Lats & Pole Dancing: Debunking Myths

Written By Randi Fentress

In this episode of 'Science of Slink,' Dr. Rosy Boa addresses common misconceptions about the role of the Latissimus Dorsi (lats) muscles in pole dancing. She explains the anatomy and function of the lats, debunks myths about their role in overhead movements, and offers tips on when and how to effectively train these muscles. Essential for pole dancers, the episode also covers related topics like muscle contraction, scapula stabilization, and potential causes of pain from tight lats. Dr. Boa recommends resources and exercises for better shoulder mechanics and performance in pole dancing.

Chapters:

00:00 Introduction and Episode Overview

01:14 Common Misconceptions About Lats

01:52 Understanding Muscle Function

03:15 Anatomy of the Lats

05:50 Lats in Pole Dancing

07:36 Scapula Mechanics and Misconceptions

11:03 Training and Flexibility Recommendations

15:18 Conclusion and Further Reading

Citations: 

Bhatt CR, Prajapati B, Patil DS, Patel VD, Singh BG, Mehta CD. Variation in the insertion of the latissimus dorsi & its clinical importance. J Orthop. 2013 Mar 7;10(1):25-8. doi: 10.1016/j.jor.2013.01.002. PMID: 24403744; PMCID: PMC3768243.

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3768243/ 

Miniato MA, Mudreac A, Borger J. Anatomy, Thorax, Scapula. [Updated 2023 Jul 24]. In: StatPearls [Internet]. Treasure Island (FL): StatPearls Publishing; 2025 Jan-. Available from: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK538319/

Paksoy, A., Akgün, D., Gebauer, H., Karczewski, D., Lacheta, L., Tokish, J. M., ... & Moroder, P. (2024). The latissimus dorsi creates a dynamic track for the inferior angle of the scapula during arm abduction in humans. Journal of Orthopaedic Surgery and Research, 19(1), 193.

Pouliart N, Gagey O. Significance of the latissimus dorsi for shoulder instability. I. Variations in its anatomy around the humerus and scapula. Clin Anat. 2005 Oct;18(7):493-9. doi: 10.1002/ca.20185. PMID: 16092134.

Links:

Transcript: 

Hello. Welcome to Science of Slink, the Evidence-based pole podcast. I'm your host, Dr. Rosy Boa, today we are gonna talk about one of the single most, common misconceptions in terms of anatomy and pole that I hear all the time. it is absolutely wrong.

And we're gonna talk about why and when you come away from this, I want you to have a deep conceptual understanding of what the Latisimus Dorsi is, right? It's muscle and what it does and what it does not do. Because there is a lot of information floating around on the internet or even being shared in classes that is making you work harder and possibly even be in pain you don't need to be in.

So we are really gonna dig into it. And before we get into this. As always, I wanna thank my members. This wouldn't be possible without you. I really appreciate you. Hearts, hearts, hearts. If you're interested in becoming a member, check out my website, scienceofslink.

It'll take you right there and you can learn more about the [00:01:00] membership and see if it's right for you and your home pole needs.

And I am gonna have coming up a version that's really stripped down. It's really just gonna be the essentials. It's called Essentials of Slink. It's coming soon, tm, so keep an eye out for that.

But putting that aside, lats. So you, might've heard someone say, you might even have said yourself, that when your arm is up for a pole spin or a pole climb or something to squeeze your shoulders black and down and to use your lats.

there are two sort of misconceptions one is that the lats are helpful when your arm is overhead. the other is that your lats move, your shoulder blades backing down. Really common misconception. They are not primary movers of the scapula. And we are gonna get into this in a lot of detail, but before we get into lats specifically.

I really wanna talk a little bit about muscles and what they do. Skeletal muscles. I'm not talking about like digestion and hearts and stuff. Because I think that [00:02:00] that can really help you once you understand that sort of puzzle out what a specific muscle is doing. muscle fibers. interweave like this.

and what happens when your, your brain's like, Hey nerves, we gotta, we gotta do something with this muscles, is that they contract, right? And, they pull together their ends and where the ends are, those are called the insertion points are going to vary muscle to muscle, right?

