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Strong Hook, But Weak Up Top - How Do I Train To Prevent This?


G-Man

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Few suggestions:

1) Practice up top more during your practice sessions.

2) Strengthen your pronation with specific movements but keep the ROM very short.

It's rather easy to get injured or strained when over pronating with weights or bands.

A greater ROM is not the primary goal but a shorter ROM with greater resistance.

3) Strengthen your index and middle fingers until they are like steel!

4) On your set-up make certain you set up past his hand and not into his hand. Your palm should barely be

in contact with your opponents. This way you have less distance to travel when going outside to gain hand control.

This is much easier to show on the table one on one than it is to try and write an explanation.

5) Practice FAST starts under light tension focusing on gaining control of your opponents hand/fingers.

6) DO NOT anchor your hand to your opponents! This is prevented by NOT trying to squeeze the blood out of your

opponents hand. John Brzenk calls this anchoring. You're squeezing so hard that you anchor your hand to his thus preventing yourself from gaining hand position. Make sense?

Hope this helps!

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Very strong hold and way to fight off the pin for as long as you can. Most people give up once there in that position. At the end you start to lean back and open up and this is how he was able to finish. In situations like that when you're able to hold off an immediate pin you need to lean in, get closer to your hand and try and go for the press. Train your wrists and back pressure more to prevent being top rolled. Hammer Curls, static holds, Sledge Hammer Levering, Neutral grip pullup holds, etc.

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My response above was under the assumption you was trying to strengthen your top roll.

Are you asking how to prevent being top rolled? Strengthen your hook power? Be more specific

so I can as well.

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Joe

It would be great if you could share some of your knowledge when it comes to how to set up a hook in straps against a top roller.

thank you

I'm contemplating starting some video tutorials on arm wrestling training, technique, tips, etc...

It's just finding the spare time to do it!

Video demonstrations are much better than written explanations for sure!

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My response above was under the assumption you was trying to strengthen your top roll.

Are you asking how to prevent being top rolled? Strengthen your hook power? Be more specific

so I can as well.

Thank you for the prompt response and useful advice, Mighty Joe. My goal is to develop the strength to pull people into either a hook or a shoulder roll.

I am going to start incorporating what you suggest going forward.

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  • 4 weeks later...

Put your emphasis on:

-pronation

-fast start

and listen Mighty Joe ...

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  • 3 weeks later...

To develop hook strength its important to train rotation (pronation). Once you give up your rotation in a match (become fully supinated) you are in trouble.

When hooking, I'm aiming to max out my cup without becoming supinated and expose their rotator muscles in outside of the forearm (not the bicep). Pronation downward thro the bottom of the hand is key here. Devon talks about this in his videos on hooking.

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JoeIt would be great if you could share some of your knowledge when it comes to how to set up a hook in straps against a top roller.thank you
I'm contemplating starting some video tutorials on arm wrestling training, technique, tips, etc...It's just finding the spare time to do it!Video demonstrations are much better than written explanations for sure!

I remember you did some instructional videos a few years ago Joe - they were excellent and helped me a lot when I started out.

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  • 2 weeks later...

JoeIt would be great if you could share some of your knowledge when it comes to how to set up a hook in straps against a top roller.thank you

I'm contemplating starting some video tutorials on arm wrestling training, technique, tips, etc...It's just finding the spare time to do it!Video demonstrations are much better than written explanations for sure!

I remember you did some instructional videos a few years ago Joe - they were excellent and helped me a lot when I started out.

Anthony, I appreciate your very kind comments sir!

My instructional AW'ing videos were done under a different YT name and somehow that account got hacked into and the videos deleted.

I was utterly devastated because of the countless hours and effort I put into making these videos for others with an emphasis on

those just starting out and even for more advanced pullers.

Just a side story here and I'm not trying to toot my horn but in 2009 at the Ruler of the Nation tournament in Kansas City, my

good friend and legend of the sport, John Brzenk came up to me and told me how great the videos were and he said he had to admit they

were some of the best he'd watched if not the best. The reason I'm sharing this with you is because of who the comment came from

and how great it made me feel at the time. Made all my efforts very much worth it for sure!!! I'll never forget that day and I cherish what he told me.

I've considered doing them once again but I hope you can understand why I'm so apprehensive.

Thanks again for your comments!!!

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My response above was under the assumption you was trying to strengthen your top roll.

Are you asking how to prevent being top rolled? Strengthen your hook power? Be more specific

so I can as well.

Thank you for the prompt response and useful advice, Mighty Joe. My goal is to develop the strength to pull people into either a hook or a shoulder roll.

I am going to start incorporating what you suggest going forward.

I was a top roller my whole competitive career (15 years) and just recently I've been training to be more of a hook puller which my build type, height,

forearm/arm ratio, etc. seem to justify such a change.

