How many times per week are you doing grippers?

[AdriaanRobert96]

Just curious how many times per week you good people train grippers specifically?

Has it changed during your gripper journey, do you train more or less these days?

Feel free to share

[Fist of Fury]

4-6 for building strength. 2-3 for peaking.

Sometimes twice per day for building strength, so it could be up to 8-10 times a week. Although I always count volume in that phase and I don't care that much about frequency.

[Apneaa]

5 a week, if i do non gripper stuff i have to take it down to 3

[dubyagrip]

1 - I go all out and with my other grip training/lifting, this is all I can manage.

Edited March 29, 2023 by dubyagrip

[Jermiah Merciconah]

I train once a week because i feel i can't recover enough to get quality reps on higher grippers, Switching to a volume block that emphasizes higher frequency every once in a while i feel is good, But overall i want to be moving weight for reps

[AdriaanRobert96]

1 hour ago, Fist of Fury said:

4-6 for building strength. 2-3 for peaking.

Sometimes twice per day for building strength, so it could be up to 8-10 times a week. Although I always count volume in that phase and I don't care that much about frequency.

Oh really? Dang it fam, that’s mad (in an impressive way)..

I’d never be able to manage that workload

[AdriaanRobert96]

1 hour ago, Apneaa said:

5 a week, if i do non gripper stuff i have to take it down to 3

Oh really?

How’s your recovery?

Interested on how your gripper work looks in terms of sets and reps.. feel free to share if you have the time and want too

[AdriaanRobert96]

1 hour ago, dubyagrip said:

1 - I go all out and with my other grip training/lifting, this is all I can manage.

Yup, sounds like me then although I am pretty sure I could manage twice per week if I’d really try..

[AdriaanRobert96]

27 minutes ago, Jermiah Merciconah said:

I train once a week because i feel i can't recover enough to get quality reps on higher grippers, Switching to a volume block that emphasizes higher frequency every once in a while i feel is good, But overall i want to be moving weight for reps

Yup I am currently like you on grippers, pnly doing it once per week, trying to build up volume with decent weight.

Pretty sure I could do twice per week but I feel that recovery is key..

[Jared P]

Once per week, and on rare occasions, twice.

I prioritize recovery and injury prevention, so I can not only get stronger but maintain the growth and health for many years to come.

Muscles and tendons take time to recover and grow, including the abdominals. The same principles apply to the hands and forearms as well, possibly even more so. I believe overtraining is the most common cause of progress stagnation, injury, and reason for quitting with grippers.

[AdriaanRobert96]

4 minutes ago, Jared P said:

Once per week, and on rare occasions, twice.

I prioritize recovery and injury prevention, so I can not only get stronger but maintain the growth and health for many years to come.

Muscles and tendons take time to recover and grow, including the abdominals. The same principles apply to the hands and forearms as well, possibly even more so. I believe overtraining is the most common cause of progress stagnation, injury, and reason for quitting with grippers.

Well said, I also feel that it’s a misconception that forearms are small muscles and can be trained to infinity.. which in some cases works.. depending on exercise selection and all that..

For grippers it’s another story, I remember when I started grippers and not having an idea of what I am doing.. I injured both my middle fingers.

Took me over 6 months to barely be able and move the #1..

So I am with you on that one

[Fist of Fury]

7 minutes ago, Jared P said:

Once per week, and on rare occasions, twice.

I prioritize recovery and injury prevention, so I can not only get stronger but maintain the growth and health for many years to come.

Muscles and tendons take time to recover and grow, including the abdominals. The same principles apply to the hands and forearms as well, possibly even more so. I believe overtraining is the most common cause of progress stagnation, injury, and reason for quitting with grippers.

I think under-training is a way more common problem. Not only for grip training but for all training.

That's why most people in general doesn't have any impressive physique or strength to speak of.

[Fist of Fury]

4 minutes ago, AdriaanRobert96 said:

Well said, I also feel that it’s a misconception that forearms are small muscles and can be trained to infinity.. which in some cases works.. depending on exercise selection and all that..

For grippers it’s another story, I remember when I started grippers and not having an idea of what I am doing.. I injured both my middle fingers.

Took me over 6 months to barely be able and move the #1..

So I am with you on that one

It's pretty well supported that you can train smaller muscles way more, like the ones in your arms and hands. Back when there was much more manual labor the average grip strength of the public was higher.

In bodybuilding and armwrestling, some people train their arms like crazy with good results.

And I doubt anyone believes you can do anything to infinity though.

