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Back
The back is made up of 3 major muscle
groups and as Police Officers it is a good idea that we
strengthen these muscles. Look around your Police Department
and I'm sure there are many Police Officers who suffer from or
have suffered from a bad back. In Police work we put our
back under stress because
we wear a lot of heavy gear, we do a lot of
tasks where we pull, pick, up & carry heavy objects, and
we spend a lot of time sitting in our cruisers and after many
years we can experience back problems. A way to combat
this is to strengthen your back by incorporating some of the
exercises depicted below. .
The wide grip chin up is the best exercise for
developing your back and it is very easy to do. No weights are
needed as you are using your body as the weight. Take a
grip on the chin up bar with a wide grip which should be
greater than shoulder width. The starting position is from the
hanging position and then you power yourself up to the bar and
bring your chin up and over the top of the bar.
Don't be alarmed if you start doing these and
find that you can only do a few reps. Keep doing chin-ups
every week and in no time you will increase the number of reps
that you can do. What I like about this move is that you can
really feel your lats (2 muscles on the left and right side of
your back) working throughout the exercise. Try and get 3 sets
with 8-12 reps for each set..
Next you will want to do the lat pull down
with a wide grip bar as shown in the picture below. You
can do either the front lat pull down which is done by pulling
the bar down in front of your chest or the rear lat pull down
which is done by pulling the bar to the back of your
neck. Both movements are great for the back and they
each hit the lat muscles in a slightly different angle.
One arm dumbbell rows are excellent for
working each side of your lat muscles individually. Good
form is key with this move and you don't want to jerk or throw
the weight up to the top position. This movement needs
to be smooth and controlled and you will feel your lat muscle
getting worked. An overlooked aspect of this move is that on
the way down towards the floor with the dumbbell you want to
stretch your lat muscle. This is achieved by lowering
the weight almost all the way to the floor to the point where
you feel your lat muscle getting a good stretch.
Finish the beginner workout with the seated
cable row which is also depicted below. As you can see
by the illustration this movement gives the lats a real good
stretch if done properly. You will start the movement by
leaning forward to grab the cable bar and then power the bar
back to your lower chest. While you pull the bar back
towards your chest you are extending your legs and your upper
torso is leaning slightly backwards.
As you become a more experienced you can throw
in some of the other movements depicted below like the t-bar
row and bent over barbell row. There are more movements for
the back that we will explore later in the advanced
routines. In Police work our backs take a lot of abuse
so help your back by exercising it once per week and you just
may avoid a back injury down the road.
Warm up with 2 sets of lat
pulls-down for 15 reps each set
Lat pull-downs - 3 sets for 8-12 reps
each set
One arm dumbbell rows- 3 sets 8-12 reps each
set
Seated cable rows - 3 sets 8-12 reps each
set
Chin-ups - 3 sets 8-12 reps each set
Lat pull-down behind the
neck
One arm dumbbell
rows
Bent over barbell
rows
Seated cable rows
T-Bar rows
Lat pull-downs to the
front
Chin-ups
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