One thing I learned from the Europeans, Russians and the Polish pullers is that incorporating a conic handle into your hook training

is very beneficial. The cone shaped handle can be used to train top roll strength as well but I've found through experimenting and recording my

progress that the conic handle is a superb training tool for hook type pullers.

The key fingers in a hook type match (specially from the start trying to suck your opponent into a hook) is your ring/pinkie fingers.

With a conic handle I set up at the table and position the handle in my hand where the larger part of the cone is placed on these 2 fingers.

What happens is when you began to exert force and pull the handle into the hook position (flexion) you have to apply much more pressure

on the cone with your RP fingers than with the index/middle fingers. If you want to train the top roll you simply reverse the handle around where the larger end is placed at your IM fingers. Does this make sense? The taper of the cone forces the 2 fingers you have placed on the larger end

to squeeze harder to be able to hang onto the handle.

BTW, for those wanted to know where they can get a conic handle, look no further than PythonGrip.com (Yuri) or Arm Power.net (Pawell). They both have excellent conic handles that I speak of. This shouldn't be a violation to our wonderful sponsors being none of them (I know of) offer such

a device.

The conic handle along with a dynomometer setup I designed to measure my output has greatly increased my pulling power in a short amount of time. I've always preached to those I train that it's always optimal if one can quantify what they do. What's measured and tracked (recorded) can

be improved upon. I can't quite explain why it is but when you have an instrument that verifies what forces your exerting you can really

progress faster than if you wasn't able to quantify your progress. It really is amazing!

Hope this helps those reading this and those interested! Most of all I hope I've not confused anyone!

If these suggestions are not clear, please speak up and I'll do my best to explain better. :)

If there's enough interest I will strongly consider doing the instructional videos once again!!! ;)

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My response above was under the assumption you was trying to strengthen your top roll.

Are you asking how to prevent being top rolled? Strengthen your hook power? Be more specific

so I can as well.

Thank you for the prompt response and useful advice, Mighty Joe. My goal is to develop the strength to pull people into either a hook or a shoulder roll.

I am going to start incorporating what you suggest going forward.

I was a top roller my whole competitive career (15 years) and just recently I've been training to be more of a hook puller which my build type, height,

forearm/arm ratio, etc. seem to justify such a change.

One thing I learned from the Europeans, Russians and the Polish pullers is that incorporating a conic handle into your hook training

is very beneficial. The cone shaped handle can be used to train top roll strength as well but I've found through experimenting and recording my

progress that the conic handle is a superb training tool for hook type pullers.

The key fingers in a hook type match (specially from the start trying to suck your opponent into a hook) is your ring/pinkie fingers.

With a conic handle I set up at the table and position the handle in my hand where the larger part of the cone is placed on these 2 fingers.

What happens is when you began to exert force and pull the handle into the hook position (flexion) you have to apply much more pressure

on the cone with your RP fingers than with the index/middle fingers. If you want to train the top roll you simply reverse the handle around where the larger end is placed at your IM fingers. Does this make sense? The taper of the cone forces the 2 fingers you have placed on the larger end

to squeeze harder to be able to hang onto the handle.

BTW, for those wanted to know where they can get a conic handle, look no further than PythonGrip.com (Yuri) or Arm Power.net (Pawell). They both have excellent conic handles that I speak of. This shouldn't be a violation to our wonderful sponsors being none of them (I know of) offer such

a device.

The conic handle along with a dynomometer setup I designed to measure my output has greatly increased my pulling power in a short amount of time. I've always preached to those I train that it's always optimal if one can quantify what they do. What's measured and tracked (recorded) can

be improved upon. I can't quite explain why it is but when you have an instrument that verifies what forces your exerting you can really

progress faster than if you wasn't able to quantify your progress. It really is amazing!

Hope this helps those reading this and those interested! Most of all I hope I've not confused anyone!

If these suggestions are not clear, please speak up and I'll do my best to explain better. :)

If there's enough interest I will strongly consider doing the instructional videos once again!!! ;)

Sounds great, Joe ! I learned a lot from your videos, and i'm sure a lot of armwrestlers would learn too ! :)

Edited by DefiantUnderdog
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  • 1 month later...

Thank you to all who responded. I have since been training with a Terminator handle doing the wrist curl, wrist curl holds and negatives with the handle lined up so it mimics the arm wrestling start.

I have also been training back pressure pretty hard. My favorite exercise is doing the one arm machine hammer curl holds for 30-seconds to a minute plus while trying to keep bar pinned against forehead. The weight is 60-100 pounds.

I am thinking of going to a tournament in about two weeks - maybe will get a rematch from the above? Will see how it goes next time.

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If there's enough interest I will strongly consider doing the instructional videos once again!!! ;)

Yup, deffo interested here. :)

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