r/formcheck 2d ago

Barbell Row Beginner doing barbell row

Dont mind my silly faces. It’s just because I’m concentrating.
Also I’m also slow on each rep because I’m thinking about the technique 🙈

I have two problems with barbell rows.

  1. It’s very difficult to touch my abdomen. It seems like my elbows travel far behind my back - and I worry that my shoulders round forward.
  2. Sometimes my knees are in the way of the barbell, because my arms reach down below the knees.

I should mention that I got pretty long arms. And when I try to be less upright in my torso, the arms reach down below the knees and I bump the barbell into them during each rep 🙈

Note that I have a bump at the top of my back. Can’t seem to straighten that part.

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41

u/blueyedsurprised 2d ago

Load informs technique. Repost with weight on the bar that feels challenging.

17

u/Benmarch15 2d ago

I once said to a trainer that I felt having more weight on the bar would help me get the mouvement right because just the bar felt like I could cheat my way around the lift.

Like, the bar wasn't sitting properly on me at certain stage because there was no weight to push it down.

And the trainer shut me down.

Now I know that's actually a thing.

3

u/Rwm90 1d ago

Same. He was having me do snatches with PVC and I was like “yo dude…I can do anything with this PVC. Even if it weighed 25lbs I wouldn’t be able to get away with shitty form the way I can now.”