Contrary to popular belief you only need a few barbell back exercises to fully develop the back. Quite often you’ll see online trainers advocating niche variations of popular back movements, in order to stand out from the crowd. In my decades of training, and coaching, I reliably come back to the same five barbell back exercises for strength and mass. Keep reading to see which exercises made the list, as well as how to put together a great back workout.
As the name implies, we’ll only be discussing the top 5 barbell back exercises. That doesn’t mean that there are no other movements with dumbbells or machines that are worthwhile. It means that these are the movements that I think give you the most bang for your buck, if you only have a barbell available. Here’s a quick overview of the best back exercises.
Top 5 Best Barbell Back Exercises
- Pendlay Row
- Meadows Row
- Chest Supported Row
- Barbell Deadlift
- High Rep Olympic Lifting
I think it’s important to note that this list of the best barbell back exercises isn’t in rank order. However, I can tell you that I most often program the Pendlay Row, and the chest-supported row for upper back development. I find these barbell movements provide very specific benefits, which need to be understood to program correctly. Let’s get to the first movement. Before we do that don’t forget to join the email list below.
Join the Email List
Pendlay Row
This is my favorite bent-over barbell row variation. This exercise was designed by Coach Glen Pendlay to develop upper back strength and power, for olympic lifting. I like this barbell row derivative because it helps develop upper body pulling power, which is often neglected.
Most row variations like bent-over rows, have a long time under tension, which is great for building a muscular back. It is less than ideal for power production, which is defined as moving a weight quickly. If you’re interested in building strength and power, then this is a good row option for you.
If you watch the video you’ll see the starting position is key. Moreover, it can vary based on your bodies proportions. What might be good form for one person wouldn’t work for another. As long as you keep your back flat, and your shoulder blades retracted, in the starting position, you’ll be successful with this movement.
It’s also important to note that while you will be lifting heavy weights, you don’t need maximal load here. Lighter weights are ok, as long as you move them as fast as possible. Here’s a quick tutorial
One of the primary benefits of this row variation is that it causes less back soreness than other row options on this list. This happens because you’re not using your Latissimus Dorsi to stabilize the weight during the lowering phase. You’re just controlling the weight all the way to the ground, not actively lowering it. This is also the reason you can generally use more weight on this exercise.
Lastly, I like this move because it limits the amount of cheating you can do with your lower back. You can go into any gym, and you’ll inevitably see some dude with way too much weight, using his lower back to lift the weight. I like to call this the kipping row. It’s a waste of time, don’t do it!
If you want an awesome fitness program designed to increase muscle growth, then check this out.
Meadows Row
One of my constant gripes with other fitness programs, is the lack of unilateral movement. Single arm or single leg movements are crucial to develop functional strength. I don’t know about you, but most heavy things in the real world aren’t perfectly balanced and easy to grasp!
This is where the Meadows Row really shines. It allows you to work specific upper back muscles like your mid trapezius muscles, rear deltoids, and your rhomboids, as well as your lats. Here is a quick technique video.
If you don’t have a landmine attachment, you can use a 5 pound plate on one end, this acts as the pivot point for this landmine row variation. It can take a little bit of practice before you get your hand placement just right. Don’t be afraid to experiment. You can even find some benefit with an underhanded or supinated grip as well.
Make sure you use full range of motion. You can also reap more benefit from this movement by focusing on your mind-muscle connection. The Meadows row is more about feeling the muscles of the back work on each rep, than just moving some weight plates around. Next we’ll talk about the chest supported row.
Chest Supported Row
This is my best exercise for upper back muscle mass. The most common variant of this is something like T-Bar rows. You can also elevate an adjustable bench, that you might use for bench press, as you’ll see in the video. More recently, we’ve seen a lot of companies making Pritchett Pads so you can barbell row with chest support. Here’s a tutorial.
This exercise allows you to really focus on using your upper back muscles to their fullest potential. Because your chest is supported, you can’t use your lower back to cheat the weight up. I also recommend that athletes experiment with using straps to assist their grip, on the heaviest sets. This is a back exercise, not a grip exercise! Next we’ll talk about the most common, and arguably most effective movement.
Barbell Deadlift
The standard conventional deadlift is the most common back exercise, that targets the lower back muscles. It’s a great way to work the entire posterior chain, from your hamstrings, to your glutes, and spinal erectors. It also utilizes your upper back muscles, like your traps, and lats to stabilize the load. It’s one of the best barbell exercises to build overall strength. It’s even better if you use a hex bar!