[AdriaanRobert96]

1 minute ago, Fist of Fury said:

It's pretty well supported that you can train smaller muscles way more, like the ones in your arms and hands. Back when there was much more manual labor the average grip strength of the public was higher.

In bodybuilding and armwrestling, some people train their arms like crazy with good results.

And I doubt anyone believes you can do anything to infinity though.

Well that I totally support and I am well aware of since I do armwrestling myself and love it

I just meant to say that grippers specifically are hard on the hands.. especially harder grippers (for myself atleast) .. but without a doubt there are people that can do grippers more often.

Forearm specific training I can also do up to 5 times/ week without recovery issues

With grippers I was able to train 3 times/ week until I got up to the #3.5, then I felt my recovery went down significantly..

I might maybe be able to hit them twice, but I stick to once per week to not hurt myself again like in the beginning

[Jared P]

Just now, Fist of Fury said:

I think under-training is a way more common problem. Not only for grip training but for all training.

That's why most people in general doesn't have any impressive physique or strength to speak of.

I couldn’t disagree more. I believe the studies show that without proper recovery, there is severely limited growth, and a severely heightened risk of injury. Take sleep for instance; the studies are objective and clear, immune to dispute - proper rem and nrem cycles are required to recover the brain, body, and central nervous system. The same type of recovery applies to hypertrophy and strength, and the repairing of tendons, ligaments, joints. 

Refer to the studies of Matthew Walker which include the analysis of the correlations between athletic performance and recovery.

The reason most people have terrible physiques or strength is more attributable to: lack of consistency, insufficient sleep, insufficient recovery, lack of proper intensity, poor technique, poor nutrition, injury, lack of mobility and ROM - leading to tightness, stress, and inflammation, and others. I wouldn’t put undertraining in the list at all, unless in the form of lack of intensity (rather than frequency) or lack of consistency. 

[Fist of Fury]

1 hour ago, Jared P said:

I couldn’t disagree more. I believe the studies show that without proper recovery, there is severely limited growth, and a severely heightened risk of injury. Take sleep for instance; the studies are objective and clear, immune to dispute - proper rem and nrem cycles are required to recover the brain, body, and central nervous system. The same type of recovery applies to hypertrophy and strength, and the repairing of tendons, ligaments, joints. 

Refer to the studies of Matthew Walker which include the analysis of the correlations between athletic performance and recovery.

The reason most people have terrible physiques or strength is more attributable to: lack of consistency, insufficient sleep, insufficient recovery, lack of proper intensity, poor technique, poor nutrition, injury, lack of mobility and ROM - leading to tightness, stress, and inflammation, and others. I wouldn’t put undertraining in the list at all, unless in the form of lack of intensity (rather than frequency) or lack of consistency. 

The simple truth is that most people don't train enough. Simply because they can't most of the times and also because most people don't have the will power to do so.

How much do you think the elite athletes in any given sport trains compared to the amateurs? It's way more. If over training would be such a common problem there would be no chance for elite athletes to train like they do.

It's just a myth that over training is common. It's actually not.

Real over training is not common amongst normal people at all. It's not even common amongs elite athletes. But that's where you start to see more of it.

Recovery is another thing, in that department most people are not doing it properly either. Regular people who have a normal life simply doesn't have the resources to reach their full potential. It's not that over training is common.

[AdriaanRobert96]

1 hour ago, Fist of Fury said:

The simple truth is that most people don't train enough. Simply because they can't most of the times and also because most people don't have the will power to do so.

How much do you think the elite athletes in any given sport trains compared to the amateurs? It's way more. If over training would be such a common problem there would be no chance for elite athletes to train like they do.

It's just a myth that over training is common. It's actually not.

Real over training is not common amongst normal people at all. It's not even common amongs elite athletes. But that's where you start to see more of it.

Recovery is another thing, in that department most people are not doing it properly either. Regular people who have a normal life simply doesn't have the resources to reach their full potential. It's not that over training is common.

A lot of truth to this one for sure, I also think that a lot of “normal” people as you mentioned confuse bad recovery with over training.. when in fact it’s more about the lack of resources to support such a high lvl of training and all that..

Like.. man you’re not over training, you’re under recovering, full time job, lack of sleep, poor nutrition etc etc..

Edited March 29, 2023 by AdriaanRobert96

[pancho_grip_lift]

5-6 times a week, every training session contains grippers...some days high intensity, and others I deload, but grippers are the cornerstone of my grip training.

