Grip injuries and prevention

[Anemptybox]

Bit of a "negative" topic perhaps but also important.

What are some of the worst injuries you've seen or experienced yourself from grip training and how do you think they could have been prevented? How did the recovery look like?

I'm not doing much grip training nowadays (or training in general, too busy and tired, hope that'll change soon) but I remember having pain in my lower knuckle on my right middle finger, it was more at one side but I don't remember which one. This was back at the end of 2017 to a few months into 2018 I believe. I think I got this problem after doing some relatively heavy grippers. I can't say for sure what rep range and set width but it definitely wasn't negatives or excessively heavy. Maybe I was just simply doing more than my hands could handle and/or something was wrong with my technique.

IIRC, what helped was to rest from grip heavy stuff for a little while and then do some light training, like lots of full range reps with easy grippers I found quite helpful, plus extensor bands.

I've also had some light elbow pain a couple of times and one of those rubber twist bar things seems to help.

Hope everyone is doing well and good luck in your training.

Edited February 19, 2021 by Anemptybox

[Lennix]

I have had both ny pinkies pop loud and getting sprained really bad with bruising and stiffness for 6-8 weeks each. First time it popped when I was pulling DOH axle. The second pinkie popped while doing monkeygrip deadlifts. I kept on training what I could during the recovery time which was everything except grippers. Contrast baths and moving them alot helped. 

Video if you want to hear the sound of the pop, second video: 

https://www.instagram.com/p/B6qKYHXA3_5/?igshid=1k9yhrr18cglu 

Except that nothing serious, minor sprains in fingers, tendinitis, skintears small and big, 2x2cm in my palm were the worst from a recent horseshoe bend. 

[Kluv#0]

For me, it has to be when I was relatively new to grip(2017) and lifted in a charity event. I pulled 245 lbs on suitcase DL- at the time PR for me- and the bar had no center knurling, so I was kinda feeling happy. After the event, David Aiman (same size as me)who is an excellent deadlifter and has a climbing background wanted to have me show him how to do suitcase DL- He went and lifted 275 lbs pretty easy! That was pretty good for grounding my ego. David and I became friends and he has since entered a few of my grip contests and is pretty darn strong except for grippers.

In a physical injury, Vid below- 2nd rep on the 1 arm double sledgehammer curl was brutal and tore a huge chunk out of my thumb- even to this day it has not healed properly.

1 Arm Double Sledgehammer Curl 20lb(22.4) & 16lb(18.7) - YouTube

 

[pancho_grip_lift]

1 hour ago, Anemptybox said:

Bit of a "negative" topic perhaps but also important.

What are some of the worst injuries you've seen or experienced yourself from grip training and how do you think they could have been prevented? How did the recovery look like?

I'm not doing much grip training nowadays (or training in general, too busy and tired, hope that'll change soon) but I remember having pain in my lower knuckle on my right middle finger, it was more at one side but I don't remember which one. This was back at the end of 2017 to a few months into 2018 I believe. I think I got this problem after doing some relatively heavy grippers. I can't say for sure what rep range and set width but it definitely wasn't negatives or excessively heavy. Maybe I was just simply doing more than my hands could handle and/or something was wrong with my technique.

IIRC, what helped was to rest from grip heavy stuff for a little while and then do some light training, like lots of full range reps with easy grippers I found quite helpful, plus extensor bands.

I've also had some light elbow pain a couple of times and one of those rubber twist bar things seems to help.

Hope everyone is doing well and good luck in your training.

I had 2 injuries on my extensors, both times becouse of doing too much too soon on grippers. One was when I started training gripsport in 2018, in a cycle where I did a session of high volume, lets say 6 sets of ten for a coc 1,5, which was my working set those days, and then a second session with max silver bullet holds. After a couple of weeks I experienced a pain that sounds just like what you described. I decided to stop training them for 3 weeks, then the pain was gone. Those days I needed to do a little less volume overall, becouse my tendons were not prepared for that load, and also, start training my extensors, which I wasn't doing at the time.

The second one was in November 2019, when I tried to train heavy on grippers and also mix it with climbing sessions. First two months went ok, I even managed to participate in a competition (which was really fun). But there was a time where I couldn't recover from all the workload, and I even remember feeling a pop in my left hand's ring finger. I went to the hospital, and I had a minor injury in my extensor, again.  Very similar to the first time, my extensors were still too weak compared to my flexors, and I was doing too much, first month climbing, for a 5'11' guy who weighs 95kg (not too short or too light), and I was also training grip 3 times a week, being one of the sessions about TNS for several reps on grippers. 

Moral of the story: Never neglect the extensors training, and don´t do too much too soon. 

