Please Scroll Down to See Forums Below 
Let's talk lower lats starting with debunking the wide grip chin, in favour of a mdium grip chin.
Arnold , still one of all time best bodybuilders firmly believed in doing wide grip pulldown and wide grip chins, but if you look carefully at his pics, especially next to frank columbo, you will see that Arnold has decent lat development under the armpits, but halfway his torso and it runs straight downward, while franco columbo had crazy spreading lats insetions all the way to his hips.
It's because wide grip chins and chins mainly work upper lats and teres/romboids and allmost NONE lower lats as you cannot pull the bar all the way down AND get your elbows behind your back like in:
- close parallel grip pulldown
- close reverse grip pulldown
- medium grip chin
For complete lat development you have to consider three thing:
1. upper lats
2. teres/rhomboids (well developed teres/romboids helps to push the upper lats even more outward)
3. lower lats
Also for a complete back we also need to add thickness.....
my workout suggestion is to forget about wide grip chins and let medium grip chins take care of upper and middle lat (not a lot of teres/romboid here) and use the backthicking exercises like barbell row and t-bar row dumbell row to hit the teres and the romboid. And throw in a specific lower lat pulldown. Some stifflegged deadlift and hyperextensions (hamstring lowerback complex on a different day) and we got all bases covered.
So for bringing out the lats give them priority but do not forget the mandatory barbell rows etc... for thickness.
1. lower lat (must do)
12 - 10 - 8 close parallel grip pulldown
2 all out lat width and thickness
12 - 10 - one arm dumbell row
3. middle / upper lat
12 - 10 - 8 medium ip weigted chins to front , or:
12 - 10 - 8 closes reverse grip pulldown
(use medium grip pulldowns until you can pull bodyweight)
4 & 5 teres / rhomboid / spine / lower traps / lat thickness
12 - 10 - 8 barbell row
12- 10 - 8 t - bar row
Save training lowerback for hamstring day, great synergy there. So you see you don''t the wide pulldowns as the rows take carry of the teres nicely...
Arnold , still one of all time best bodybuilders firmly believed in doing wide grip pulldown and wide grip chins, but if you look carefully at his pics, especially next to frank columbo, you will see that Arnold has decent lat development under the armpits, but halfway his torso and it runs straight downward, while franco columbo had crazy spreading lats insetions all the way to his hips.
It's because wide grip chins and chins mainly work upper lats and teres/romboids and allmost NONE lower lats as you cannot pull the bar all the way down AND get your elbows behind your back like in:
- close parallel grip pulldown
- close reverse grip pulldown
- medium grip chin
For complete lat development you have to consider three thing:
1. upper lats
2. teres/rhomboids (well developed teres/romboids helps to push the upper lats even more outward)
3. lower lats
Also for a complete back we also need to add thickness.....
my workout suggestion is to forget about wide grip chins and let medium grip chins take care of upper and middle lat (not a lot of teres/romboid here) and use the backthicking exercises like barbell row and t-bar row dumbell row to hit the teres and the romboid. And throw in a specific lower lat pulldown. Some stifflegged deadlift and hyperextensions (hamstring lowerback complex on a different day) and we got all bases covered.
So for bringing out the lats give them priority but do not forget the mandatory barbell rows etc... for thickness.
1. lower lat (must do)
12 - 10 - 8 close parallel grip pulldown
2 all out lat width and thickness
12 - 10 - one arm dumbell row
3. middle / upper lat
12 - 10 - 8 medium ip weigted chins to front , or:
12 - 10 - 8 closes reverse grip pulldown
(use medium grip pulldowns until you can pull bodyweight)
4 & 5 teres / rhomboid / spine / lower traps / lat thickness
12 - 10 - 8 barbell row
12- 10 - 8 t - bar row
Save training lowerback for hamstring day, great synergy there. So you see you don''t the wide pulldowns as the rows take carry of the teres nicely...