Muscle work is really contracting, we can release that contraction and stretch, but we can't really do that with force. we can't do eccentric contraction, which is where we hold that contraction as we begin to stretch. but that will happen because the muscle that opposes the muscle that's eccentrically contracting is contracting more.

It's winning the tug of war. if we have movement, in our body, it's because a muscle or more than one muscle is contracting.

And we only get work through [00:03:00] contraction, right? muscles pull things together. They don't push things apart. Hopefully that was helpful to give you a little bit of a conceptual understanding if we know the attachment of muscles, 

we can tell what's gonna happen when it contracts, That's its job. So where do the lats attach?

They're big muscles. so if we're gonna imagine this bottle is a torso. the lats start their attachment near the butt, they attach to the, the hips. and then

down at the lower back, right next to the spine, there's this big web of fascia. then they curl up around the side of the body, and their final attachment point is in the front of the arm.

So knowing that when that contracts right. Starts or ends, here at the front of the arm and goes down to my lower back. When I contract that, it does a couple things. one thing is it internally rotates my arm, So if my arm were, in front of me, if my elbow pointing towards at a 90 degree angle, fingers up to the ceiling, internal retraction, [00:04:00] there would be, my palm would come down.

So I'd travel in the direction of my palm, if I had my, Forearm, in a neutral position, external rotation would be the back of my hand leading this movement. and that actually stretches the lat, Because it's moving this insertion point farther away from the furthest insertion point.

It also pulls the arm in towards the body, right? So addutction, if you were trying to play an accordion, and you had to squeeze your hands together and bring your elbows into your side, uh, that would do that.

And then the final thing it does is it pulls your, arm behind you. So this is shoulder extension. Right. Brings the elbow behind you Those are the three main things. Internal rotation, abduction, and extension. That is the opposite of the movements we are doing. when our arms are overhead, we are flexing the shoulders.

We are maybe add ducting a little bit, but if we're thinking [00:05:00] just in terms of rotation and flexion extension, we are flexing the shoulders, opening up towards the ceiling. Uh, and then we want to externally rotate to make space, for our nerves to go through 

without getting pinched or irritated. if you do that habitually, it could lead to nerve impingement. tingly, painful feeling, not super great.

So all that is to say, uh, the movement that the lats do, because remember, the thing that a muscle does is it contracts.

It doesn't push the insertion points apart. It can only pull the insertion points together. It. Does the opposite of what we are doing when we are reaching up overhead, shoulder flexion, external rotation. So if we try to squeeze our lats when we're doing that, we are fighting against the movement we are trying to find.

and again, we do use our lats, I'll talk about later, some specific pole moves where you need a lot of strength in your sist doci and what that, looks like and how to train that. when working on spins and [00:06:00] climbs. not so much.

a good way to think about the general motion of lats is rowing, Pulling your hands towards you, bringing your elbows into your side, and then finding a little bit of internal rotation as your elbows come behind you.

is that rowing movement. Or a pull up? So if we start with our hands in flexion and external rotation, right? The lat is fully stretched and we want to come to that row position like in a pull up, our lats have to trigger to do that.

So that's one of the reasons that if you're working on pull-ups, one thing that people will cue is to think about pushing the bar in front of you slightly, because that helps to start that lat activation, and could be a nice cue to help you find that mind body connection.

we don't necessarily wanna do that if we are trying handstand, pole stands, or spins where our arms are supposed to be overhead. particularly if we're taking a weight in the arms.

That said, we do need that movement in a lot of places in pole. I mentioned [00:07:00] pull-ups. If you're doing pull-ups, if you're working on your arms on the climb your pantera climb, you are gonna need this. You really need, that lack activation energy. also if you're working on inverting or chopper, 

Flares, possibly. Anything where you start with your arms extended and you pull yourself up to the pole, you definitely need lat strength for that. I'm not saying don't work on your lats I am saying do not think about contracting them when your arms are overhead. If what you are trying to find is stability in that arms overhead position.

