I don’t think you can harm your grip strength by using straps, but more by avoiding grip work. [/quote]
In my opinion, that is avoiding grip work…because your grip work is seen in everything you do.
That weak link can ruin everything else so I would rather someone see growth in strength there as they grow all over.
Once again, you do what works for you…but I don’t think recommending that to even most people is a good idea.
There is no better “grip work” than heavy training for everything else.[/quote]
I wouldn’t call it avoiding grip work, because I don’t consider my regular training as grip work. Grip work is it’s own entity.
I would have to disagree with the idea that there is no better grip work than heavy training for everything else. Look at the training grip athletes and strongman due specifically to improve their grip. And in turn, strongmen are also big on using straps for their other heavy work so that they can focus on training their grips.
When I train deadlifts, I train the movement of deadlifts. When I train my lats, I train my lats. When I train my grip, I train my grip. I’ve taken 600lbs for a ride on meets at the 181 weightclass with no grip issues with this approach, and it’s honestly what I’ve advocated to trainees/people I’ve trained with success.
I would have to disagree with the idea that there is no better grip work than heavy training for everything else. Look at the training grip athletes and strongman due specifically to improve their grip. And in turn, strongmen are also big on using straps for their other heavy work so that they can focus on training their grips.[/quote]
Those strong men are not primarily focused on specific muscle growth in priority…which pretty much requires one to feel that muscle working to make it grow optimally.
Strongmen have a goal of moving the weight…not specifically making sure their chest or biceps or lats do all of the work.
That’s cool. I respect your progress.
I am simply giving the very sound reasons for why I would not recommend newer trainers follow the same if the goal is OPTIMAL MUSCLE GROWTH.
[quote]Waittz wrote:
Stu you answered my question before I asked it. I am just having a hard time understanding how placement of your hands would make your muscle grow differently from a shape and directional standpoint. Can’t muscles only grow and get stronger? How are we still beleiving that you can shape it differently these days? My comments are as aimed at increasing bicep peaks as they are lat ‘width’ and are just that questions, not sarcasm.
I am no Mr. O but for what it is worth I have always had a wide back and NEVER do anything wider than just a bit more than shoulder width. Fucks with my shoulders. Think somebody mentioned that too. [/quote]
I’m not stu so ignore my post if you don’t care about my opinion
I don’t think you can truly shape a muscle. I think some fibers of the muscle can be activated better if they are parallel to the line of pull or force which with the back there are a ton of different muscles that span the whole back so it makes sense in my mind to use different hand widths and grips and angles to attempt to hit all the fibers from different angles. Also I don’t believe I can link it but supp versity has a good break down of emg studies showing angles and hand placement in exercises can activate different parts of the same muscle group. I would hypothesize that you might be able to shape a muscle somewhat by growing one part a bit more but as always overall attachment and muscle belie shape will determine the over all look
[quote]T3hPwnisher wrote:
One of the other things I found really essential for training how to use the lats is using straps. By removing my hands from the equation, I can really focus on pulling with the elbows. I know there are a lot of Billy Badasses out there that refuse to use straps, but for me, when I got over my ego and started using them for almost everything, my lats finally started to grow.
I actually shot a multipart series on the subject a while ago, because I realized it was something that was screwing a lot of people in their training
Parts 2 and 3 are on my channel as well.[/quote]
100% agreement on straps. It helps remove the forearm and arm from the back work so you can solely focus on back contraction. It helped accelerate my back growth and actualky feeling my back workout once I used straps on every set ever exercise. My forearms have not suffered at all. And I’m not a PLer or strongman so I don’t care about direct grip strength anyways
[quote]ryanbCXG wrote:
My forearms have not suffered at all. [/quote]
But, your forearms don’t seem that big.
I am not making light of anything either. I could see if you had huge forearms, but you don’t.[/quote]
Nothing on me is big to you. But since I have mutiple ppl ask me what I do for forearms. Irl I am gonna go with their opinion over your mmmk. Also I didn’t say they were big did I? I said they haven’t suffered.
[quote]ryanbCXG wrote:
My forearms have not suffered at all. [/quote]
But, your forearms don’t seem that big.
I am not making light of anything either. I could see if you had huge forearms, but you don’t.[/quote]
Nothing on me is big to you. But since I have mutiple ppl ask me what I do for forearms. Irl I am gonna go with their opinion over your mmmk[/quote]
It wasn’t an insult.
I am just making the point that if guys are going to run around now and tell people to use straps all of the time, maybe they should take a look to see if those forearms are peaking because of that choice.
I mean, seriously, how does that not make sense?
I don’t use straps much. My forearms are pretty damn big.
Gee, maybe there is some connection there…NNAAAAAAWWWWW.
