Form cues
- Arms long, elbows soft
- Pull with your lats
- Ribs down, core tight
- Stop at your thighs
Exercise
Cable Straight Arm Pulldown
Back, cable
A cable lat exercise where you pull a straight bar from shoulder height down to your thighs with mostly straight arms.
Target: lats. Also works: shoulders, biceps.
Steps
- Attach a straight bar to a high cable pulley and face the machine.
- Grab the bar with an overhand grip, step back slightly, and hinge forward a little at the hips.
- Start with your arms straight in front of you at shoulder height and your torso braced.
- Pull the bar down in a wide arc toward your thighs without bending your elbows.
- Squeeze your lats at the bottom with the bar close to your hips.
- Raise the bar back up slowly to shoulder height while keeping your arms long and your torso still.
Common mistakes
- Bending the elbows and turning it into a triceps pressdown
- Leaning back and using body swing to move the bar
- Shrugging the shoulders up toward the ears
- Letting the bar drift away from the body at the bottom
Breathing
Inhale as the bar rises to the start, and exhale as you pull it down toward your thighs.
In the app, search for Cable Straight Arm Pulldown and add it to a workout.