So that's what your lats do. What do they not do? this is where I see a lot of misconceptions. I've heard a lot of people say the lats move, the scapula. They do not, they are not a primary mover of the scapula. And the scapula are our shoulder blades, right? Those two sort of kind of spade shaped bones that sit on our back, in humans, we have very mobile scapula. they can move around quite a bit. So it is [00:08:00] important for us to stabilize our scapula on the back so that they can find good mechanics and movement as we're reaching up overhead as we are taking weight in our arms, which not a super common movement pattern for modern humans.

unless you're an avid climber or doing a lot of those ninja obstacle course things. Probably not something you were doing a whole bunch in your life. very normal that you wouldn't have worked a whole bunch on that particular movement pattern.

learning to stabilize the scapula is very important. It is just not what the lats do. thinking about squeezing your lats is not helpful. thinking shoulder blades back and down is kind of the opposite way that we want them to move when we're reaching overhead.

particularly if we're reaching overhead and then taking weight we actually want our, scapula to protract. So that's move. Forward around the sides of the rib cage. And we want them to rotate so we have good mechanics and space as our shoulders come up overhead.

the muscles that do that, the trapezius, especially the lower and middle trapezius, not the upper trapezius that, [00:09:00] uh, is the, the shoulder mount ouchy muscle. That one is not as involved in that part of the motion. And the serratus anterior, which is the sort of fingery shaped muscles that attach the scapula and ribs and come forward, into the armpit.

It's been shoulder month in the studio, and I'm having us do a lot of, targeted exercises to help build those muscles and proprioception there in particular. and, one of my, one of my students, during class was like, I really feel them.

And I was like, fantastic. That is what I'm looking for. you're starting to see interior, you're getting tired. excellent. Precisely what we are targeting. 

I have, a link to, a reference, anatomy, thorax, scapula, the National Library of Medicine, by Mancho et all, 2023, that you can check out. But in addition to them not being primary movers of the scapula, a lot of people actually just don't have muscle attachments of the lat to the scapula at all.

This is something where there seems to be quite a bit of individual anatomical variation. when I was doing my teacher [00:10:00] training, I was taught that, the lots attached to the scapula for a lot of people. They just don't. I'm reading here from, significance of Latismus Dorsi for shoulder instability, variations in its anatomy around the humerus and scapula.

The Lattimus Dorsi can have muscular fiber attachments arising from the inferior angle of the scapula. And they only found that, and this was a cadaver study in 43% of the partci-, well, uh, donors, I guess cadavers. So less than half of the cadavers they looked at had, muscular attachments of the mis doci

And in, a further 47%, there may only be a few fibrous strands between the cul and the scapula, or an intervening bursa. A bursa's, so it's just like what you got around your knee, right? It's the sort of fluid filled pockets. It is not a primary move for the scapula and for a lot of folks, there just is no muscular attachment or a very limited attachment of the Latismus Dorsi and the scapula.

So if you are trying to move your shoulder blades and you're thinking about your lats, it is not going to be [00:11:00] very helpful for you. And it's really not gonna help your shoulder mechanics.

So with all that said, what should you do with your lots? So the first thing I would recommend for all pole dancers is active flexibility drills for them.

in my experience, a lot of pole dancers have very Overactive very tight lats. They're very big muscles. Particularly if when you do something like a climb, you really rely on the pull of your arms and you are predominantly carrying your weight in your arms, 

they're likely to be very tight, , which can limit you in, effective overhead reaching. And I don't just mean for flexibility and shoulder flexibility and extreme contortion moves like dove. I also mean just being able to have good mechanics where you reach your arm up overhead or if you're working on your, handstands being able to have a straight line.

From the humerus to the thorax, rather than a closed angle because your lats are so tight that they're pulling your arms in front of you and you can't [00:12:00] find overhead shoulder flexion with external rotation, a foundational movement for pole dancers or any overhead athlete.

