find max value in a matrix

I have a=[ 1 2 3; 7 8 9; 4 5 6; 2 1 3]. I want to find max value in the matrix 'a' but i don't want it to consider second row. So I should get 6 as the answer. How to do it?

Answer 1

[Star Strider]

This works:

a=[ 1 2 3; 7 8 9; 4 5 6; 2 1 3];
a_134 = a([1 3 4],:);
max_a134 = max(a_134(:));

[Ace_ventura]

Thanks Man. But is there a way in which i don't have to define a_134 . I am looking for the max value without defining any sub matrix

[Star Strider]

In that instance, just nest two max calls:

max_a134 = max(max(a([1 3 4],:)))