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Barbell vs Dumbbell Rows

Very often in seminars or internships I get the following question asked in one form or the other:

I have not seen you mention barbells rows in your workouts. Agreed, most people do not perform them correctly, but what are your reasons to ignore this great exercise? Could you provide a quick primer to barbell rows just in case I get bored by chin-ups?

The reason that I don’t mention barbell rows is simply that I don’t believe they are a great upper back exercise, even when performed correctly. Why? Because there is is too much neural drive expended in firing the muscles involved in maintaining the postural aspect of the exercise. There is a great neuromuscular demand on firing the erector spinae, glutes and hamstrings at the same time- so much that the level of recruitment finally left over for the lats is too minimal to be worth it.

I would rather stick to variations of one arm dumbbell rows. To develop optimal structural balance, I strongly believe that for every set of chin-up done, one should a set of dumbbell rows (for both arms, of course). One arm dumbbell rows allow for even distribution of the load on both upper extremities, and great range of motion (particularly for the scapulae retractors). I can hear the functionalist cult already on their soap box: “What about function? This is a primary movement”. My answer to that is: if you already did a good job in the loading parameters for the squat and deadlift exercises, why overtrain the posterior chain?

One thing with dumbbell rows is that you need some heavy ones for your strong athletes.  Having thick handles ones, like the ones made by http://blackironstrength.com/somewhat reduces the need for a heavy load by 10-15% depending on hand size, but builds more transferable strength to the sporting World.