[quote]ryanbCXG wrote:
My forearms have not suffered at all. [/quote]
But, your forearms don’t seem that big.
I am not making light of anything either. I could see if you had huge forearms, but you don’t.[/quote]
Nothing on me is big to you. But since I have mutiple ppl ask me what I do for forearms. Irl I am gonna go with their opinion over your mmmk[/quote]
It wasn’t an insult.
I am just making the point that if guys are going to run around now and tell people to use straps all of the time, maybe they should take a look to see if those forearms are peaking because of that choice.
I mean, seriously, how does that not make sense?
I don’t use straps much. My forearms are pretty damn big.
Gee, maybe there is some connection there…NNAAAAAAWWWWW.
[/quote]
Could of swore this was a thread on wider lats not how big your forearms are. Must of skipped into a different demension again
[quote]ryanbCXG wrote:
My forearms have not suffered at all. [/quote]
But, your forearms don’t seem that big.
I am not making light of anything either. I could see if you had huge forearms, but you don’t.[/quote]
Nothing on me is big to you. But since I have mutiple ppl ask me what I do for forearms. Irl I am gonna go with their opinion over your mmmk[/quote]
It wasn’t an insult.
I am just making the point that if guys are going to run around now and tell people to use straps all of the time, maybe they should take a look to see if those forearms are peaking because of that choice.
I mean, seriously, how does that not make sense?
I don’t use straps much. My forearms are pretty damn big.
Gee, maybe there is some connection there…NNAAAAAAWWWWW.
[/quote]
I have a tendency to think of forearms a lot like calves. Some people can have huge calves with no direct work just secondary involvement during other leg and conditioning work. Some people have to work outrageously hard on their calves. Forearms are the same way. I will say that the best set of forearms I have personally seen on a person though was someone who actually did a lot (compared to most people) of direct forearm work when he did Bi’s.
I have a tendency to think of forearms a lot like calves. Some people can have huge calves with no direct work just secondary involvement during other leg and conditioning work. Some people have to work outrageously hard on their calves. Forearms are the same way. I will say that the best set of forearms I have personally seen on a person though was someone who actually did a lot (compared to most people) of direct forearm work when he did Bi’s. [/quote]
I tend to agree with that…but I had skinny arms.
The one thing that helped me with grip strength is the day I stopped using my straps so much.
I didn’t stop completely using them for years…but tried to stick to the really heavy movements only or the last sets.
Could of swore this was a thread on wider lats not how big your forearms are. Must of skipped into a different demension again[/quote]
Maybe so…because it is all related…which is the main point.
The guy really reaching his optimal growth and hitting his peak…is the guy who isn’t leaving weak links and finding substitutions but the one addressing the weak link.
If you can take up the slack with more direct forearm work, so be it…but don’t ignore these words like they aren’t making sense when they do.
[quote]ryanbCXG wrote:
My forearms have not suffered at all. [/quote]
But, your forearms don’t seem that big.
I am not making light of anything either. I could see if you had huge forearms, but you don’t.[/quote]
Nothing on me is big to you. But since I have mutiple ppl ask me what I do for forearms. Irl I am gonna go with their opinion over your mmmk[/quote]
It wasn’t an insult.
I am just making the point that if guys are going to run around now and tell people to use straps all of the time, maybe they should take a look to see if those forearms are peaking because of that choice.
I mean, seriously, how does that not make sense?
I don’t use straps much. My forearms are pretty damn big.
Gee, maybe there is some connection there…NNAAAAAAWWWWW.
[/quote]
I only use straps for heavy deadlifts, rows, and heavy shrugs. And by heavy I mean when my forearms are exhausted and the poundage is pretty heavy. Like over 405 on deads, over 495 on shrugs, etc.
Crap, I posted my back pic request in the wrong thread… the MC thread is so derailed I forgot which one the topic was in.
I’ll make the request here… X will you post a pic of your back - lat width - to show an example of the width you’ve gained? I’m sincerely interested as the only pics I’ve seen are from the front. This isn’t a challenge, just genius curiosity at your progress.
Edit: Crap, I saw X added his back pic… nice back X!!
I would have to disagree with the idea that there is no better grip work than heavy training for everything else. Look at the training grip athletes and strongman due specifically to improve their grip. And in turn, strongmen are also big on using straps for their other heavy work so that they can focus on training their grips.[/quote]
Those strong men are not primarily focused on specific muscle growth in priority…which pretty much requires one to feel that muscle working to make it grow optimally.
Strongmen have a goal of moving the weight…not specifically making sure their chest or biceps or lats do all of the work.
