would look at me like I have three heads if I asked them to hang from a bar on day one.

Rather than jump right into the pull up, it is going to take a dedicated approach training all the major muscles of the upper body, lower body, and core muscles to be able to support your entire body weight and get your chin over the bar.

Hanging and Body Awareness

If you are serious about doing your first pull up (and eventually dominating your pull ups) you should spend some time getting comfortable hanging from a pull up bar.

Practice hanging for multiple sets. Start with 5 seconds at a time, and start adding a few seconds at a time as your grip (and confidence) gets stronger. Remember, high rep sets of pull ups will require you to hang from a bar for 30-60 seconds, so you want to build up the strength-endurance to handle that much hanging first.

In addition, I would also recommend going to your local playground and spend some time hanging from the monkey bars and transferring from bar to bar. You won’t be a monkey at first, but overtime you will develop the strength and skill to transfer your weight from two shoulders to one.

Using monkey bars and playground equipment will also help you to gain body awareness–what your body is doing in space and how you can control your body in initially-uncomfortable situations.

You might feel a little silly as an adult on a playground (but hell, maybe you will have FUN!) but this exercise is invaluable for improving your pull up performance.

Build Grip Strength:

Start building up your grip strength with strategic exercises. You can learn more about building up your grip to do pull ups by clicking here. 

Farmers Walks: Pick up heavy weights and walk with them, in perfect posture, for as long as you can without form breaking down. Holding onto heavy dumbbells will really help develop that grip strength as well as core stabilization to hang in a proper position.

You can even do one side at a time (shown in video) to build your oblique muscles.

Can Women do Pull ups: Build Core Strength:

In order to perform your pull ups safely, you will need a base level of core strength. To do a pull up properly, you should be able to hold a slight hollow position with your glutes and abs tight. This mimics a hollow hold position.

If your core is not strong enough to hold this tension while you perform pull ups, you could end up flailing through your lower body and putting undue pressure on your spine.

Pull ups should be a very lower-back friendly exercise (see Pull ups for Lower Back Pain) if you do them correctly and should decompress your spine a bit, BUT that depends on you doing them correctly.

To build the core strength for pull ups, I recommend a multidimensional approach to core training. Don’t neglect your internal and external obliques and use movements that require you to resist movement to the side or across your body.

Example movements below:

Can Women do Pull ups: Build Glute Strength

Having a strong butt definitely helps your pull up performance! It will also help you keep your back in a proper position as you hang from the bar.

For example, exercises like glute bridges, rope pull throughs, and extended range of motion glute bridges can help you develop the glute strength to hold your body in the correct position and contribute to total body pulling power.  

Can Women do Pull ups: Let’s get to the program

Seem like a lot of work just to achieve your first pull up?

That’s because it is! But it is most definitely worth it.

Achieving your first pull up will give you pride and confidence in and out of the weight room! You’ll achieve strength and confidence that will transfer to other areas of your life, and you will build a banging body in the process. Every muscle, tendon, joint and ligament in your body will be stronger and more resilient. Your body fat will drop and your lean muscle mass will increase, and you will gain confidence knowing you are stronger than 99 percent of all women!

Can Women do Pull ups: Pull up Programs for Women!

Now that we have established how awesome pull up training is for women, let’s get to the program: beginner to first pull up in three months! This program addresses the muscles needed for strong pull up performance. You will definitely need to add in training for your lower body to complete the program. Your goal is to progress each week (by adding weight, reps, or decreasing your rest periods) and try the new pull up variations each month.

If you are not ready to try the new pull up progressions each month, stay on your current month for as long as needed. Only advance when you are ready to tackle the harder progressions.

Women’s Pull up Program: Month 1

Day 1 (Monday)

Barbell Glute Bridge: 3 x 12, 10, 8 adding weight each set

Superset 3 x 10 each:

DB Flat Chest Press

DB Bent over Row

Day 2 (Wednesday)

Superset 3 x 12 each:

DB Neutral Grip Overhead Press

Lat Pulldown

Core Superset:

Plank: 30 seconds

TRX Fallout: 8 reps

Day 3 (Friday)

DB Chest Supported Row 4 x 10

Bent Over Rear Delt Fly: 3 x 15

Tricep Push down: 3 x 12

Bicep Curl: 3 x 12

Reverse Hyperextension 3 x 15 with 1 count pause at the top

Day 5:

Hang from a bar in the hollow body position 5 x 10 seconds

Hanging Scapular Retraction 5 x 5 reps

OPTIONAL (Play at the Park and try the monkey bars 😀 )

Women’s Pull up Program: Month Two

Day 1 (Monday)

Barbell Glute Bridge: 4 x 6, 8, 10, 12 (decrease weight for each set)

Superset 3 x 8 each:

DB Flat Chest Press

DB Bent over Row

Day 2 (Tuesday)

Superset 3 x 10 each:

DB Neutral Grip Overhead Press

Lat Pulldown

Core Superset:

Plank: 60 seconds

TRX Fallout: 8 reps

Day 4 (Thursday)

DB Chest Supported Row 4 x 10

Bent Over Rear Delt Fly: 3 x 15

Tricep Push down: 3 x 12

Bicep Curl: 3 x 12

Reverse Hyperextension 3 x 15 with 1 count pause at the top

Day 5 (Friday):

Band Pull ups 5 x 5 

Hanging: 5 x 20 seconds

OPTIONAL (Play at the Park and try the monkey bars 😀 )

Women’s Pull up Program: Month 3

Day 1 (Monday)

Barbell Glute Bridge: 4 x 15,12,10,8, adding weight each set

Superset 3 x 10 each:

DB Flat Chest Press

DB Bent over Row

Day 2 (Tuesday)

Superset 3 x 12 each:

DB Neutral Grip Overhead Press

Lat Pulldown

Core Superset, 3 rounds:

Plank: 30 seconds

TRX Overhead Hollow Hold: 30 seconds

Day 4 (Thursday)

DB Chest Supported Row 4 x 10

Bent Over Rear Delt Fly: 3 x 15

Tricep Push down: 3 x 12

Bicep Curl: 3 x 12

Reverse Hyperextension 3 x 15 with 1 count pause at the top

Day 5 (Friday):

Pull up Attempt: Try a Pull up 3 times, with 2-3 minutes between sets

(With minimal band or machine assistance)

Pull ups 6 x 4-5 reps

OPTIONAL (Play at the Park and try the monkey bars!

And there you have it! Now you are equipped  that lady busting out pull ups–unassisted–in the middle of the gym floor!