For decades, women have been steered towards cardio while men claimed the pull-up rig, cementing a myth that female anatomy cannot handle the bar.
But the rig cares about mechanics, not gender. Elite trainers dismantle the lie that women cannot do pull-ups, proving that mastering your own body weight is purely a matter of relative strength and progressive training.
The idea that only men should use the gym’s pull-up bar is slowly fading away.
"The National" reached out to these trainers on the front lines of functional fitness for women to dismantle the noise. The consensus is clear: the bar doesn’t care about your gender; it cares about your mechanics.
Anatomy vs adaptation
"Anatomically, there is nothing inherently about being a woman that makes a pull-up impossible," explains Ntokozo Mthembu, a high-performance personal trainer known to thousands on social media as Savage Bodies.
"Heck, I’ve been privileged enough to witness a female client progress from an inverted row to a single pull-up, so I’ll reiterate and say no again."
The reality of breaking news in the fitness world isn't that women lack the capacity, but that gym culture has historically directed women toward the cardio floor while men monopolised the rigs. This has created a profound training gap rather than a biological barrier.
"Generally speaking though, women tend to have less upper body muscle mass and a lower upper body strength-to-bodyweight ratio, which can make pulling movements like pull-ups more challenging," Mthembu notes.
"Interestingly enough, they tend to excel with lower body workouts. The strength gap between men and women is also much smaller in the lower body than it is in the upper body."
This is where the brutal mathematics of relative strength training comes into play. A pull-up is an unforgiving mirror; it demands that your upper back hoist every single kilogram of your total body mass.
"A pull-up isn’t just about how strong your back is; you’re asking your upper body to move your entire body weight," Mthembu warns.
"So you can actually be strong, but if you don’t have enough strength relative to your bodyweight, that first pull-up is going to be a bitch."
Personal trainer Phelo Dandala echoes this sentiment, cutting straight through the social conditioning.
"No, it’s not harder for women to do pull-ups. It’s just that most women tend not to train their upper bodies as they would their lower bodies. As much as a man might have bigger shoulders and a bigger back anatomically, that doesn’t give them an advantage for proper execution."
Tsepang Mokoena aka Master, a group exercise instructor at Virgin Active, said, "There is no exercise that is strictly for men. Any exercise can be done by everyone. Anyone can do any exercise at any given chance, anywhere, anyhow.
"So the thing is, the pride, as I call it, pride or what, I don't know. People are scared to do some things. People see things as they are specifically for a certain gender."
Common mistakes to avoid
Many people in the gym try to make the exercise look easy by taking shortcuts, but this doesn't help you get stronger. To get the most out of a pull-up, you need to use a full, smooth motion.
Here are the three most common mistakes people make:
- Shortcutting the movement: This happens when you don't go all the way up or all the way down. You should pull yourself up until your chin is clearly over the bar and lower yourself until your arms are straight. If you do half the work, you get half the results.
- Wobbling and losing control: If you don't keep your stomach muscles tight, your body will swing around. Staying stiff and controlled makes it much easier for your back muscles to pull you up efficiently. Your midsection acts like an anchor for the rest of your body.
- Using momentum to "swing" up: Some people kick their legs or swing their hips to throw themselves over the bar. While this is a specific skill used in some sports, it’s often just a way to hide a lack of strength. If you want to master a real pull-up, you should be able to lift yourself using only your upper body strength without any kicking.
The blueprint to the bar
Mthembu, who jokingly refers to himself as a "push-up cult leader," outlines a foolproof, three-step progressive track to bridge the gap:
1. Scapular push-ups: These help develop scapular control and teach you to actively move and stabilise your shoulder blades rather than simply hanging passively from the shoulders. Your shoulder blades are supposed to move during a pull-up. The goal isn't to keep them rigidly pinned down and back.
2. Negative pull-ups: These build strength through the lowering phase of the actual pull-up movement and help you get used to controlling your bodyweight. They're one of the most specific ways to bridge the gap between assisted and strict pull-ups.
3. Inverted rows: They strengthen the lats, biceps, upper back, and core, while allowing you to control the difficulty simply by changing your body position and foot placement.
And don't forget grip strength. You can have the back strength to pull, but if your grip gives up before your back does, you're not getting that rep. Dead hangs and other grip work can be useful depending on where the person is struggling.
“So no, I don't buy the whole 'women can't do pull-ups' argument, Mthembu concludes.
"Give someone the right progression, build their relative strength, improve their technique, and give their body enough time to adapt. The pull-up isn't a male exercise. It's a strength exercise."
vuyile.madwantsi@nationalmg.co.za