Exercise of the Week: The Sternum Chin-Up
by Charles Poliquin

This variation of the chin-up, which was popularized by Vince Gironda, involves leaning back throughout the entire movement. In this variation, the lower portion of the chest should touch the bar.


You can use either a supinated or pronated grip, and the grip can vary from narrow to shoulder-width (the latter being more indicated for the stronger trainee).

As you pull yourself to the bar, have your head lean back as far away from the bar as possible and arch your spine throughout the movement. At the upper end of the movement, your hips and legs will be at about a 45-degree angle to the floor. You should keep pulling until your collarbone passes the bar and your sternum touches it. By the time you've completed the concentric portion of the movement, your head will be parallel to the floor.

If you've never seen anyone do it before, that's because it's damn hard. I consider this movement the king of compound movements for the upper back because it works more than just the lats. It also creates a great overload on the scapulae retractors.

The beginning of the movement, however, is more like a classical chin, while the midrange resembles a pullover motion. Finally, the end position duplicates the finishing motion of a rowing movement.

If you're an advanced trainee pressed for time, I would make the sternum chin-up a staple of your back routine. If you're particularly strong and you still find it easy, you may want to slow your concentric tempo. One of my female assistants — Jose Tremblay from Montreal — can do them using a 5050 tempo (that's five seconds on the way down and five seconds on the way up). Who ever said that women can't do chins?

By the way, one of the ways that I assess the quality of a coach or personal trainer is by a simple test. If qualified, a coach or personal trainer should be able to get a female trainee to do 12 shoulder-width supinated chin-ups in 12 weeks — that is, of course, assuming that her body fat is within normal range. This test, as you can imagine, clearly indicates that there are very few personal trainers out there who know what they're doing.