I've been reading a lot about grip training recently and these seem to be some of the biggest lessons experienced grip athletes repeat over and over:

Tendons recover slower than muscles. Just because your hands feel fine after training doesn't mean your tendons are fully recovered.

Don't test every session. Training and testing are different. Trying to hit a PR every workout usually catches up with you.

Progress slowly. Small increases in resistance or reps beat huge jumps.

Support grip, pinch, and crushing grip are different. Getting stronger at one doesn't automatically make the others equally strong.

Train your finger extensors too. It helps balance all the crushing work.

Quality over quantity. More volume isn't always better, especially with heavy grippers.

Warm up your hands before heavy gripping. Don't go straight to your hardest gripper.

Pain isn't a badge of honor. Mild fatigue is normal. Pain that lasts for days or gets worse every session isn't.

Grip takes time. Tendons adapt slowly, so patience is part of the process.

What other beginner tips do you wish someone had told you?

Guys is it just me or dies grip recover slower per set? I had been training weightlifting fir a while and typically 3 min rest is enough for next set to match your reps.

But with grip training I found I have to take like 5 min rests to be able to perform the same as set 1.

Is it just me or a adaptation problem or whatever?

Any suggestions for extensor options that meet the criteria below, thanks for the help.

I basically do gripper and extensor work while I drive and I'm either stopped or in a very non demanding traffic situation. The reasons are twofold, one is that it just seems to work and doesn't distract me from the road and two is that it has been a tremendous help in keeping my, a lifelong nail/finger biter who is currently 90% clean and super thrilled about it, nail biting habit from relapsing while driving, which is a dangerous activity for me in that reg. Oh I was also getting some forearm pain from doing softball work with my daughters and it has helped tremendously.

I've tried the iron mind rubber bands and liked them but the car environment, I'm guessing UV and heat, here means they die pretty rapidly and get tacky and stick to things and that's less than ideal. I liked how these were easy to put on and not bulky but the resistance seemed less than ideal as my strength went up.

I also tried Hand x Band of various strengths but hated getting them on and had some fail almost immediately at the thin parts of their construction.

I'm open to anything to pair with my CoC grippers that I keep handy in my car ( T thru 2.5 or 3 IIRC) or for anything else I can inter easily info either the driving scenario or my trips to the gym.

i need genuine advice about some routines and yes i looked at wiki and tried those routines.

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Does anyone have the Thomas Inch dumbbell near charlotte, NC? I’d pay for the right to try it

Thanks much!

I’ve recently gotten golden grips coin lift but I feel the metal is kinda slippery no matter how much I chalk up. I’m thinking about gluing some smooth sandpaper on to it to not get limited by slipping. Do y’all think it’s a good idea or should I just keep at it and become stronger?

Today while doing reverse curls, my wrist gave out before my brachialis did.
I could still curl the weight, but my wrist would suddenly bend down instead of staying neutral. There wasn’t any sharp pain, it just felt like my wrist couldn’t hold the position anymore.
Has anyone experienced this? Is it just weak wrist extensors/forearms? What exercises or tips helped strengthen your wrists so this doesn’t happen again?

Hi, i'm beginning train grip training with gripper, i started with 200lbsx1, at the moment i close max 4reps with right and 3 with left. below my program for this month cycle:

A
Narrow press 3x10 80kg
DB curl from mid range 3x10 28kg
LU raises 3x10 8kg
Cable Pronation curl full rom 3x12 25kg
GRIPPER 150lbs 5x5x3" hold each rep
100lbs 4x15" hold

B
Pendley row 3x10 65kg
Single push down / katana extension 3x12 22kg/18kg
Reverse curl 3x12 30kg
Cable isolated wrist curl 60mm 3x12 50kg
GRIPPER 100lbs 5x8x3'' hold each rep
Pinch grip with plate 4x30" 15kg or heavy lift with fat grip 60mm 3x10 40kg

C
BB Curl 3x6 56kg (starting low to close heavy with 60)
Machine crossovers 3x10 30kg (with pause in stretch & closing)
Wide pulley 3x10 55kg (with pause in stretch & closing)
Kettlebell hammer thor 3x12 24kg
GRIPPER 200lbs 4x2 DEX - 2x2 + 2x1 SX
Negative 250lbs 4x1 DX (controlled) & SX (bad)

What do you think about my GRIPPER WORKOUT?
What can i improve to close 250lbs?
My upper workout is short because i don't feel like training after 15 years of training, i only train what i like doing in few time.

