In his prime, Dorian Yates had one of the best backs you would ever see on stage. Now he has decided to impart of some his wisdom so you can have a back as peeled as his.
As a six time winner of the Mr. Olympia, there is no denying that Yates is one of the best to ever do it. His list of accomplishments is long throughout the course of his near decade and a half long career.
Following his retirement from competition in 1997, Dorian has maintained his role as a crucial member of the sport. He has been a bit of an ambassador for bodybuilding, as well as being a gym owner himself.
Related: Dorian Yates Hits Kettlebells With Intense At-Home Workout
Recently, Dorian Yates decided to share some tips to help younger athletes sculpt their back in a way that will bring them serious success. He posted those tips to Instagram, so that anyone can use the advice.
Dorian Yates’s Tips For A Better Back
The key thing that Yates feels most people get wrong with working their back, is bad technique. He says that getting the proper form on everything is key.
“To build a complete back, you need to work all of the back muscles using an array of exercises that target these muscles.
“Technique is crucial to target the lats and I see 99% of people in the gym doing this incorrectly.”
He says that it is important to do your best to maximize every single rep that you complete. This will give you the best results with each workout, so that you can see the most gains possible.
Yates has some good workouts to help boost your back workouts too. When he was training with his son recently, he explained the benefits of using close grip pulldowns and single arm dumbbell rows to work the lats.
“Starting off with close grip pulldowns which allows for a greater range of motion for the lats. Then moving into single arm dumbbell rows with perfect, strict form to failure.”
There is another key part of workouts that Dorian Yates feels a lot of people lack in. He says that a lot of beginners make the mistake of putting too much focus into the concentric portion of the rep but not the eccentric parts.
This is a tip that is good for more than just back workouts, and applies to any workout. However when putting this method into your back sessions, it will help to really boost your lats and delts.
“The single biggest mistake that most beginners make is putting 100% of their effort into the positive (concentric) part of the rep, while paying no attention to the negative (eccentric) segment.
The negative portion of the rep should ideally take twice as long to complete than the positive portion, the most muscle damage actually occurs during the negative part so it is best practice to try to emphasise this.”
If you take these tips from Dorian Yates, you will certainly be able to make some serious gains on your back. This will easily take your back workouts to the next level.
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