Flip your grip and the lats and lower lats take over.
Keep your elbows close to your sides, the underhand grip pulls more lat and biceps in.
Turning your palms toward you on the pulldown lets the elbows drive down close to your sides, a path that puts the lats in a strong line of pull through a long range, with the biceps contributing far more than in a wide overhand grip. The stretch at the top with arms fully extended is where much of the value lives. It earns its place as a lat builder that most people are meaningfully stronger on, and as the machine cousin of the chin-up.
The underhand grip brings the elbows in front of your body and recruits more biceps, while the overhand wide grip keeps elbows out and biases the upper lats and teres. Most lifters pull more weight underhand.
Same grip and very similar pulling pattern, but the machine lets you pick the exact load and control the negative. It is the smart choice for building toward chin-ups or adding volume beyond them.
Stay mostly upright with your chest tall, a slight natural lean is fine. Turning it into a rowing lean-back shifts the work away from the lats and lets momentum steal reps.
