Wrist workout

[Guest champs]

Could use some advice regarding wrist work. Incorporated it a few months ago to augment my grip routine which is comming along fine. Wrist strength seems to be progressing quite slowly, if at all. I train wrists once a week with the following routine atm.

8rep x 4 31kg dumbell wrist curl

10rep x 4 15 kg reverse wrist curl

These are both done draping arm over a bench with wrist off the edge.

8rep x 4 wrist curls with olympic bar behind back 90kg, standing up

2x wrist roller with 20kg plate

Each exercise results in failure or close to failure. Each week I try to add anotehr rep or a little more weight but with mixed and limited results so far. Training wise the rest of me seems to respond far better. Any advice or suggestions from yeh more experienced grip and wrist trainees?

[Roark]

If you perform the exercises in the order presented,

may I suggest you begin with barbell wrist curls, using

progressively heavier sets, until you reach a weight

wherein you fail on the seventh rep. Try the curls over

your knees with your butt elevated. This will allow you

to use your calves for an assisted rep near failure.

Then immediately go to one set of dumbell wrist curls

over the CORNER of the bench using whatever weight

will get you 6 to 8 reps in perfect form.

Your standing wrist curl is amazing! Are you blocking

your wrists with a 2x4 or a pad so that your forearms

cannot pendulum? And leaning slightly foreward to get

max contraction?

Try not performing seated wrist curls in the same workout

as standing wrist curls. Alternate.

Sometimes I place a 2x4 lengthwise on the bench with

about 2" of it sticking past the edge of the bench, then

place a towel on the edge of the 2x4 for padding, and

perform dumbell wrist curls. Variety.

Hope this helps.

[Guest champs]

Thanks for the advice, yeh I use plastic bar I slide across at about lower back height and slight bend at hip otherwise it tends to ride up yeh glute. The standing wrist curl seems alot easier for me, maybe it's just something structural with my wrists or perhaps there is some kind of leverage advantage from that angle. I will try barbell bench wrist curls. I thought about it when I first started this program but the dumbell exercise was alot easier to get going on since I tend to superset the reverse curls and the wrist curls, perhaps this is a bad habit. Do you pyramid or maintain reps and just work up the weight towards your last set?

[Roark]

Warmups are something I used to chuckle at- now I

must include them.

Recently injured my right forearm extensor by not

warming up; dumber than dumb.

My typical wrist workout, about every five days,

seated wrist curl over knees:

empty bar warmup for 12 reps

65 x 12

100 x 12

140 x 6

160 x 6

180 x 6

200 x 6

single or double with 220

160 x 10

sometimes, instead of the above, I will do standing

wrist curls using an arm blaster around my lower back

to block the wrists. But 135 for 12 in good form is

really all I can do- your 90 kgs makes me happy for you

and sad for me

I have not been able to use the wrist roller for a

couple months since the extensor injury.

[OldGuy]

Joe, I have not done wrist curls of any form in my training. How do you hold the bar? I have seen where people roll the bar to their finger tips, and then let it roll back. I would prefer not to do that.

[Roark]

Thumbs under the bar with bar in palm. I do not,

nor would I suggest, allowing the fingers to unfurl.

Wrist curl, not finger curl, is the goal.

Hands extended slightly past the knees as I straddle

the bench so the bar can be rested upon it at failure.

I had made a stand for over the bench-end wrist curls,

but in a move that proves my non-Mensa mind, I

disposed of it. It was a cradle six inches wide, so I

could place my forearms over the end of the bench,

grasp beside the upraight stand, and wrist curl, then

settle it back into the cradle- no ackward contrivances

to get into and out of position.

To make one, cut some 2" pipe lengthwise down the

middle and weld it onto a jack stand. Bingo!

[OldGuy]

Maybe wrist curls are what I need to transform my puny 15'' forearms into those that rival Apollon!

[Roark]

15" forearms. Do you have the magical mystery ratio

of 2:1? Is your wrist 7.5" or smaller?

[OldGuy]

No I have the magical wrist size of 8 5/8'' . My proportions are 95% of those given for Apollon. My height at 6' 3 1/4'' is the same. Could it be reincarnation without the strength and French accent? I am lazy like he was said to be.

[Roark]

Wee Oui chance

[Mjoynt]

Old Guy,

15" forearms aren't exactly small. ???   And an 8 5/8" wrist is pretty good sized.  I only have around a 7.5" wrist.