[Anemptybox]

On 2/19/2021 at 8:27 PM, Lennix said:

I have had both ny pinkies pop loud and getting sprained really bad with bruising and stiffness for 6-8 weeks each. First time it popped when I was pulling DOH axle. The second pinkie popped while doing monkeygrip deadlifts. I kept on training what I could during the recovery time which was everything except grippers. Contrast baths and moving them alot helped. 

Video if you want to hear the sound of the pop, second video: 

https://www.instagram.com/p/B6qKYHXA3_5/?igshid=1k9yhrr18cglu 

Except that nothing serious, minor sprains in fingers, tendinitis, skintears small and big, 2x2cm in my palm were the worst from a recent horseshoe bend. 

Scary pop sound there and damn you're too strong! Speaking of pinkies, I think my right pinky tend to lock up a bit in certain positions when doing grippers and it doesn't feel too good.

 

On 2/19/2021 at 9:32 PM, Kluv#0 said:

For me, it has to be when I was relatively new to grip(2017) and lifted in a charity event. I pulled 245 lbs on suitcase DL- at the time PR for me- and the bar had no center knurling, so I was kinda feeling happy. After the event, David Aiman (same size as me)who is an excellent deadlifter and has a climbing background wanted to have me show him how to do suitcase DL- He went and lifted 275 lbs pretty easy! That was pretty good for grounding my ego. David and I became friends and he has since entered a few of my grip contests and is pretty darn strong except for grippers.

In a physical injury, Vid below- 2nd rep on the 1 arm double sledgehammer curl was brutal and tore a huge chunk out of my thumb- even to this day it has not healed properly.

1 Arm Double Sledgehammer Curl 20lb(22.4) & 16lb(18.7) - YouTube

 

Damn, I can imagine that must've hurt pretty bad. Reminded me of another very small injury I had when plate pinching and the plates slipped and hurt my thumb, not anywhere near your injury but it hurt for a while. I hope your thumb will heal.

 

On 2/19/2021 at 10:13 PM, pancho_grip_lift said:

I had 2 injuries on my extensors, both times becouse of doing too much too soon on grippers. One was when I started training gripsport in 2018, in a cycle where I did a session of high volume, lets say 6 sets of ten for a coc 1,5, which was my working set those days, and then a second session with max silver bullet holds. After a couple of weeks I experienced a pain that sounds just like what you described. I decided to stop training them for 3 weeks, then the pain was gone. Those days I needed to do a little less volume overall, becouse my tendons were not prepared for that load, and also, start training my extensors, which I wasn't doing at the time.

The second one was in November 2019, when I tried to train heavy on grippers and also mix it with climbing sessions. First two months went ok, I even managed to participate in a competition (which was really fun). But there was a time where I couldn't recover from all the workload, and I even remember feeling a pop in my left hand's ring finger. I went to the hospital, and I had a minor injury in my extensor, again.  Very similar to the first time, my extensors were still too weak compared to my flexors, and I was doing too much, first month climbing, for a 5'11' guy who weighs 95kg (not too short or too light), and I was also training grip 3 times a week, being one of the sessions about TNS for several reps on grippers. 

Moral of the story: Never neglect the extensors training, and don´t do too much too soon. 

Good advice, I often neglect extensor training which isn't smart. I probably also did too much volume when I got that same type of pain.

I did a TNS with the CoC No. 1.5 like half a year ago and tore the skin off the upper part of my middle finger, so I had to use "sports tape" to do any strength training for a bit. Kinda weird, I felt like the gripper was in a bad position for some of the reps but I kept going because I wanted to max out. The problem for me is usually just a big callus in the middle of the hand.

[JayGrips]

Voodoo floss (pretty easy to find videos on how to floss your forearms, elbows, upper arms)

Foam Rolling(i use lacross ball for forearms and even sometimes a small rubber ball for my thumb bad)

stretching whole body (bodyweight warrior on youtube has some great routines)

Hitting extensors, pronation, supination, radial and ulnar deviation (Basically make sure your training your wrists in all directions to balance out the grip strength)

training your full body (the body always wants balance and its just better to be well rounded)

eating healthy and keeping overall good healthy behaviors like sleeping 7-9hrs per night and drinking alot of water etc

Edited February 22, 2021 by JayGrips

[Blacksmith513]

While not grip training related... I sprained my thumb at work a few years ago at work.I was carrying 2 sheets of hardiebacker up some stairs, I set them down to reset my grip because of low ceilings, one sheet slid back and pop, it hurt but you get used to getting hurt in construction... An hour later i'm carrying sheet of plywood with someone and POP, even the kid i was with heard it, my thumb swelled instantly. Got an xray, it was some sort of ligament damage and took 2 years to heal. I'm going real off topic now but it hurt so bad, I wanted to take the next day off to ice it... My  dad and brother shamed me into working, and i kept re-injuring it and i didn't want to spend the money on physical therapy.

Stretching, forearm roller and compression gloves are what saved me.