Intermediate

Jumping Muscle-Up

The jumping muscle-up lets you practice the full muscle-up path with your legs taking part of the load, which is ideal for grooving the transition before you own a strict rep. Using a bar or rings set around standing reach, you jump to add momentum through the sticking point while your lats, biceps, and chest learn the turnover. Gradually reduce the leg drive to shift more work onto the arms as you get stronger.

Equipment
Pull-Up Bar
Body part
Biceps, Lats
Type
Strength
Browse by movement
Squat, Vertical Press, Vertical Pull
Muscles worked
Target
Latissimus Dorsi, Biceps Brachii Long Head, Biceps Brachii Short Head
Secondary
Pectoralis Major Sternocostal, Triceps Brachii Long Head, Deltoid Anterior
Tertiary
Trapezius Lower, Abdominal External Oblique

How to do it

  1. 1

    Stand under a bar or rings set at about standing reach and take your grip.

  2. 2

    Bend the knees and jump up while pulling hard, driving the hands toward your lower chest.

  3. 3

    Use the upward momentum to rotate the elbows over the bar or rings and lean the torso forward.

  4. 4

    Press out of the transition to lock the arms out in full support on top.

  5. 5

    Lower under control to the hang and reset, using less jump as you progress.

Tips

  • Time the pull with the jump so the momentum carries you through the turnover, not before it.
  • Keep the bar or rings close to the body during the transition rather than pushing them away.
  • Reduce the leg assistance over time to bias more of the work onto the upper body.

Variations

Common mistakes

  • Bar height decides what exercise this is: a bar well above your reach turns it into a jumping pull-up, and one at chest height means you never hang and never press out of anything.
  • The feet never really leave the floor, so the rep becomes a standing press off the ground with the legs grinding away underneath. If you cannot get airborne, lower the bar and jump properly.
  • A mistimed jump puts your chest or chin into the bar at speed. Stand close enough that the bar travels up the front of your body, and bail by letting go and landing on both feet.
  • On rings set at standing reach the feet start walking up a wall or the straps, and the drill becomes a climb rather than a turnover.
  • Twenty reps get written into a workout because the legs make them possible, and a tired jumping muscle-up is a scramble through the one position this drill exists to teach.
  • The grip gets taken with bent arms from a standing start, so the rep begins halfway up and the bottom of the pull is never trained. Stand tall, hang with straight arms, then bend the knees.

Frequently asked

How many jumping muscle-ups should you do when you are new to the exercise?
Five or six sets of 3 reps with 90 seconds of rest, treated as skill practice rather than conditioning, two or three times a week. Before starting, own 8 to 10 strict pull-ups and 8 to 10 dips, or the top half will be a scramble no amount of jumping fixes. Progress by shrinking the jump: start from a quarter squat, then a shallow knee bend, then a small ankle hop, then try one with no jump at all. Lower through the transition on every rep.
What can I use instead of a bar at standing reach for jumping muscle-ups?
Rings hung so the bottom sits at head height work, and they let you keep the feet on the floor and take as much weight through the legs as you want, which is the most adjustable version there is. A low bar in a squat rack, set anywhere from chest to head height, does the same job. Without either, split the skill: chest-to-bar pull-ups on whatever bar you have, straight-bar or parallel-bar dips for the press-out, and slow negatives from a supported top position to learn the turnover.
What is the jumping muscle-up good for, and when is it a poor choice?
It is the most efficient way to practise the transition, the part of the muscle-up that stops nearly everyone, because the legs carry you through it often enough to learn the shape. It suits anyone working toward a first bar or ring muscle-up. It is a poor choice for building strength, since the legs remove most of the load, and a poor workout movement for high reps, where it becomes a thrash with your face near the bar. It is also wrong if you cannot yet do several strict pull-ups and dips.

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