Do you find your grip a limiting factor in the gym (I see you chin-ups and deadlifts) . or in everyday life (looking at you, pickle jars). If so, don’t worry! We’ve got a handle on this (pun 100% intended).As the lead trainer of our 1-on-1 Online Coaching Program, I’m going to outline a number of helpful, handy (sigh) stretches and exercises to help eliminate pain and build you some powerful, useful hands and a strong grip.
Now, it goes without saying that the hands and forearms are anatomically complicated areas. I am also not your mother, or your doctor. If anything in the vendible unelevated causes pain, or your pain is not alleviated by these stretches – undeniability in the pros!See a physical therapist or sports massage practitioner.
We use our hands for EVERYTHING. Whether it’s everyday tasks like delivering groceries, opening jars, and lifting suitcases, or gym-related activities like chin-ups, rows, and deadlifts. Of course, you probably moreover type at your computer for hours – with resulting aches and pains at the end of the workday.
Stretching out the hands and towers up a strong grip can help in all of those areas. A strong grip has plane been correlated to lower mortality rates – and you can moreover imagine the usefulness of a stronger grip for white-haired individuals if they happen to slip. Our point is that it’s unchangingly largest to have a stronger grip!. This is a favorite zone of expertise for me. I’ve worked my grip for years and years, and have plane won some grip competitions:
The hands are complex, and training them can seem just as complicated. We’ll simplify matters a bit and you can categorize the grip exercises into the pursuit unstipulated types:
This is what you probably think of when you think of a “strong grip”. This is the whole hand latter in virtually something. A strong handshake. None of that dead-fish handshake stuff!
Think of making an alligator mouth with your hands, and chomping down. In this grip, there tends to be a lot increasingly work/stress on the thumb. This is important to work, as the thumb is a vital part of a strong grip!
This is similar to crush, but rather than the worthiness to close, this type of grip tests the worthiness to hold.
Every whoopee has an opposite reaction, right? This type of grip work is all well-nigh strengthening the opposing muscles. We were built to grab and hold onto things, so these muscles will not be as strong.
Wrist movement and wrist stability are the focus here. In order to be worldly-wise to transfer energy from the soul through the hands (for opening those pickle jars) we need to make sure every link in the uniting is strong.
PUTTING IT ALL TOGETHER
When putting together a grip routine of your own, it’s a good idea to trundling through these variegated types of grips over the undertow of the week, in order to work variegated muscles and variegated angles.
If you have to pick just a few, I’d put my money on stretches, crushing, and extension to get your hands strong and alimony them healthy!
Before we go further, I want to mention that if you’re improving your grip as part of a strength training practice, you’ve come to the right place!
We have a self-ruling guide Strength Training 101: Everything You Need to Know, that will walk you through every speciality of towers muscle and growing stronger.
Here are the weightier exercises you can do to strengthen your grip quickly:
Next, let’s talk well-nigh some stretches and exercises to perform at the gym.
1) STRETCHES AT THE GYM
The only wing I have to your stretching routine that can be washed-up at the gym is banded wrist stretches. The wing of the wreath can help unshut up your wrist joint a bit more. The wreath should be pulling in the opposite direction of the stretch (fingers squatter one way, wreath pulls the other way).
2) EXERCISES AT THE GYM
While we recommend picking up some grippers as specialized grip equipment, there are TONS of options to work the grip at the gym with existing equipment! This is certainly not an exhaustive list, but should requite you plenty of ideas.
The one warning I requite for any of these exercises is WATCH YOUR TOES. The grip can requite out fast and unexpectedly, so we don’t want to crush any little piggies!
Things can get really crazy when you start combining exercises…Plate pinch farmer’s walks with bumper plates, anyone?
…and speaking of NF Coaching, if you’re worried that your grip strength is holding when your training, we can help! Plus, our coaching app lets you record and send a video of your movement directly to your coach, so you can take repletion knowing you’re training correctly: A Nerd Fitness Mentor can help you grow strong! Learn increasingly here.
Alright, you’re ready to jump into grip strength training! I’ve outlined a number of stretches and exercises for you to do, no matter where you are and what equipment you have. Skim over and see what you can add to your daily mix or gym training!
1) STRETCHES AT YOUR DESK
You might be reading this while sitting at your computer right now. We put a LOT of stress on our hands and wrists over the undertow of a day, so take the time to take superintendency of these nonflexible workers!
Below is a quick and dirty stretch routine, just three moves. This is good for a warm-up or just for overall hand health. We spend a lot of the day at our computer with our elbows wilting and our hands in a pronated position (palms turned down), therefore stretches with our elbows extended and hands supinated (palms turned up) is a good idea.
