There’s something about Pinch Grip & Plate Curls

[AdriaanRobert96]

Good day to you lads and lasses, so today while sipping on my coffee I had another theory/ thought ..

I’ve done grip training ON & OFF for about 2 years by now and my main goal is to ”man handle” the CoC #3 on any given day.

That being said, I put the grippers away for a while and went with my gut, telling me to increase pinch strength of any width.

So pinch grip of any width but also pinch wrist curls/ or plate curls if you wanna call it that.

I don’t use a plate, I just use my home wooden made pinch plate to curl aswell.

Now with all this out the way, my theory is that pinch grip of any width and or plate curls increases my gripper/ crush strength through the roof!

I am speaking from experience on this, I’ve no-set closed the CoC #3 on about 3 occasions and every time I did that, it was about 1-3 weeks after plate curls and heavy pinch work.

I can’t describe it, but pinching makes my hand feel sturdier overal and “plate” curl makes my crush grip feel insane… not only “feel” insane but become insanely strong.

I remember the CoC #3 clicking so damn hard that I thought I broke it..

Never felt such insane strength before..

I even surprised myself

So what I am asking is, does anyone else have or have had this experience with place curls and or pinching?

Let me know down below, let’s chit chat about grip good people

Thanks in advance and may the Grip Gods bless ya’ll

NOTE: This and a the tool that I use for both “plate curls” and pinch grip work.

 

Edited July 2, 2022 by AdriaanRobert96
Typo

[Vinnie]

My friend and gripboard member Chez is one of the best gripper closers in the world, and one of very few people who can TNS close a 3.  Chez has told me that he believes pinch work complements gripper closing.  He said some pinch work the day or two before going for a max on gripper closes can be helpful.  I am not sure what you meant by doing grippers 1-3 weeks BEFORE pinch, but in any event, it seems there is some correlation between the disciplines if you and Chez are both seeing it.

For my part, I don't have a good pinch set up to be able to test this theory, but I have noticed that doing some wrist work (with sledge hammers) a day or so before gripper closes seems to give me a little bump up. 

I tried that out before my last comp, and came up 5 pounds RGC over my PR on the block set gripper close, so it seems to work for me.  I think that's about what Chez thinks the pinch work adds.  It doesn't put you in a different ballpark, more just pushes you towards the top of the range you might be in on any given day.

All this is anecdotal of course.  I am not aware of any specific scientific or anatomic basis for it, just my experience and other people's accounts.

[Vinnie]

37 minutes ago, AdriaanRobert96 said:

I remember the CoC #3 clicking so damn hard that I thought I broke it.

This is pretty remarkable.  You may as well cert it then - it should be pretty easy for you, and I think the gripper is free (not sure about international, but in the US it is) as long as you can show them in advance by video that you are capable.  You might even be able to CCS the 3.5 if the 3 is that easy.

[Fist of Fury]

Everything other than gripper training interfere with my crush strength. I have to do other grip exercises in very moderate volumes and intensity if I want to maintain and gain crush strength. having said that, doing so, moderately does help, but there's a really fine line, which is very easy to step over. Then my crush strength really takes a beating and it does not recover either, I regress if I reach that point and I have to start over.

So my experience is probably opposite of yours.

That's what's so incredible with strength training. One thing that works for one person might be a disaster for another person.

You don't have to seek confirmation from others. If something works for you, just stick with that. Trying to do something just because somebody says you should is not smart. The smartest way is always to listen to your own body.

[AdriaanRobert96]

35 minutes ago, Vinnie said:

My friend and gripboard member Chez is one of the best gripper closers in the world, and one of very few people who can TNS close a 3.  Chez has told me that he believes pinch work complements gripper closing.  He said some pinch work the day or two before going for a max on gripper closes can be helpful.  I am not sure what you meant by doing grippers 1-3 weeks BEFORE pinch, but in any event, it seems there is some correlation between the disciplines if you and Chez are both seeing it.

For my part, I don't have a good pinch set up to be able to test this theory, but I have noticed that doing some wrist work (with sledge hammers) a day or so before gripper closes seems to give me a little bump up. 

I tried that out before my last comp, and came up 5 pounds RGC over my PR on the block set gripper close, so it seems to work for me.  I think that's about what Chez thinks the pinch work adds.  It doesn't put you in a different ballpark, more just pushes you towards the top of the range you might be in on any given day.

All this is anecdotal of course.  I am not aware of any specific scientific or anatomic basis for it, just my experience and other people's accounts.

Yeah I think this all makes sense, or atleast for some people, and I meant to say 3 pinching 3 weeka before closing a gripper hehe

[AdriaanRobert96]

33 minutes ago, Vinnie said:

This is pretty remarkable.  You may as well cert it then - it should be pretty easy for you, and I think the gripper is free (not sure about international, but in the US it is) as long as you can show them in advance by video that you are capable.  You might even be able to CCS the 3.5 if the 3 is that easy.

I appreciate it, well I never thought about certifying since I didn’t see it as such a big deal anymore.. it was more for myself

But I’ll keep that in mind

 

[AdriaanRobert96]

14 minutes ago, Fist of Fury said:

Everything other than gripper training interfere with my crush strength. I have to do other grip exercises in very moderate volumes and intensity if I want to maintain and gain crush strength. having said that, doing so, moderately does help, but there's a really fine line, which is very easy to step over. Then my crush strength really takes a beating and it does not recover either, I regress if I reach that point and I have to start over.

