Muscles worked
With the close handles, your elbows travel back tight to your body, and your lats do a large share of the work. Your mid traps and rhomboids pull your shoulder blades together at the end, with help from your rear shoulders, biceps and brachialis. The machine guides the path, and if it has a chest pad, your lower back does not have to carry your torso. A neutral grip, palms facing each other, tends to feel kind on wrists and elbows.
Common mistakes
- The seat is at the wrong height. Too low or too high and you pull at an angle, up towards your throat or down towards your thighs. Set it so the handles are level with your lower chest when your arms are straight.
- Turning back before your arms are straight. Under a heavy weight, many people reverse halfway out and train only the inner part of the pull. Let your arms straighten and your shoulder blades spread slightly before the next pull.
- Your elbows drift out to the sides. As you tire, your elbows tend to flare and the row becomes a different exercise. Let them brush past your ribs and drive them back in a straight line.
Variations and alternatives
- The close grip seated cable row has the same grip without a fixed path, so you also train holding your torso still.
- The wide grip machine row when you want to shift the work towards your upper back and rear shoulders.
- The dumbbell row when the machine is taken, working one side at a time.
Sets and reps
To build muscle, 8 to 12 reps over three or four sets is typical, and 6 to 8 reps works well when you want to go heavier. As the finish to a back session, 12 to 20 reps fits. The guide to sets and reps explains how the ranges differ.
The machine holds you in place, so you can go down to one or zero reps in reserve on the last set. Note the seat and chest pad settings alongside the weight, or the numbers will not compare between sessions. Add reps until you reach the top of the range on every set, then move up one step. That is what progressive overload looks like on a machine.