Having a pull-up bar can prove to be one of the best and cheapest investments for the fitness value. They can be one of the best fitness tools to have on hand because pull-ups and chin-ups are one of the best exercises to do when it comes to body weight training. Right now, they have all kinds of pull-up bars, and cheap too. Right now I’m using a pull-up bar made by Iron Gym. For the amount of pull-ups I have already done since buying it and the shape I have already gotten into, it has been a $30 well spent. It’s cheap, well structured (sturdy), and also easy to set up. As opposed to being permanently attached, it simply slides securely over the door frame. And don’t worry, you wont fall and bust your bottom. Trust me, I’ve already tried. Let’s just say it uses leverage to stay put.

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The Pull-Up: If you’re just starting out, you can place your hands anywhere where you feel most comfortable doing them. Typically, you would want to place your grip a little bit wider past your shoulders. If you’re using a pull-up bar at home, make sure the bar is set up high enough so that you bend your knees in a hanging position without your feet touching the floor. If they do, trying to get a workout with your feet touching the ground can be a nuisance. Alright once you get to working out, if you find out that you can’t even do one pull-up, here’s a few techniques you should incorporate.

Don’t get frustrated, just follow my directions. This time around, I want you to grip the bar with your palms facing you. This is called a chin-up. Or if you can’t do one chin-up with your palms facing you, here’s another method you can try doing. Get a stool or chair and place it near under the pull-up bar. Step on the stool and grip onto the pull-up bar. While you are standing on the stool and gripping the pull-up bar, pull yourself up until your head is over the bar completely. Next, let off the stool and and come back down as slow as you possibly can. These are called negatives. Do a set of 10 repetitions, for 3 sets total. As each week passes, keep testing yourself until you can do a pull-up and keep adding more repetitions for negatives.

You can still make good use of a pull-up bar even if you’re not interested in getting into shape with an exercise routine. Here’s something you can do to increase your pull-up strength. About 3-4 times a week, place your pull-up bar between the door of your room and leave it there for the remainder of the day. Now every time you pass it, do one pull-up. Or if you can’t do a pull-up, perform a set of negatives. In no time, you’ll be doing 10-15 pull-ups by the set. Trust me, with hard work and determination, you can reach that goal. But it all depends on you. As mentioned, pull-ups are a great way of to get into shape and can even be used as a solo type exercise to improve your upper body strength and core. Even if you can’t do one pull-up by yourself, use the methods I mentioned above. With hard work, you’ll be doing pull-ups like a navy seal!

I’m going to cover two types of bench presses in this article because there’s a difference in spotting a barbell as opposed to dumbbells. When spotting the barbell bench press, the first thing you want to do is make sure that you have a sturdy base from which to work. This usually involves adopting a nice wide stance with a fair amount of bend in your knees and lowering your center of gravity. You’ll also want to position yourself fairly close to the bar so all you have to do is offer a slight amount of vertical assistance to the weight on the way up. By contrast, keeping your feet together and standing a foot or so behind the bar not only causes you to lean forward excessively, putting strain on your lower back but it also fails to give you the leverage you need in case you have to lift the bar off some one whose lost control of the weight.

You’ll also need to consider your hand spacing. Try to position your hands approximately 12 inches apart in the middle of the bar so that you can give the lifter a nice balanced spot. Never mind this grabbing the bar with one hand garbage. It might look cool, but besides throwing the lifter off balance it can also be incredibly dangerous to those around you. If by some chance the person you’re spotting forgot to use collars, allowing the weight to tip to one side ever so slightly can result in weights flying all over the place. So do us all a favor and always spot with two hands.

How you choose to hold the bar is entirely up to you and often depends on how much weight the lifter is using. The most common way is to use a palms-up, or supinated grip. This way you can just give the slightest bit of assistance with your fingertips, yet still be in good position to grab the bar and help the lifter rack the weight in the event they’re unable to finish the repetition. There are those however who prefer to position themselves directly over the bar and use a palms-down, or pronated grip. This is best suited for someone who is going fairly heavy, since this grip puts you in better position to pull the weight off of him or her if they fail. I should point out though that if someone is using extremely heavy weights it is best to use multiple spotters; with one positioned above the lifter and one at each end of the bar.