Ring Pull-up / Chin-up

 Main muscle worked: Back

 Other muscles worked: Biceps

 Equipment: Rings

 Mechanics Type: Compound

 Exercise Instructions: Ring Pull-up / Chin-up

1. Adjust the height of the rings so that your feet will not touch the ground between repetitions.
2. Stand under the rings and grip them with either an overhand (for the pull-up), or underhand (for the chin-up) hand position. The free movement of the rings means that your grip does not have to be strictly one position or the other, and it may change throughout the exercise.
3. Keep your arms straight and simply hang off the rings, keeping your body vertical.
4. Pull your chest up toward the rings by bending your arms. Keep the movement smooth, slow and controlled and try not o jerk any muscles as you pull-up.
5. Pause for a moment at the top of the exercise before you start lowering yourself back down.
6. Slowly lower yourself toward the starting position. 
7. Once you are lowered back to the hanging position, pause, and repeat the exercise.

Notes:

• Throughout the exercise keep your torso straight, legs together, and shoulders relaxed. 
• Minimise any rocking or swaying movements.
• Practice the false grip pull-up to strengthen your wrists and prepare for the muscle-up.

 Exercise Information: Ring Pull-up / Chin-up

The pull-up is an incredibly effective exercise and the ring pull-up even more so. It's one of the best ways to build upper-body strength and it is commonly said by many professional trainers that if you could only do one upper body exercise, to make it pull-ups. It's a fundamental movement which demonstrates you have the strength to lift your own body weight.

Many people buy fitness rings primarily for pull-ups, which have many benefits over using a standard static pull-up bar. Whilst a bar or pull-up station will lock your hands in place and limit shoulder mobility, using gymnastic rings for pull-ups will exploit the free movement of the rings and makes the motion more natural and kinder on the joints.

It is common that many people will also find that they can achieve more repetitions using rings for pull-ups than a fixed bar and even some people who have previously injured their shoulders and find it difficult to do pull-ups on a fixed bar can use rings to do the exercise.

During a ring pull-up you will usually find that the rings rotate and your hand position can change from more of an overhand, pull-up style grip into a underhand chin-up position. Whatever feels most natural and enables you to safely complete full range repetitions is recommended, but hand position will call different muscles into play. When palms are facing you (chin-up) it will target the biceps and lats more, whilst palms away from you (pull-up) focuses more upon upper back muscles.

It's also worth noting that the rings distance apart will determine the difficulty and targeted muscle area also. The greater the distance between the rings, the wider the grip, which will focus work on the lateral muscles, whilst a narrower grip will work the middle back muscles.

 Exercise variations:

Wide ring pull-ups

Narrow ring pull-ups

Muscle-up

One-arm ring pull-ups

 Beginners

The pull-up is not an easy exercise and a lot of people can't even do one full repetition, but there are techniques to help you develop the necessary strength.

Assisted pull-ups

One technique is assisted pull-up's - in which something is supporting a portion of your body weight to help make the exercise more achievable. As you get stronger you can gradually work your way up to performing the exercise using your full body weight.

This can be as simple as using a box, chair or bench. Place the object underneath the rings and place one foot on the object and have the other leg hanging freely. As you lift yourself, straighten the supported leg for assistance. Use as little assistance as possible.

Resistance bands

Many people have had success using fitness / resistance bands to help achieve the same thing. Essentially using heavy duty fitness bands to help support part of your body weight during the pull-up exercise. These are available at fitness stores and come in various thicknesses.

Thread the bands through the rings so the loops hang at knee level. As you hang from the rings put your feet into the elastic loops and the bands will now work to support some of your weight as you do the pull-up. The thicker the bands used the easier the pull-up will be.

Negative pull-ups

Another option is to specifically train the negative pull-up, which is the lowering portion of the pull-up exercise. Stand on a bench to get to the top of the exercise and simply lower yourself down as slow as possible to help build the muscles required for the full pull-up.

Body Row

Try practicing the Ring Body Row, an exercise which uses similar muscles to the pull-up but is much easier to do.

 Experts

Weighted vest

If you are pull-up master and looking for new challenges try introducing a weighted vest into the exercise. A weighted vest is a great way to increase the body weight used during the exercise and can help you develop phenomenal strength. Just make sure you have quality fitness rings that can support the entire load.

Muscle-up

A natural progression from the pull-up is the muscle-up. The muscle-up is an awesome upper-body exercise that begins as a pull-up exercise and ends with your body being above the rings.