Gorilla Chin-Up
Trains the Abs.
- Equipment
- A pull-up bar
- Mechanic
- Compound
- Force
- Pull
- Level
- Intermediate
How to do it
- Hang from a pull-up bar with an underhand grip about shoulder-width apart.
- Set your shoulders down away from your ears.
- Raise your knees toward your chest and hold them there.
- Keeping the knees up, pull yourself up into a chin-up.
- At the top, curl the knees a little higher toward your chest.
- Lower under control to a straight hang with the knees still raised.
Common mistakes
- Letting the knees drop as you pull. Holding the tuck through the chin-up is what makes it different from doing the two movements in sequence.
- Swinging. A tucked body on a bar swings easily, and a swing does part of both halves.
- Attempting it before a strict chin-up and a hanging knee raise are each comfortable. This asks for both at once and adds a grip demand on top.
- Expecting the crunch half to be the work. Most of the abdominal effort is in holding the tuck for the length of the set, not in the extra curl at the top.