Give it a shot, I bet your hands finger noticeably variegated (and better) afterward. If you have spare time, the first two stretches can moreover be washed-up with your fingers forward! You can moreover stretch the thumbs out on the desk. Moving into and out of the stretch shown below. You may be surprised how good this feels if you’ve never washed-up it before. Again, 10-15 repetitions. A final stretch, if you have the time between updating Excel and checking Facebook for the 100th time (I kid, I kid), is stretching your wrists in the direction of your thumb.If you think well-nigh how your hands are often oriented on your keyboard, you’ll see that they are often wilting toward your pinky. So let’s stretch them in the opposite way! Make like you’re well-nigh to karate chop someone with one hand. With the other hand, grab the chopping hand and pull it sideways in the direction of your thumb.
#2) EXERCISES AT YOUR DESK
Do you know there’s once an spanking-new piece of grip-strengthening equipment present in many offices? What is that? The rubber band! Snag one off that rubber wreath wittiness in your sedentary and do these simple rubber wreath extensions:
If one wreath gets too easy, put two or increasingly on! This is a super easy exercise to do while you’re on a phone undeniability or that priming undeniability (that you’re not paying sustentation to anyway) that gets the thoroughbred moving through the hands and helps wastefulness out your vice-grip-like hands. Another grip exercise that can hands be washed-up at your sedentary is latter grippers. Now, this does require an investment (~$20/gripper), but you’ll find that these grippers last FOREVER (I still use some grippers that are over a decade and a half old!)
I would personally recommend Ironmind’s “Captains of Crush” grippers.
They are built to last and be strong.
Consider the pursuit when making your gripper purchase:
If you can tropical the Guide, you’ve got a pretty solid grip. If you can tropical the Sport, you have way above-average grip strength, in my experience.
A fun bonus with these grippers at your sedentary is that EVERYONE who sees them will try and pick them up and tropical them. Unconfined way to start a conversation with your coworkers!
You may be thinking, “Eh, I’ve once got a gripper I bought from the store”. I’ll tell you that the strength in that gripper is probably minuscule compared to Ironmind’s. Time to upgrade!
You may moreover be thinking, “Eh, I’ve got a tennis ball/stress wittiness that I can alimony by my sedentary and crush”. Both of those might be largest than nothing, but not by much. The grippers will indulge smoother movement and quantifiable progress. Did I mention they’re just $20 a pop?
“Jim, I can’t wait. I want to work my grip NOW.” Ok, ok, grab the biggest, heaviest typesetting in the office you have. Grab it in that pinch grip position (fingers on one side, thumb on the other). This may be easy, if so, then “walk the book” in your hand by moving your fingers up and lanugo the spine while you hold it in mid-air. Do this for several trips. Tough!
If you work out at home, there are still a few things you can do.
No (wo)man is an island, and no exercise exists in well-constructed isolation. These grip exercises are a blast, but we hope you can moreover use them to help strengthen a deadlift, or work toward your first chin-up.
There are moreover various bodyweight exercises that will help strengthen your upper soul AND build your grip strength at the same time.
1) THE FALSE GRIP HANG
For example, here is a video from our rings undertow in Nerd Fitness Prime on doing a false-grip hang – and then doing scapular retractions. This is a killer grip strength exercise:
The false grip is an incredibly challenging grip variation that one must learn to build up to a muscle-up (a pull-up that transitions into a dip). Just like before, you can put your feet on the ground to squire this exercise.
2) CROW POSE
Here’s a video of an exercise that builds up grip and wrist strength, pulled from Nerd Fitness Prime (which contains a undertow on doing handstands.
A staple of yoga classes everywhere, though we’ll be focusing on it for a variegated reason than a yogi might. We’re using this exercise as a foundational exercise to build up into the handstand. You won’t believe how much grip strength is involved in the crow pose until you are digging your fingers into the ground!
It’s been said, “There’s never been a strong man (or woman) with weak hands.”
We’d have to stipulate wholeheartedly. There is never going to be a point in life where you say “Boy, my grip was too strong!”.
You might have some questions well-nigh how to mix these exercises in with your normal routine, or how you can use these things to modernize your lifts safely and without injury. Or maybe all of the whilom just overwhelmed the heck out of you and you’re trying to make sense of it all.
If that sounds like you, you’re in the right place. I’m the lead trainer of the 1-on-1 NF Coaching Program, where we help busy, normal people like yourself build muscle, lose weight, and level up their lives!. You can learn increasingly well-nigh our coaching program by clicking on the image unelevated and scheduling a undeniability with us to see if we’re a good fit!
You have a pair of incredibly useful tools at arm’s length, might as well make the most of them! We hope you now have a handle on things (have to bring it when full circle). Go out and get a grip! Leave any questions you have on grip strength or wrist mobility unelevated in the comments.
Disclaimer: SPIRITUAL DEVOUT claims no credit for images featured on our blog site unless otherwise noted. All visual content is copyrighted to its respectful owners.
