One-Arm Pull-Up

Technique

How to perform One-Arm Pull-Up

1. Stand beneath a sturdy pull‑up bar and grasp it with your working hand. Let your free arm rest across your torso or hang for balance.
2. Engage your core, squeeze your glutes, and depress the working‑side shoulder to create a solid, hollow body line. This is your starting position.
3. Exhale as you initiate the pull by “tucking” your elbow tight to your rib cage.
4. Keep it pulling toward your midline the entire way up. This angle recruits the lower lats and the pec on that side, turning the movement into a powerful chest‑assisted row rather than a wide‑flared pull.
5. Continue pulling until your elbow passes behind you and your chest shifts slightly toward the bar, allowing your chin to clear the bar (or the bar to contact your shoulder).
6. Pause here, feeling the intense squeeze through your lats, biceps, and the engaged pec.
7. Inhale as you lower under strict control maintaining shoulder depression and keeping the elbow grazing your torso all the way down until your arm is fully extended.
8. Reset, then repeat for the prescribed reps, switching arms as required while always emphasizing the close‑in, cross‑body elbow path for maximal strength and joint safety.

GymDaze demonstration

Watch One-Arm Pull-Up

Programming relevance

Muscles involved

Primary targets: Latissimus Dorsi, Biceps Brachii Long Head, Biceps Brachii Short Head, Brachialis.

Calisthenics graph

Progression relationships

These relationships describe graph position, not personal readiness.