Inverted Row
Trains the Rhomboids and Middle Trapezius.
- Equipment
- Not recorded
- Mechanic
- Compound
- Force
- Pull
- Level
- Beginner
How to do it
- Set a barbell in a rack at roughly hip height, or use a suspension trainer or a low bar.
- Lie underneath it and take an overhand grip slightly wider than your shoulders.
- Extend your legs and rest on your heels, so your body forms a straight line from head to feet. Bending the knees and putting your feet flat makes the movement easier and is the right regression.
- Squeeze your glutes and brace your stomach so the line stays straight — like a plank you are also rowing in.
- Pull your chest toward the bar by driving your elbows back and out at roughly forty-five degrees.
- Finish with the shoulder blades squeezed together and the chest close to the bar, then lower under control until the arms are straight.
Common mistakes
- Letting the hips sag. Once the body stops being a straight line, the row has become a partial one and the abdominal work has stopped. Squeeze the glutes; if it still sags, raise the bar.
- Not touching, or nearly touching, the bar. Stopping halfway avoids the end range where the shoulder blades retract — which is the part of the movement the upper back is here for.
- Setting the bar too low too soon. Raising the bar makes the exercise easier by reducing how much of your bodyweight you are lifting, which is a legitimate way to scale it. Lowering the bar before you can do full repetitions just produces half ones.
- Shrugging toward the bar. If the shoulders rise toward the ears, the upper traps have taken over from the mid-back muscles the movement is chosen for.