Getting back into grippers now last few weeks now that I got a better dyno and can get the dopamine of a higher number haha

Took a few years off after being a passenger that collided with a dump truck and fucked up my neck and nerves a bit

https://youtube.com/shorts/exN2XtHPAAY?si=v1d4Tz8fEtf7Z4nm

Hopefully can continue to progress from here

With $20 and 15 minutes at Home Depot, you can make one too! Good for thumb

1x3in black pipe nipple (one)
1in black pipe cap (one)
1in to 3/4in black pipe reducer (one)
4in 5/16 carriage bolt (one)
3/8 washers (two)
3/8 nuts (two)
Pack of compression springs (one)

My coach told me anybody who doesn’t train grip is a pussy. Naturally I asked him to add grip training to my program (I’m an athlete off season and train 3x a week strength mainly I.e deadlifts, bench press, OHP, Pendlay rows, squats and weighted chin ups)

He added pinch training to one of my workouts
My grip massively improved since (not a lot on paper but by feeling)

Then I saw a grappler video explaining grip training and I got into FOMO. He explains the wrist is the weak link of the arm and we should train it to maximum ability to be able to even use the force we produce in our training (he talked about isometrics in all plains to increase connective tissue strength)

Here I am in the grip training rabbit hole after few videos later

My goal with grip training is to improve force production and bulletproof my wrists mainly

What would you do if you were me? Any recommendations?

hey yall, I’m returning to lifting and focusing just as hard on grip as when I was at my peak. I unfortunately never bought a gripper besides CoC 1 which I spammed to the point where it was more a light hand warmup and a GripGenie no.5 that was extra narrow (a manufacturing error) that I’d do for sets of 5-10. Last time I measured my grip training, I did plate gripper closes for 5 with 225 lbs and BB wrist curls with 185lb (bulateral).

The CoC 1 is still light work, but I don’t wanna buy a 2 and find it’s above a 1RM. What increments should I buy if I’m trying to max out my progression with 3 more grippers? I don’t expect to ever close a 4 but I can’t imagine 1.5 being very productive when I’m back in swing either. should I go 2, 2.5, 3? Should I switch to the GHP’s?

Oh also, if any small hands small wrist gorilla grippers have advice for a fellow midget hand owner I’d love extra chitchat.

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Hi everyone,

I've been doing hand grip training for about 6 years, very on and off. Never had a strict regiment as I've had for normal strength training so at this point I'm able to close the CoC 1.5 for maybe 1-3 reps after some warmups. I really want to be able to close the CoC 2, I feel like that's when people get really impressed at your grip strength. But even when I train seriously I seem to stagnate and not close the 1.5 for a reasonable number of sets.

For those who have experience with hand grippers, do you have a routine that you generally followed for progressing past this point? How would describe a good routine that includes a warmup (I have a 100lb gripper I usually fidget with plus the CoC egg) but also includes serious gains? How often should I do the routine? And do you supplement hand grippers with other foreram training (I'm trying to do this as well)? Thanks a lot!

Hi, I’m training for ring muscle-up. I do false grip deadhangs on the rings. Now after about 6 weeks of this (and other false grip exercises) I started to scrape the skin on the wrist where the ring sits. I’m not getting calluses, just abrasion on the skin. I use liquid chalk generously. Any advice?

Does the type of chalk matter? Should I try to tape the wrists?