Because you can load the movements quite heavily, I find it’s best done with lower reps. Sure, you can use higher reps to get some hypertrophy benefit, but it incurs a high recover cost when used that way. I invite you to think about the times when your back has been the most sore. I bet high rep deadlifts were involved! Here’s a quick overview of this excellent movement.
If you want a good rep scheme that touches on strength and hypertrophy, you might try one of my favorite strength protocols (8,5,3,2,1). While you can find specific percentages in my programs, it’s fairly self explanatory. You start in the 70% range, and finish above 90% of your 1 RM.
I’ve found that this really targets a lot of major muscle groups, without incurring so much muscular damage, as to take too long to recover from. Remember, you need to trigger the strength and muscle building response with as little work as possible. If you blast your muscles with too much volume, then you’re just delaying your next back workout. Next we’ll talk about the most controversial option on this list.
If you want a fitness program designed to build strength with your barbell lifts, then this is for you.
High Rep Olympic Lifting
Traditional strength and conditioning coaches scream every time you mention high rep olympic lifting. To be honest, their logic is faulty. Most commonly you’ll hear them say that olympic lifting is designed for max power. That is correct in the way they use it. However, it can also build a lot of back strength, and size when done in higher rep schemes.
This logic is akin to saying you can never jog because running is meant to be a sprint. Well, I clearly can jog, and it has great cardiovascular benefit. They also claim that it causes injury. I can tell you that in my years of coaching I’ve never seen someone injure themselves on lighter, high rep olympic lifting. Where as I’ve commonly seen athletes injure themselves on heavy deadlifts. This is why I often recommend using a hex bar.
It goes without saying that you must use correct form, with all of these movements. If you’re comfortable with power cleans and power snatches, you’ll find that sets of 10 or higher can really build a lot of muscular size in your traps and shoulders. That’s primarily why you see CrossFit athletes with great trap development. In the next section let’s review how to create great back workouts, using some of these best barbell back exercises.
Constructing a Back Workout
In this section I’m going to review some simple rules of thumb that I use when creating a strength or muscle building program. The most common mistake that athletes make is building too much volume into any one back workout.
If you read this article about strength training volume, or this one on bodybuilding volume, you’ll understand that most athletes only need 10-15 sets per body part, per week. Newer athletes can get by with less volume. More experienced athletes could go up to 20 or sets per week, for a few months at a time.
Using these movements I might build a workout that looks like this. After my warm up, I would start with deadlift, working up to 3×3 at 80% of 1RM. I would then do a few warm up sets with my next barbell movement, the Pendlay Row.
I would keep the Pendlay Row to 4 sets of 6-9 reps, with a load that allows me to maintain a fast barbell velocity on all reps. Remember this row variation is for power.
For functional fitness athletes, I would then do a WOD that uses higher rep olympic weight lifting and an unrelated movement. Think, 21-15-9 hang power snatch at 95 pounds, paired with toes to bar.
For non functional fitness athletes I would skip the WOD and recommend a more specific upper back movement, the Meadows Row. I would do 3 sets of 8-12 reps with proper form. This example workout would yield 10 sets.
Intermediate athletes could do this workout once per week and be within their ideal volume range to build strength and back muscle. Advanced athletes would have to do another session later on to stimulate muscle growth. Sometimes it sucks to be a good lifter! Now let’s finish this article about the best barbell back exercises.
Final Thoughts
In order to build muscle mass and strength, for more than a few months, you must be smart with your exercise rotation. Quite often athletes find a few movements that they really like, and then stick with them for the rest of their life. That’s cool if your name is Jerry and you wear ankle warmers, but that won’t yield consistent results.
I recommend sticking with the same exercises for 4-8 weeks and then rotating. Personally, I find I do better with a 4 week rotation. However, newer athletes can benefit from a slower rotational pace, as they have less experience with each movement.
I also recommend that you take one set of each movement close to failure. Going to failure on all sets is too much. You do need to take a few sets of each workout to momentary failure. Intermediate and advanced athletes need this intensity to make progress. Newbies can get by with less difficulty.
If you have any comments or questions about your next back day, put them in the comments section. Don’t forget to join the email list below.
The opinions and information expressed in this article are solely those of the author and are not affiliated with any corporation, group, public or private entity. This web site is not endorsed by, directly affiliated with, maintained, authorized, or sponsored by Crossfit Inc. All product and company names are the registered trademarks of their original owners. The use of any trade name or trademark is for identification and reference purposes only and does not imply any association with the trademark holder of their product brand.
Any links to Amazon are affiliate links. That means they pay us a referral fee if you purchase from them after clicking. It costs you nothing and helps us keep the lights on here. Thanks!
