Grip Strength

zil

Second times a charm

I started lifting a couple of months ago and I'm getting to the stage where my grip strength (or lack thereof) is the limiting factor in a lot of my exercises, especially on deadlifts. I'm currently doing about 2 full body sessions a week and I've actually had to drop the weight in the last few weeks to be able to finish a exercise without the bar falling out of my hands. I took a rest for a week and today I noticed I was having more success completing a full set before my hands give out.

From what I've read it seems like I'm suffering from over training however it seems a bit weird that only 2 sessions a week would be causing that. Do you reckon that's the case or is it just that grip always takes longer to develop than your other muscles and I should just keep training as usual and my grip will slowly catch up.

I should say that my main focus is being able to do my regular lifts, I don't care about my grip strength just as long as it's not the limiting factor. Also I've tried using a hook grip which does help slightly but usually after about 2-3 reps my thumb slips out due to sweat and my normal grip fails me shortly after.

Any help would be appreciated as it's currently getting to the stage where I'm only putting in about 70% effort on my free weights as I'm not able to step up to a higher weight as it'll drop out of my hands on the first few reps of my 2nd or 3rd set.

arybvtcw0eolkf

Grip strenght is always something thats going to be derisive here.

Speaking as someone whose grip strenght is very important - I'm a Judoka (Judo fighter) I believe that when you train for grip strenght, do just that. When you train (in the case of deadlifts) back or over all strenght then thats what you must do.

So, if your doing DL's for back strenght, use straps - why sell yourself short because your smaller finger muscles fail before your very much larger back muscles - strap up.

There are specific exercises for grip strenght - they're not very important for the majority of people here, although some people like to do them, but personally I think its time wasted in the gym unless you absolutely need grip strenght.

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bigstar

what grip are you using. double overhand or mixed? if its not a mixed grip start using that for your heaviest sets. chalk will help too.

rccaulfield

Dont use straps or take shortcuts if you are intending on doing deadlifting/similar for the longterm. On the workout that doesn't have the deadlift use elastic bands with good tension on the tips of the fingers and go to failure for 1 set, this can be done watchin the telly after the workout! While i was waiting for my grip to strengthen i had to drop my reps and raise the weight a bit as this brought my back/hamstrings(stiff-legged dl)and took my grip strength more out of it!
I found after a few weeks my grip strength and back ham strength were in unison.

kevpants

Chalk is the first thing to get before you think about straps in my opinion.

The thing about straps for deadlifting is that deadlifting is a really taxing movement on your CNS, hence the ease with which you can overtrain due to it. There's a lot of evidence to suggest the gripping element of deadlifting is the most taxing on the CNS rather than any back or hips involvement. It's also pretty clear that this battering of your CNS is what stimulates strength increases and makes the deadlift a true full body exercise.

Leaving out the grip challenges of deadlifting is for me the same as saying "I can hang onto the bar but I just want something to help me pull the weight up", and you'd get lambasted for asking that. If you ask me, deadlifting with straps isn't really deadlifting. It's back work, but it's not deadlifting.

I know sometimes people have to use straps in the event of a torn callus or somesuch but making straps part of your everyday routine is a mistake.

So I'd say use chalk, and if you can only get X reps with a weight that you dropped but could have pulled a few more times then you only got X reps. There are no asterisks with grip disclaimersas far as deadlifting numbers go if you ask me.