[Guest champs]

Hm I might try working the weight up rather than starting and sticking at the same point for the workout. You get a real good pump on the standing wrist curls, perhaps I just need to warm up better. The handles on the dumbells I use are the thick metal sleeve variety that fairly easily rotate which seems to make the weight significantly harder. 220 max on the bench wrist curls sounds quite impressive, not sure I could reach that, guess I will find out next week. Whats yeh forearm measurement, I dunno if it's relevant but would be interesting to see if there was any correlation between poundage. Just measuring now I am about 38.5 cm (tiny bit over 15 inches converted I think)

[Roark]

My forearms are about as impressive as my face, which is to

say, I will get a second look faster from a frowning poilceman,

than from a smiling woman

My best single wrist curl is 240 lbs, and 225 for six reps. I

cannot do that now, but can always get 200 x 6, and am

back on track following the forearm injury.

My unpumped, held-straight forearm is 13.25", yes, 13.25"

Before I began serious wrist curls over a year ago

that measurement was about 12.75. There is no difficulty in

wearing a long-sleeved shirt. Unfortunately.

[OldGuy]

A 15'' forearm measured with the arm straight and relaxed is very large, exept when compared to Apollon! If and when they look like his. I will always wear short sleeves and even post pics on here. They have not grown in 30 years, so not much chance of that unless wrist curls wakes them up.

[Guest champs]

Ive found that wrist curls have done nothing really noticeable for forearm size, tho I have noticed a noticeable thickening of the the 2 major tendons that run down the middle palm side of the wrist. Reverse wrist curls however seem to of added the most size to the upper forearms, if you want to increase your forearm size thats what I would be working with.

[Guest rockblaster]

I have found that a simple way to work the wrists is to do thick bar curls/reverse curls and superset them with sledgehammer lifts.

[Guest CalvinP]

Many Baseball players have very big forearms. and it seemed they are pretty functional too, not just for look. Wrist-curl builds muscles but is it functional? Forearm movements involve more than just up and down motions as wrist-curl dictates. It seems twisting motions are more useful and functional. Pardon me if I am wrong!    Any suggestion?

[Patrik_F]

About the wrist size. 2 years ago when I had never touched a weight my wrists were about 7 inches. Now they are 8 inches. I am 21 years old. Before when I didnt train I ate terrible food and drank no milk whatsoever. I have heard that your bone-structure continues to grow until you are about 25-30 years old.

So I was wondering if I can expect my wrist to thicken some more with time? Oldguy maybe can answer this  :p

[Roark]

Yes, OldGuy, please answer this

[ChrisJames]

A friend of mine who is a 6 time world powerlifting champion told me that when he was in his thirties he had 8 inch wrists.

I measured his wrists on his 60 th birthday and they now measure 9 inches.Also his wedding ring can no longer fit any of his fingers.He works out with 2 1/2 inch dumbells.He had a trophy for managing to lift one of Inch's dumbells, we think it's the 150lb one,in the 1960's.

Chris

[ChrisJames]

I forgot to mention he's about the same bodyweight.

[Tom of Iowa2]

So when taking forearm measurements you take them with arm straight and un flexed??

When compareing forearm measurements of historical figures I can assume they did it with a straight relaxed arm?

Do any of you guys take a flexed measurement(at its largest point)?and then take a measurement held out straight and unflexed?What sort of difference is there?

I've noticed at big fights they sometimes have chest measurement relaxed and expanded.Bicep relaxed and flexed.

My wrists and fingers are definitely getting bigger...of course I've gained a LOT of weight in the last 5 years of training.

I've noticed some older(perhaps 60+)men that have done manual labor most of their lives have very large wrists and fingers.Appearing much bigger than mine(8 1/4 wrist-size 13 ring)I have been told I have big knuckles and fist but some of these older dudes are incredible.

What brings this about?

[Jonathan McMillan]

Along with the sledgehammer levers already noted I would highly reccomend plate bicep curls and plate wrist curls with the arm draped over your knee or bench.  The nice thing about these is they don't require any other equipment then you already have.  It's kindof tricky to add weight though.  I've been adding weight to a plate by jamming my clamp through the holes in the plate I'm curling and the weights I want to add.

NICE wrist curl weights everybody!!!!!!

Jon@han

[bender]

The final John Brookfield quote from MoHS.

 "Curling regular weight plates may be the greatest wrist developer under the sun."  "Curling plates is a great exercise to build wrist strength beyond your wildest dreams."   -JB

[RogerSteffens]

I've increased and continue to maintain my wrist curling largely through plate wrist curling.  For example, I can do 10 reps with 225 and will plate wrist curl with a 25lb plate with a 10lb plate stacked on top for 10 reps, so I don't bother doing the 225 very often, why bother ?