So my experience is probably opposite of yours.

That's what's so incredible with strength training. One thing that works for one person might be a disaster for another person.

You don't have to seek confirmation from others. If something works for you, just stick with that. Trying to do something just because somebody says you should is not smart. The smartest way is always to listen to your own body.

Amen to that brother!

About that, I personally feel that fat grip work really interferes with my crush grip for some reason

It really is interesting for sure!

[slazbob]

You can definitely make a case that All forms of grip training ties it all together…some feel wide pinch is helpful for grippers, where I feel that in the thumb more. A pinch of thinner objects is more beneficial because I feel it more in the fingers…that’s probably why you felt stronger with the no.3 using that width.

i always felt I had to focus on grippers to get better at them, but trying to lift the inch over and over did help my grippers.

i recently threw towel training in and it set me back gripper-wise. I usually don’t see a strength boost from a new exercise until my hands adapt in a couple weeks- then the boost comes and you think you’re just having a good day, but it’s really what you put in there a few workouts before that’s paying off.

for me, I have to be more disciplined; I get lost in trying to close a particular gripper that’s a max attempt over and over. I know from experience that you can’t max every workout…I think everyone knows that, but you always think this is the day it’s going down and you keep trying. Like gambling, really haha. 
 

your goal to master the no.3, anytime you try, is just building reps with it and ultimately getting the 3.5

i don’t think there’s anyone who can do the 3.5 and not close the no.3 anytime….unless it’s a weak 165 3.5 and you have a 160 no.3 …then you have to be warmed up haha.

on a side note…people have used squatting in-between sets of grippers to fire up the cns which can be a nice boost, as long as you’re not straining your wrists back …maybe have a safety bar that you don’t have to have that strain. I found dumbbell side laterals to be the ultimate gripper helper. Just fires up all the nerves from the neck down through the hands and gives me a definite boost.

[AdriaanRobert96]

13 minutes ago, slazbob said:

You can definitely make a case that All forms of grip training ties it all together…some feel wide pinch is helpful for grippers, where I feel that in the thumb more. A pinch of thinner objects is more beneficial because I feel it more in the fingers…that’s probably why you felt stronger with the no.3 using that width.

i always felt I had to focus on grippers to get better at them, but trying to lift the inch over and over did help my grippers.

i recently threw towel training in and it set me back gripper-wise. I usually don’t see a strength boost from a new exercise until my hands adapt in a couple weeks- then the boost comes and you think you’re just having a good day, but it’s really what you put in there a few workouts before that’s paying off.

for me, I have to be more disciplined; I get lost in trying to close a particular gripper that’s a max attempt over and over. I know from experience that you can’t max every workout…I think everyone knows that, but you always think this is the day it’s going down and you keep trying. Like gambling, really haha. 
 

your goal to master the no.3, anytime you try, is just building reps with it and ultimately getting the 3.5

i don’t think there’s anyone who can do the 3.5 and not close the no.3 anytime….unless it’s a weak 165 3.5 and you have a 160 no.3 …then you have to be warmed up haha.

on a side note…people have used squatting in-between sets of grippers to fire up the cns which can be a nice boost, as long as you’re not straining your wrists back …maybe have a safety bar that you don’t have to have that strain. I found dumbbell side laterals to be the ultimate gripper helper. Just fires up all the nerves from the neck down through the hands and gives me a definite boost.

Funny thing how we’re all after the same thing, yet our paths are so different

[Vinnie]

54 minutes ago, AdriaanRobert96 said:

Funny thing how we’re all after the same thing, yet our paths are so different

One thing Chris Rice (Climber511 on here) said on Facebook very recently:  keeping a log of your training is very helpful.  I have never been able to maintain that, but if you do it, you can see trends you might not notice otherwise, and you can confirm what you think you see by doing it again.

He is very wise.  I will try again to log my training, first gotta actually start training again lol

[AdriaanRobert96]

1 hour ago, Vinnie said:

One thing Chris Rice (Climber511 on here) said on Facebook very recently:  keeping a log of your training is very helpful.  I have never been able to maintain that, but if you do it, you can see trends you might not notice otherwise, and you can confirm what you think you see by doing it again.

He is very wise.  I will try again to log my training, first gotta actually start training again lol

I thought about doing that honestlyI’ll take a look that Chris Rice aswell

[Fist of Fury]

5 hours ago, AdriaanRobert96 said:

Amen to that brother!

About that, I personally feel that fat grip work really interferes with my crush grip for some reason

It really is interesting for sure!

Yes fatbar is very taxing and can easily kill crush strength if you're not careful.

[Paul Savage]

For grippers you need strong fingers and a large thumb pad an both pinch and plate curls increase finger strength and build the thumb pad so the would be why you seen the strength increase

[AdriaanRobert96]

46 minutes ago, Paul Savage said:

For grippers you need strong fingers and a large thumb pad an both pinch and plate curls increase finger strength and build the thumb pad so the would be why you seen the strength increase

Yeah I guess that makes sense then, fun to see how far I’ll progress.

Going to build up to a 25kg / 45lbs weight