The Number One accessory for CrossFit and how to do it right.

CrossFit, or Functional fitness, is a very comprehensive exercise modality. Yet, it seems to have one glaring weakness. You can’t even count the amount of exercises the sport has in vertical presses and vertical pulls. Handstand push-ups, pull-ups (kipping counts, you just don’t know how to do it), jerks, muscle-ups, handstand walks, rope climbs… All of these are great exercises, but as you may imagine, these are in a very similar movement pattern.

I didn’t mention push-ups and bench presses, which especially have recently gotten more love from competition organizers. However, horizontal pushing is the less involved movement pattern compared to vertical pushing in functional fitness. There is still one elemental movement pattern missing from all this. And you never see these in competitions.

Horizontal pulling. 

These include any type of rowing movements, where you are pulling the resistance towards your body.

Even though pull-ups and its derivatives do work the back quite well, they definitely don’t hit all the necessary muscles in a way that would support long-term health and progression in the sport. For sure, any proper program does include these movements. But at least for what I’ve seen, horizontal pulls are treated with much less attention compared to those movements that come up in competitions. Understandably so, but since they are treated only as an accessory, you might be shooting yourself in the foot.

It is known that the exercises you perform first in the workout improve the most. (1) In the beginning of the session, you are fresh, your ability to produce force is at its highest and there is little to no fatigue. As the session goes on your ability to produce force and concentrate decreases because of fatigue. Therefore, the last exercises you perform in your workouts don’t get the same love they might need. Execution can be poor, sets are ended haphazardly, no clear progression is included from week to week… This is not a means to effective training. Even for mere accessory movement.

If your training sessions are lasting 2-3 hours, you can bet those last accessories you are doing aren’t necessarily worth a damn. They probably be better off done in another session.

Horizontal pulling does matter. It is a quite elemental part of shoulder health and good posture. (2) Putting more effort to your horizontal pulls can elongate your sporting career, since shoulder issues are quite common in CrossFit. (3)

 

How to do it right

Horizontal pulling hits most of all those mid-back muscles that contribute to good posture and control the scapula by retracting it. Like many other supporting musculatures, in which the major function is to maintain posture, these muscles can tolerate quite high training volumes, since these muscles (rhomboids and posterior deltoids) are mostly composed of type 1 muscle fibers, the slow twitch muscle fibers. Therefore, you probably get the best benefits for these exercises from the higher repetition ranges, 10-30 reps per set or longer time under tension. You shouldn’t be just mindlessly pumping those long sets. Aim is to maximally contract in the top position, where the tension is at its highest. You need to squeeze your shoulder blades together hard.

Secondly, since stretch under load does induce hypertrophy (muscle gain) (4), stretching at the bottom of the rep is probably a good idea. Basically, you should work with a full range of motion.

Since the mid-back digs higher volume, you can do quite many sets per week. Unless you are a complete beginner, who shouldn’t need to worry about these issues by the way, you can probably do something between 8 to 20 sets of horizontal rowing each week. Start with smaller set amount and add more if you can recover from it. It needs to be said that, if you are adding something more to your training, it is probably better to do less of something else. For example, in the beginning of the competitive season, when competitions are further away, you can focus more on the horizontal pulling, and do less pull-ups and muscle-ups. 

Dumbell Batwing row. Perfect with a pause.

Pause

Some people have issues with feeling their mid-back musculature. This is normal, especially if you are new to some exercise, you don’t necessarily know how to contract the correct muscles. Adding a pause at the top of each rep usually helps with this issue. I prefer pauses of 3 to even up to 6 seconds in the peak contraction. You will definitely feel your mid-back after that!

When you pause the reps, it is smart to do less total reps in a set, since you don’t want the set to last for 2 minutes. I usually program sets of 8-10 repetitions with when pause is added. Tempo prescription could look like following: 2013. 3 second pause at the top, 2 seconds lowering of the weights.

 

Prioritize

In extreme cases, I would recommend doing the rows first in a workout. Or doing them in a separate session completely. Like previously mentioned, the exercises done first in the session get the best benefit. If you have shoulder issues, if your shoulders are caved in so that your upper back resembles a bow, or you simply have no idea where the rows should feel, you should absolutely consider doing horizontal pulling better! Do them first, with a proper focus on each rep, and see the changes in just few weeks.

Ring Inverted rows are a great bodyweight variation.

Exercise selection

Aim to hit your mid-back muscles from multiple different angles. If you do chest supported rows on a bench, you can vary with different inclines or just do them on a flat bench. If you do cable rows, you can do them seated, from high cable setting or low cable. Inverted rows are excellent choices as well. Try to find which exercise works best for you. Different exercises may feel better with long rep ranges, some with shorter. Try different tempos and pause lengths. Variations are endless.

You don’t need to be doing ten different horizontal rows in a session. The best approach is to divide the total rowing volume into multiple sessions. 2-4 sessions per week. If you are planning to do 12 sets a week twice a week, you can to two different exercises per session and perform three sets each exercise. Alternatively, you can do three sets a day on four separate days. Different exercise each day. Which ever works better for you.

And of course the classic horizontal pull variation - Bent over row

Just do your rows! Properly!

If you have been struggling with shoulder issues and can’t seem to shake them off, contact me on mlstrengthperformance.com.

Together we’ll Bulletproof your shoulders.

Sincerely,

Mitja

Follow me on Instagram: @mitja_lievonen

Training programs & Coaching: HOME | MLSP (mlstrengthperformance.com)

 

References

1. Simão R, de Salles BF, Figueiredo T, Dias I, Willardson JM. Exercise order in resistance training. Sports Med. 2012 Mar 1;42(3):251-65. doi: 10.2165/11597240-000000000-00000. PMID: 22292516.

2. Park SH, Lee MM. Effects of Lower Trapezius Strengthening Exercises on Pain, Dysfunction, Posture Alignment, Muscle Thickness and Contraction Rate in Patients with Neck Pain; Randomized Controlled Trial. Med Sci Monit. 2020 Mar 23;26:e920208.

3. Feito, Yuri et al. “A 4-Year Analysis of the Incidence of Injuries Among CrossFit-Trained Participants.” Orthopaedic journal of sports medicine vol. 6,10 2325967118803100. 24 Oct. 2018, doi:10.1177/2325967118803100

4. Nunes JP, Schoenfeld BJ, Nakamura M, Ribeiro AS, Cunha PM, Cyrino ES. Does stretch training induce muscle hypertrophy in humans? A review of the literature. Clin Physiol Funct Imaging. 2020 May;40(3):148-156.