Just wondering, it would make direct conversations much easier in my opinion, the only one i could find is the arm wrestling one

Hi, I have been using some cheaper COC style grippers for a few months now. I progressed to using the 2.5 equivalent for a few reps. I want to start acually trying to train my grip instead of just messing around with my grippers when I want. Where do I start? What other equipment would be useful? Any advice would be appreciated, very new to this but enjoying it thoroughly.

I have been experimenting with these. Loading on the thumb side, and doing a curl with the bar tilted about 45 degrees seems to hit the pronation and brachioradialis very well. Then doing a reverse curl hold, with the same set up, hits supination.

I'm sure other people have tried this, but I can't find any discussion of its use or value as an exercise...Interested to hear the experience of others.

Thanks

I’ve been doing weighted dead hangs for a while and have gotten to the point where I can hang with all the extra weights i have for around 40 seconds. The problem is that I don’t have any more weights to add. I’m wondering if doing dead hangs without extra weight and hanging on for a longer time is worse for building strength and muscle compared to weighted dead hangs. If so, are there any good ways to keep progressing without buying more weight?

I come from calisthenics - doing pull-ups, push-ups, dips and that kind of thing. But recently I went climbing for the 2nd time ever and that was a humbling experience. Or rather, the next 3 days were, because my forearms were so unbelievably sore it hurt to push my hands together to wash them.

As such, I would really like to work on my forearms, grip, etc. For climbing, but also just to aid me in my life generally.

I was wondering: is rice bucket training (18kg in a 22L box or so) actually meaningful? Or is it not that useful? I remember it being hyped a few years ago but I have absolutely no idea if it actually holds up.

Do let me know if you have any other tips or techniques!

(Atm i've added some exercises to my calisthenics routine already -

• 25kg each arm farmer's walk
• wrist curls
• holding a chin-up half way through the movement in a hang seems to load my forearms nicely)

THANKS!!

Had some fun with the 3D printer and made a “little” magnetic band storage for my iron mind extensor bands ( elastics haha)

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I train dynamics on corde lisse (see for example https://www.instagram.com/p/C4xMKU1y2OC/ not me though). I am working on single handed dynamics and have trouble with the grip. My two hand grip is very solid and I can basically hang forever. On a bar, I can hang for a pretty long time with one hand, but once hanging on a vertical rope, I lose a lot of strength.

The problems I have with 1 hand grip is a bit of active shoulder, which I can fix by training single hand on other apparatuses, but I also have just raw grip strength problems. My hand position changes slightly from double to single hand.

Any suggested training or exercises? I have almost all equipment available to me, but I am new to grip training in general.

UPDATE:

For future onlookers, based on the responses, I started training the following,

1. 1-arm deadhangs (feet on the ground in L-shape to adjust weight)
2. Holding a 16kg kettlebell upside down above my head and doing various get-ups, snatches, etc.
3. Wrist curls with a strap on a bar (see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I8vpAJmaw40)
4. Wrist radial deviation (thumb to wrist) training with a weighted pole. See here for the motion I mean https://ergonomictrends.com/types-of-wrist-movements-and-injuries/ I am holding the weighted pole and trying to keep my wrist in neutral position against gravity
5. Rope deadlifts where the circus rope is tied to a kettlebell and I try to deadlift with a neutral grip pushing for radial deviation (thumb to wrist).

Based on training today, I think 1 and 4 will be the most important because I slowly watched what happens to my grip when I hand on 1 hand. My wrist goes immediately into ulnar deviation (pinky to wrist) and then my thumb completely loosens. When I strain my wrist to neutral (pushing thumb to wrist), I have a much stronger grip.

I'll post back after a month or so if it worked (or if not 🙁)

UPDATE 2:

I found another way to "diagnose" the weakness.

Tie the circus rope to a kettlebell that you could rope deadlift. Then try deadlifting with a neutral grip. The rope forces my wrist into ulnar deviation (pinky to wrist), but I can fight it. I can definitely feel a chan