Pull Up Study

11.August 2020

A first experiment consisted of a subject performing 10 sets of pull-ups to failure with 3 minutes of rest. The purpose was to increase body temperature to test the parameters of heat extraction from the hand. One day, after completing 10 sets and cooling down at the end of the workout, the subject went back to the bar and did the same number of pull-ups as in the first set, which amazed the researchers and led them to find that muscle fatigue disappeared with cooling.

After this discovery, the format of the experiment changed and the subject was cooled down after the 10th set for the next 6 weeks (with 2 workouts per week). Over this 6-week study period, the subject increased his total number of pull-ups from 100 to 180 in one workout.

Over the next 6 weeks, the subject cooled down during the 3-minute rest period after every other set within a workout (except on control days). The subject improved from 180 pull-ups to 616 pull-ups, a percentage increase of 342%.

When analyzing the study, it became clear that the most significant gains were seen on days with cooling rather than control days. The researchers also noted the strong conditioning effect, whereby the increased performance levels during the study period were also maintained during the control period without cooling.