Levering And Finger Opening

[truth1ness]

When I lever, am I supposed to keep the entire handle crushed flat against my thumb/pinky pads or should the fingers on one side be allowed to open up a bit to get more range?

For example, in this picture of Jedd you can see the pinky/ring fingers open up a bit and there's a gap between his pinky pad and the handle. So it looks like the thumb pad/web is acting as a point fulcrum rather than the entire hand.

I find that doing this is the only way I can get the bar even remotely horizontal. I can get like 1/5 of the range if I don't open the fingers. My issue with this, though, is the whole exercise essentially feels like a gripper crush with emphasis on the pinky/ring fingers, and I don't feel much in my wrist muscles. Is that how it's supposed to feel or am I doing something wrong?

I feel like I get a better wrist muscle workout when I do sledge front/rear raises (arm straight down), though I'm still wondering if I should be using finger opening on these or super strict with keeping the handle crushed against both sides of the palm pad.

As a side question, is it ok for front/rear raises to be my main levering work rather than overhead levering, or should I be doing closer to half and half in terms of volume? Is overhead levering more of a once in a while feat or more of a regular staple exercise for you? I see videos of the overhead lever much more often probably because it looks more impressive, but I'm curious how much you do of each style in day to day training.

Edited June 9, 2014 by truth1ness

[Ivan Beritashvili]

Brother, never EVER [you hear?] open fingers on sledge to the forehead. Grip the handle tight as f*** through the whole motion. Tight grip tightens your thumb web. If you allow the handle to hang on the web it will tear, I promise you.
Also put the forearm on some bar, set higher than your shoulder. Rememer, maximum tension is when handle is parallel to the floor. I found resonable in this exercise lowering to about 30 deg to horizont.

Here is how I do it:

Rear and front are much more effecient for developing ulnar/radial deviations. But levering to forehead puts more pressure on radial part of wrist joint, that is good for tightening wrists for reverse.

Hope this helps, stay safe