But I work with pole dancers, so that's what I'm thinking about. So active flexibility drills y'all who have been in a lot of my feel good flex classes, when we talk about shoulders. Know well, exactly what I'm talking about. 'cause we do a ton of them. 'cause they're very beneficial. I would recommend if you are interested in, something like Pantera climb, arms Free climb, working on two handed pull-ups can be helpful because that is essentially a one handed pull up.

having that in your progression, I recommend if that's something you're interested in working on. I don't think you need to be able to do a pull up to do pole, but if that's specifically something you're working on, Or if you're interested in things like holding a pencil pull up for a long time, you need to target strength building in your lats.

Also if you're working on inverting and you find that your arms start to straighten before you would like them to, during your inversion, if you find that as you start to tilt back your hips and waist begins to slide down the [00:13:00] pole, I recommend adding lat strengthening to your conditioning.

An isometric inverted row, ideally with the pole is probably the most analogous to what you're doing. any sort of weighted row, bent over row in particular would be helpful. even something like a rowing machine with high resistance can also be helpful, to work on finding that that lack contraction.

If you work on it, isometrically, for example, doing, crab crunches and holding that crunch position, try to be in the same angle that you would be in an inversion. So back flat or head slightly towards the floor.

isometric strength. is built to the greatest degree in the specific joint angle that you are working. if you're gonna do isometrics, I would recommend doing isometrics at the specific joint angle that you are trying to target. So that's my, my general recommendation. In addition especially if you're working on strength, work on active flexibility.

Tight lats, which I know a lot of pole dancers have can really be a cause of shoulder pain. Uh, and lower back pain. So this is, from bot at all. tight latismus dorsi [00:14:00] has been shown to be the cause of chronic shoulder pain and chronic back pain because latisimus dorci connects to the spine and the humerus, right?

So lower back and then spirals up and, and connects to this arm bone. Tightness in this muscle can manifest as either sub optional glenohumeral joint function, which leads to chronic shoulder pain, especially for those of us who are doing a lot of weight bearing , or tendonitis in the tendinous fascia connecting the latisimus dorsii to thoracic and lumbar spine. that's, down at your lower back, there's this thick web of fascia that the last attach into.

that can also be a cause of, tightness and potentially pain. That's my recommendation. I definitely think it is worthwhile to train them. I do not think it's worthwhile thinking about contracting them in this arms overhead position, especially if you're stretching your shoulders. especially if you're doing something like a pull lock, especially if you're doing something like handstands. It is not gonna help your shoulder mechanics.

It will make your shoulder mechanics work because it's likely to pull you into internal rotation.

Doesn't mean you shouldn't necessarily train them at all. It doesn't mean they're not helpful. [00:15:00] It doesn't mean they're not good. perfectly fine. But if you're working on things like spins, or overhead motion like Aisha or handstands, they're not part of that equation except for active mobility work to help you get into external rotation in the humerus.

That's my prattling on about lats. if you're interested in learning more about the anatomy of overhead movement, I really recommend, anatomy of Aerial Arts. Dr. Emily Scherb's book, she's a doctor of physical therapy who, focuses on working with, aerialists and circus artists, and she's been on the podcast before, so you can go check out that episode 

I think it's called Every individual is a Researcher in their Own Body, very informative title, or, Bendy Kate. book upside down injuries also goes more detail so I'd recommend that I hope this has been informative and I hope, at this point you have an understanding where that attaches what it does when we use it and when we don't use it.

Uh, and that your movement, makes a little bit more sense to you now.

All right, that's all I got for you this week. As [00:16:00] always, citations are down there. So you wanna read some of these papers for yourself. In particular, that 2024 Paksoy, paper “the lastismus dorsi creates a dynamic track for the inferior angle of the scapula during arm abduction In humans”, it is really interesting 'cause it talks about the way that the lat and the scapula slide over each other as the arms move.

I thought it was a really cool paper and maybe you will like it as well. Thank you for listening. Feel free to reach out if you have any questions. most places where the podcast is posted, you can, send comments and I should get notified about them, and I will talk to you very soon.

Goodbye.

Randi Fentress
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Celebrating Three Years of Slink Through Strength: Reflections and Future Plans