Heavy hand grip training?

Well in order to develop grip strength, you need to focus on all aspects of hand strength. This includes thumb and wrist strength not just finger strength. So you need to include pinch grip exercises for thumb strength, and special techniques for wrists (as I do not advocate wrist curls as they can cause a lot of damage to your wrists if you do not know what you are doing).


Finger flexor exercises:

Grippers - Don't need to go more into these, other than that you need one which lets you do 1-6 reps and one that you cannot yet close so you can guarantee maximum effort just by trying as hard as possible. These train closed hand crushing grip.

Thick Bars - These train your flexors by making you crush much harder than the same weight on a regular bar, because the bar is trying to force it's way out of your hand. The bigger your hands, the bigger the thick bar needs to be. This trains open hand crushing grip.

Towel Pullups - These force your fingers to grip into the towel rather than simply support the weight (as in regular pullups), because otherwise you will simply fall. So you need to grip hard enough at all points throughout the reps in order to complete them, which causes your forearms to be strained in multiple ways. Trains closed hand crushing grip and the brachioradialis.

Barbell Finger Curls - Depending on how strong your hands are you can roll a bar down your fingers and then back up into a fist. If you think you will drop the weight then do not do them. I usually do these with about 100kg. Start with a low weight and work out what the weight you can do 1-6 reps with is. Also make sure you keep your fingers curled and never completely straighten them, because the weight will roll out of your hand. This trains open hand crushing grip.



Finger Extensor Exercises:

Rubber Band Extensions - Place a number of rubber bands over the outside of your fingers and thumb on one hand. Try to extend your fingers and thumb as far apart as possible. If you need more resistance, add more bands, or place them higher up your fingers, if you need less then do the reverse.

Thick Bars - These also train extensors through the fact that your fingers are being pushed outwards and your extensors are trying to stop this the whole time that your flexors are crushing, because you cannot get your fingers fully around the bar.



Pinch (To get thumbs like turkey legs) Exercises:

Plate Pinches - Place the plates facing towards each other, so that there are only flat surfaces for you to hold onto (otherwise you may as well not bother) then lift them with the thumb on one side and the fingers on the other. Do reps and use a weight that you think is challenging. Trains thumb strength.

Barbell Assisted Plate Pinches (I've never mentioned these on the forums before) - Place two plates of equal size on one end of the barbell in the same way as in the method above. Then you simply pinch the plates and lift that end of the barbell up. However the barbell through the middle means that the weights cannot separate making the exercise easier. However you can also use these to make the exercise harder. By simply adding smaller weight plates after the two main plates, you can add weight to the pinches therefore increasing difficulty.



Wrist Exercises:

Uneven Weighted Wrist Curls - Using a dumbell, place uneven amounts of weight on either side of the dumbell. Start with your wrist in line with your forearm, then curl your wrist upward. Only go back to in line with your wrist, one of the most damaging things you can do is do too big a ROM with these, as it is easy to damage your wrist. The uneven weight means you use less weight, further reducing the likelihood of damage to your wrist, but you will find these a lot harder. Rotate the dumbell round for each set you do, so that both sides of your wrist have both sides of the dumbell used on them equally.

Sledgehammers - These can be dangerous if you have weak wrists. Simply get a sledgehammer and lever it so that the weighted end is over your head, then lever it back up to pointing in the sky. Do this for 1-6 reps (depending on how many you can do). You can also do reverse sledgehammers by placing the end of the handle the other way around in your hand and have your arms by your sides and lever the weight upwards and downwards behind you.



If you do a bodypart split, do this workout:

Superset 1:
1 Finger Flexor Exercise
1 Finger Extensor Exercise (You cannot use Thick Bars for both, only one or the other)

1-6 reps per set
2-3 minutes between supersets (no rest between the two individual sets)


Superset 2:
1 Pinch Grip Exercise
1 Wrist Strength Exercise

1-6 reps per set
2-3 minutes between supersets (no rest between the two individual sets)

And do the supersets in this pattern: 1-rest-2-rest-1-rest-2-rest-1

Do this on one of your usual rest days.


If you do a FBW then do this:

Superset 1:
1 Finger Flexor Exercise
1 Finger Extensor Exercise (You cannot use Thick Bars for both, only one or the other)

1-6 reps per set
2-3 minutes between supersets (no rest between the two individual sets)

Do this after your first workout of the week. Repeat 2 more times after rests.


Superset 2:
1 Pinch Grip Exercise
1 Wrist Strength Exercise

1-6 reps per set
2-3 minutes between supersets (no rest between the two individual sets)

Do this one three days after superset 1, but only do one repeat of this superset.



The more experienced on this forum will be able to cope with the first workout plan, which is why it is done on one day, not split into two.

Good luck.

Thanks i missed that last part lol.

So ill do 2 sets of heavy grippers on days i workout. Thanks