Written by Patrick Dale, PT, ex-Marine

Chest Supported Cable Rows (Credit: My PT Hub/YouTube)

Variety, they say, is the spice of life. That expression holds true when talking about the food you eat, your circle of friends, your job, and, of course, your workout.

In the same way that you’d get bored of eating the same meal over and over, your muscles get bored of doing the same old workout routine and will stop getting bigger and stronger as a result.

For that reason, smart bodybuilders make small changes to their workouts more or less weekly and bigger changes every 4-8 weeks or so.

This ensures that your muscles never becomes completely accustomed to any workout or exercise and continue to get bigger and stronger over time.

For that reason, it’s imperative that you keep on adding new exercises to your workout library. That way, as one exercise starts to lose its potency, you can simply slot another exercise into your program to maintain your progress.

So, if you’ve been doing pulldowns and bent-over rows for as long as you can remember, it’s definitely time to upgrade your back workout with a new exercise. In this article, we reveal why and how to do the incline bench cable row.

The incline bench cable row is a compound or multijoint exercise for your upper back. As such, it involves movement at multiple joints and uses several muscles.

The main muscles trained during incline bench cable rows are:

Latissimus dorsi – located on the side of your upper back, the lats give your back most of its width. In fact, when fully developed, the lats look a little like wings. The lats have two main functions: shoulder extension and shoulder adduction. They’re also involved in the medial or inward rotation of the shoulder joint.

Trapezius – the traps are a large diamond-shaped muscle that covers much of your upper back. It’s made up of three sets of fibers: upper, middle, and lower. While all three sets of fibers work during incline bench cable rows, the middle and lower traps are most active.

Deltoids – the deltoids are your shoulder muscles. There are three deltoid regions or heads: anterior (front), medial (middle), and posterior (rear). All three are involved in incline bench cable rows, but the rear delts are the most active.

Biceps – located on the front of your upper arm, the biceps are responsible for flexing your elbows during incline bench cable rows. In this exercise, the biceps are classed as synergists or helpers because they are NOT the primary target muscle.

Get more from incline bench cable rows while keeping your risk of injury to a minimum by following these guidelines:

This exercise works best with light to medium weights and low to moderate reps. Focus on smooth, controlled movements and keeping constant tension on your upper back. Using heavy weights will invariably lead to cheating and take work away from the target muscles.

Not sure if incline bench cable rows are worth your time and energy? Consider these benefits and then decide!

While incline bench cable rows are a mostly beneficial exercise, there is also a drawback to consider:

Incline bench cable rows are a highly effective upper back and lat exercise, but that doesn’t mean you need to do them all the time. There are several variations and alternatives you can use to keep your workouts productive and interesting:

Seated cable rows are very similar to incline bench rows. Still, instead of a bench supporting your upper body, you must use your lower back to hold you in position. Most gyms have a seated cable row machine, and this exercise is a very popular back builder.

Related: Seated Cable Row Alternative Exercises For Building A Massive Back

Face pulls are another cable upper back exercise. However, where incline bench cable rows are mostly a lat exercise, face pulls emphasize your trapezius and rhomboids. Face pulls are an excellent exercise for improving your posture and the perfect antidote to prolonged sitting and slouching.

Inverted rows, also known as Australian pull-ups, train the same muscles as incline bench rows. However, this is a bodyweight exercise, so it may be more convenient for some people. All you need for inverted rows is a waist-high bar to hang from, a suspension trainer, or a set of gymnastic rings.

Seal row have nothing to do with Navy Special Forces and even less to do with the animal. In fact, it’s hard to see why seal rows are called seal rows! Regardless, this freeweight back exercise is similar to incline bench cable rows and ideal for anyone who prefers lifting barbells and dumbbells to training with cables.

The chest-supported T-bar row is almost identical to the incline bench cable row. The only difference is that the cable variation tends to keep your muscles under constant tension.

In fact, it appears that incline bench cable rows were invented as a way of doing chest-supported T-bar rows when no such machine was available.

Single-arm dumbbell rows might not look much like incline bench cable rows. Still, they share a very important characteristic – both provide your lower back with extra support. When you do single-arm dumbbell rows, you can use your free hand to hold your body in optimal alignment, making them more back-friendly than regular bent-over rows.

You can also do this exercise with very heavy weights and a little more body English, which is an exercise called Kroc rows.

You don’t have to lean your chest against a bench to take the stress off your lower back during rows. The Pendlay row, invented by US weightlifting and powerlifting coach Glen Pendlay, starts and finishes with the barbell resting on the floor, which gives your back a brief rest between reps.

This back and grip-friendly rowing exercise should allow you to lift heavy weights with relative safety.

Related: How To Build Your Best Back Ever With Pendlay Rows

The Yates row is another lower back-friendly bent-over rowing exercise. It was invented by multi-Olympia winner Dorian Yates. The Yates row involves less forward lean than traditional bent-over rows, which, according to Yates, means not just less low back stress but a better workout for your lats and upper back.

Related: Yates Row Exercise Guide: Muscles Worked, How-to, Benefits, and Variations

While there is nothing wrong with building your back workouts around staples like pulldowns and regular rows, you can have too much of a good thing. Doing the same exercises over and over can soon become boring, and that means less productive workouts.

The good news is that there are plenty of other exercises you can use to build the back of your dreams, and now you have a new one to add to your workout library – incline bench cable rows.

Try it; we think you’re going to like it!

Patrick Dale is an ex-British Royal Marine, gym owner, and fitness qualifications tutor and assessor. In addition, Patrick is a freelance writer who has authored three fitness and exercise books, dozens of e-books, thousands of articles, and several fitness videos. He’s not just an armchair fitness expert; Patrick practices what he preaches! He has competed at a high level in numerous sports, including rugby, triathlon, rock climbing, trampolining, powerlifting, and, most recently, stand up paddleboarding. When not lecturing, training, researching, or writing, Patrick is busy enjoying the sunny climate of Cyprus, where he has lived for the last 20-years.

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