I’m not gonna lie, I have no experience training arm wrestlers. So I can only theorize about what would work best for them from what I’ve seen of the sport and my understanding of it.
I do have a friend of mine who competed at a fairly high level so his training (he was training mostly strongman-style with additional grip and arm work) can give me some ideas.
From what I know, strength is obviously very important, especially in the upper body/arms, although it seems like the technique has evolved to rely on the whole body. BUT I think that power/explosiveness is just as important if not more.
It seems to me that the person who can go from zero to max force in the smallest amount of time has a huge advantage. This would require both a quick reaction time and a very high level of starting strength (the most rapid form of power).
I also don’t think that you should get overly specific with your strength movements, especially if you include a good amount of technique work.
Again, since it’s not my area of expertise I’m actually using the this “answer screen” to do my thinking “out loud”, this helps me gradually work things out.
So, I’ll start by some general thoughts.
Things that I think would be very beneficial:
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Heavy arm flexor work focusing on both the concentric, eccentric and overcoming isometrics. I think that Zottman curls might be especially interesting (for the eccentric emphasis portion)
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Explosive arm flexor work like heavy cheated hammer curls and barbell curl drop and catch
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Standing shot put. This essentially throwing a shot (12-16lbs) as far as possible without using the spin or glide. Just a body turn and arm push while staying in place
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Medicine ball throws using only the wrists. Imagine wanting to throw a free throw but with both hands equal on the ball (directly behind it), keeping the arms straight and only throwing by whipping the wrists (ok it’s nothing like a free throw). I think that an 8-15lbs med ball would be best, speed being more important than load.
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Various grip exercise. I really like farmer walk for this.
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I think that a strong lower body is also going to help greatly, but I think that training with stuff like the deadlifts and power cleans (or power snatches) from the hang or blocks would be better than squats and other traditional lower body work.
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Speaking of deadlifts, I think that a Goerner progression might be a good way to train the deadlift/lower body while also improving grip strength tremendously. Basically, it’s a multi-exercises continuous ramp.
Note that until mentioned, all grip types are double overhand.
- Start light and deadlift the bar using only the index finger of both hands
- Increase the weight gradually from set to set
- When you can’t add weight with one finger, switch to two fingers per hand (index and middle finger), continue to ramp up the weight each set
- When you can’t add weight with two fingers, hold the bar with 3 fingers per had (index, middle, ring) and gradually ramp up from set to set.
- When you can’t add weight with the three fingers move on to a full grip, double overhand and continue ramping up
- Finally, when you can’t ramp up anymore with the double overhand grip, switch to a mixed grip and continue to ramp up.
I like sets of 3 reps for those.
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I think that pectorals and anterior deltoids will also be important, but ironically the peck deck machine, power DB flies and cable flies might be a better option than bench pressing, although I’d still bench heavy.
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Finally. I think that moderately heavy work on cable internal and external rotations would be important.
For the next step, please help me help you. Review the info above and let me know your thoughts. If it’s not totally idiotic, I’ll think further about how to potentially structure the training.