Hammerstrength High Row
The Hammerstrength High Row is a plate-loaded machine exercise that targets the upper back and lats through a high-to-low pulling motion. It provides chest support to isolate the back muscles while allowing for heavy loading to build thickness and strength.
Since this machine follows a fixed path, our AI focuses heavily on your load management and RPE to ensure progressive overload without compromising recovery. By analyzing your performance data alongside your sleep and HRV, the app can detect when your central nervous system is fatigued and adjust your volume, ensuring you stimulate the large muscles of the back without overtraining. Additionally, if you have a history of lower back pain, the app recognizes this chest-supported variation as a safer alternative to free-weight rows and optimizes your progression accordingly.
Form Cues
- Keep your chest pressed firmly against the pad throughout the entire movement.
- Drive your elbows down and back toward your rear pockets.
- Squeeze your shoulder blades together distinctly at the peak of the contraction.
- Control the weight slowly on the ascent to fully stretch the lats.
- Don't shrug your shoulders up toward your ears as you pull.
- Don't lift your chest off the pad to use momentum to move the weight.
- Don't curl your wrists excessively; keep them neutral to disengage the forearms.
- Don't jerk the handles down explosively at the start of the rep.
Common Mistakes
- Shrugging shoulders at the top
- Lifting chest off the support pad
- Pulling with biceps instead of back
- Using excessive momentum
- Shortening the range of motion
Muscles Worked
This exercise primarily targets the upper back musculature, specifically the trapezius, rhomboids, and the upper and outer portions of the latissimus dorsi. The high-to-low angle emphasizes back width and thickness, while secondary assistance comes from the biceps and rear deltoids.
Primary
Secondary
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