MN/PE6 negative hanging leg raises lats activated?

Hey all, quick question for those with experience.

On the negative hanging leg raises, are the lats activated or relaxed?   

Second question, I'm assuming that the elbows remain straight through out this entire exercise.  Is this correct?  I can tuck up with a slight bend in my elbows but am having a very hard time if I keep my elbows locked.  However, I'm assuming that I need to take a baby step; just working on tucking and getting my knees to my shoulders, as the athlete in the video does.

Thanks for you advice!

Chris

Hey Chris

It's a process, you may not be able to keep your arms straight now, but it will come. I stayed at 3x2 for ages just improving my form, and eventually it got good enough to build volume.

Keep your lats relaxed so that your elbows can remain straight.

Goldeneagle:   you can activate the lats without bending the elbows.

Related question: In the course video the athlete raises his knees to face before straightening the legs out. That initial raise, which puts the body perpendicular to the stall bars, involves lat activation, right? Or maybe it's not the lats, maybe it's the pecs(sorry if I'm horribly wrong here, not an expert here) but I just can't believe it's only the core doing the work.

meras:  that's what I was thinking too. Straight arms but lat activation to get the full tuck.

I thought the whole point of doing hanging leg lifts on stall bars rather than on let's say a pull-up bar is because you don't want to activate your lats because on a pull-up bar you cheat too much by having the core doing too little work and lats doing too much work.

I'm pretty sure you're striving for as little lat activation as possible

The point of this exercise is the negative.  How you get to the starting point isn't the focus.  Just don't start the descent until your arms and legs are straight and lats are disengaged.

Edit:  I'm just starting PE4, so take my thoughts for what they are.

Cadams said:

Goldeneagle:   you can activate the lats without bending the elbows.

I know. I have done hanging leg raises with my scapula depressed

I'll play around it tomorrow. Wouldn't completely disengaging the lats mean that compression should be at the level of Lucas Abner to touch the bar?

holy cow.  that's amazing compression.