GRIP STRENGTH is very important in the weight room. Working on your grip will help you lift more weight in the gym, especially when it comes to exercises such as pull-ups or deadlifts.
When it comes to strength training, building a stronger grip is an area that’s mostly neglected. Many gym goers sabotage their grip strength by avoiding working for it altogether, or by relying solely on machine-based workouts that don’t challenge their grip at all, without realizing that having a weak grip makes it increasingly challenging to perform heavy lifts.
There are many reasons as to why you should increase your hand grip. A strong grip means:
- BIGGER LIFTS – Grip training can heavily influence the amount of weight lifted, especially when doing deadlifts, pull-ups, chin-ups and rows.
- IMPROVED INJURY RECOVERY – When you have stronger muscles and connective tissues, they recover faster after an injury.
- BETTER MUSCLE ENDURANCE – With a stronger grip you will find it easier to execute repetitions per set of an exercise.
- IMPROVED DEXTERITY
- BIGGER FOREARMS – The repetitive stress from exercising your grip will cause a quick jump in grip strength and will immediately help to further develop your forearms.
- INCREASED MARTIAL ARTS & WRESTLING SKILLS – Grip strength will add snap and power to your punches, and help you maintain the hold on your opponent.
- ENHANCED WEIGHT TRAINING SESSIONS – A strong grip is essential to weight training movements that depend on correct gripping technique and strength.
The hand can be used to grip objects in several different positions that require 3 different types of grip strength:
- The CRUSH GRIP where the object being gripped rests firmly against the palm and all fingers, as with a handshake.
- The PINCH GRIP where fingers are positioned on one side of the object, while the thumb is on the other side, like when grabbing a weight plate by the top edge. An object gripped like this doesn’t touch the palm, and the grip is considered weak.
- The SUPPORT GRIP involves holding something for a long time. A perfect example for this grip is The Farmer’s Walk, where the weight is held and carried over a long distance.
Building a strong grip requires more than just a few wrist curls at the end of a workout session. That’s exactly why you should supplement your workout routine with some grip strength exercises.
We suggest grabbing a pair of weightlifting gloves and working on our top 5 choices for grip strength exercises:
- GRIP HANGS
For this support and crush strength exercise, you simply have to hang from a bar, holding your grip on a towel for as long as you can. As you continue to do this exercise daily, the time spent hanging from the bar will slowly, but surely increase.
- FARMER’S WALK
A suitable area where you can walk about 100 meters holding a weight plate with your fingers will undoubtedly work miracles for your pinching strength. A twist with this movement that will work on your support strength is walking with a pair of weights or anything heavy you can hold.
- WRIST TWISTS
Now, for this highly effective exercise, we strongly recommend the use of workout gloves with wrist support and padded palms, as the movement can be as dangerous for your hands as it is effective. Here’s how you do this great grip strength exercise: sit on the end of a bench holding a fairly weighted dumbbell in one hand. Keep your feet shoulder-width apart and rest your forearm on your thighs with wrists slightly off the edge of your knees. Grab the dumbbell and slowly rotate your hand back and forth making sure that the forearms are stabilized. Do 3 sets of 12-15 repetitions for one hand and then switch.
It’s very important to wear gloves that will help your grip while supporting and stabilizing your wrists throughout this exercise. This will ensure that you’re getting all the benefits this movement has, instead of getting an ugly injury.
- RUBBER BALL SQUEEZE
Use a rubber ball you can squeeze on for up to 60 seconds (ideally 90). Do 3 sets of this movement for each hand. Even though it may seem like child play, it truly is a great exercise for enhancing your crushing grip strength and targeting your forearm flexors.
- BARBELL HOLD
This exercise involves, as you might have figured our already, holding a barbell. Try holding it up for 90 seconds as it works on your crushing and supporting grip strength. Make sure you vary the grip style from wider to narrower for each of the 3 sets you need to do.
Working on your grip strength using these 5 exercises on a daily basis will enable you to handle greater gripping poundage each week and make you more secure for your weight training sessions.
Again, I can’t stress enough on the importance of using a suitable pair of gloves that will help with your grip strength and flexibility, offer you a slip-proof grip with sweat protection, add extra wrist support that will keep your wrists from rolling on you or turning out, and protect your hands from any nagging injuries.
These are our thoughts on the importance of grip strength. All that’s left for you to do now is to get a grip on your workouts!
You will never be asked how much you can grip. However, grip training will positively impact the results you attain from your training program, as well as your answer to questions like how much you can bench, how heavy you can lift and, how large your biceps are!