.[/quote]
Right, I feel like we’re bouncing between topics on this one. I was only focusing on your comment about what is the best grip work when I brought up grip athletes/strongmen, addressing that comment in a vacuum. Unless you meant grip work to mean forearm work, rather than the actual training of grip as a quality in and of itself, which I can see the room for debate on.
We definitely have different perspectives and experiences, and both have proven successful. There are a lot of valid paths out there.
Punisher, I don’t want to derail this thread to much (and we can get back on topic after this) but what has been your experience with the CoC grippers? I bought some a few months ago and have been doing my high reps with the 1 and holds with the 1.5 (following the booklet program) and finishing with the extensor bands. I’ve noticed a difference in grip strength (though I think I’m ready for a 2 already, which I am slightly disappointed as I always thought they’d be more difficult, since 3 gets your name on a list) but how has forearm growth been for you?
I know increasing strength requires building muscle, but do you believe, or have you experienced, significant growth from using the grippers? I also only use straps for heavy dumbell rows (will change once my chalk arrives from home) and max effort deadlifts.
[quote]T3hPwnisher wrote:
One of the other things I found really essential for training how to use the lats is using straps. By removing my hands from the equation, I can really focus on pulling with the elbows. I know there are a lot of Billy Badasses out there that refuse to use straps, but for me, when I got over my ego and started using them for almost everything, my lats finally started to grow.
I actually shot a multipart series on the subject a while ago, because I realized it was something that was screwing a lot of people in their training
Parts 2 and 3 are on my channel as well.[/quote]
100% agreement on straps. It helps remove the forearm and arm from the back work so you can solely focus on back contraction. It helped accelerate my back growth and actualky feeling my back workout once I used straps on every set ever exercise. My forearms have not suffered at all. And I’m not a PLer or strongman so I don’t care about direct grip strength anyways[/quote]
What’s funny is that, as a powerlifter, I still go with this approach. I come across as a heretic among a lot of my peers, but when my deadlift sucked I looked at what strongmen did, because somehow those guys have fucking ridiculous deadlifts compared to powerlifters of equal weight even though it’s not even a primary lift for them. I saw a lot of big men pulling with straps and reduced ROM, so I followed suit.
2 great mottos to live by. One is that success leaves clues, and the other one is to look at what 95% of the population is doing and do the opposite.
[quote]Quasi-Tech wrote:
Punisher, I don’t want to derail this thread to much (and we can get back on topic after this) but what has been your experience with the CoC grippers? I bought some a few months ago and have been doing my high reps with the 1 and holds with the 1.5 (following the booklet program) and finishing with the extensor bands. I’ve noticed a difference in grip strength (though I think I’m ready for a 2 already, which I am slightly disappointed as I always thought they’d be more difficult, since 3 gets your name on a list) but how has forearm growth been for you?
I know increasing strength requires building muscle, but do you believe, or have you experienced, significant growth from using the grippers? I also only use straps for heavy dumbell rows (will change once my chalk arrives from home) and max effort deadlifts.[/quote]
I haven’t really been charting forearm growth to be able to say. I get asked about forearms a lot by weekend warriors and such, and I think they’re pretty sizable, but it’s not anything I really measured. They definitely got bigger.
The jump between the 2 and the 3 is insane, don’t sweat if you’re able to close the 2. I could close the 2 for over 20 reps and still come nowhere close to the 3, haha. The 2.5 is as high as I ever got.
I have a tendency to think of forearms a lot like calves. Some people can have huge calves with no direct work just secondary involvement during other leg and conditioning work. Some people have to work outrageously hard on their calves. Forearms are the same way. I will say that the best set of forearms I have personally seen on a person though was someone who actually did a lot (compared to most people) of direct forearm work when he did Bi’s. [/quote]
I tend to agree with that…but I had skinny arms.
The one thing that helped me with grip strength is the day I stopped using my straps so much.
I didn’t stop completely using them for years…but tried to stick to the really heavy movements only or the last sets.[/quote]
I definitely agree with Professor X on this one, primarily because we are back once again to the question of prioritization. High frequency and high volume have there place, but why would I necessarily cut into my recovery ability and increase my workout time by adding in MORE exercises, or worse, another whole day of training?
If my training revolves around multi-joint movements with heavy weights, why would I add direct forearm work when I can train my forearms on those very same exercises? I’m not saying that direct forearm work isn’t necessary for anyone, but why should I automatically give forearms their own training time when I can train them with everything else?
And furthermore, I also think X is dead on in his assessment of the issue being mind-muscle connection development rather than the need for straps. I swam competitively for years, and as a consequence, I have NO problem tapping into my lats regardless of grip (thumbs over/around, supinated/ pronated, wide/narrow). You don’t need to use straps if you can develop that mind-muscle connection; it’s really that simple.