[AdriaanRobert96]

1 minute ago, pancho_grip_lift said:

5-6 times a week, every training session contains grippers...some days high intensity, and others I deload, but grippers are the cornerstone of my grip training.

Holy moly, I am jealous of your recovery

Was able to hit grippers 3 times per week until I got to the #3.5, then I had to go down to once per week‍

I just feel like my hand can’t recover that well.

Forearm exercises I can do pretty much 5 times/ week but not grippers

Good on you man!

How’s progress looking, you have a training log?

[pancho_grip_lift]

23 minutes ago, AdriaanRobert96 said:

Holy moly, I am jealous of your recovery

Was able to hit grippers 3 times per week until I got to the #3.5, then I had to go down to once per week‍

I just feel like my hand can’t recover that well.

Forearm exercises I can do pretty much 5 times/ week but not grippers

Good on you man!

How’s progress looking, you have a training log?

Yes I do, it's called pancho's best lifts. I've been lazy to write my workouts lately, but training is going well. I'm currently focused on ghp blocksets. 

I haven't got to the #3,5 yet...my best close has been standard cobalt (160).

[matek]

3 hours ago, Fist of Fury said:

The simple truth is that most people don't train enough. Simply because they can't most of the times and also because most people don't have the will power to do so.

How much do you think the elite athletes in any given sport trains compared to the amateurs? It's way more. If over training would be such a common problem there would be no chance for elite athletes to train like they do.

It's just a myth that over training is common. It's actually not.

Real over training is not common amongst normal people at all. It's not even common amongs elite athletes. But that's where you start to see more of it.

Recovery is another thing, in that department most people are not doing it properly either. Regular people who have a normal life simply doesn't have the resources to reach their full potential. It's not that over training is common.

I completely agree with this. Depends on how someone defines "overtraining", but how I see it, it's extremely hard to overtrain. And injury doesn't necessarily mean overtraining at all.
I've seen this a lot. A lot of people go to the gym just for the sake of going to the gym (funny video related to this btw). A lot of people complain about not having progress in the gym (usually about physique, not strength), but they just don't train hard enough. If I'm healthy, I never go easy in the gym, even if I'm tired.

8 hours ago, AdriaanRobert96 said:

Just curious how many times per week you good people train grippers specifically?

Has it changed during your gripper journey, do you train more or less these days?

Feel free to share

Two times per week. Recently I've been doing bending, thick bar, pinching, grippers, + regular gym training every week. If I would focus on grippers, I feel like probably 3 times/week would be the best for me. When I started grip last year, I did grippers more frequently. But I think this is very common; it's much easier to get into grippers than for example pinching. Men love big spring, crush crush, men happy. 

[Stephen Ruby]

6 hours ago, Jared P said:

I couldn’t disagree more. I believe the studies show that without proper recovery, there is severely limited growth, and a severely heightened risk of injury. Take sleep for instance; the studies are objective and clear, immune to dispute - proper rem and nrem cycles are required to recover the brain, body, and central nervous system. The same type of recovery applies to hypertrophy and strength, and the repairing of tendons, ligaments, joints. 

Refer to the studies of Matthew Walker which include the analysis of the correlations between athletic performance and recovery.

The reason most people have terrible physiques or strength is more attributable to: lack of consistency, insufficient sleep, insufficient recovery, lack of proper intensity, poor technique, poor nutrition, injury, lack of mobility and ROM - leading to tightness, stress, and inflammation, and others. I wouldn’t put undertraining in the list at all, unless in the form of lack of intensity (rather than frequency) or lack of consistency. 

From my personal experience I feel this is more true in that I see more gains in all areas when I get better sleep(most important to see significant improvement in gains) and eat better. 

I also think it's easy to cheat yourself in how hard you train which is why I think it's good to track progress or follow a program. 

I think optimal training is actually pretty difficult to figure out but I do know that with busy lives I find I see the most benefit from reducing stress and sleeping more(easy to say harder to do) 

 

I really like the ideas around training hard from Dr. Mike Israetel that he has put out on youtube I found these discussions interesting even though its applied more to muscle building I think you can get some good ideas with regards to grip training also. He has a ton on youtube I like the longer conversations in general. 

 

^Around 7:30 good discussion on pushing too hard hurting his gains with strength training 

 

 

Right now I'm doing thickbar/pinch/grippers/ with wrist work thrown in so grippers around twice a week. I think if I wanted to peak on grippers I would drop other grip training and do it around 3-4 x a week. I also think you should play around with various ideas and see what works for you. If your making progress keep it up. If you are stalling for a long time then maybe that's when you can evaluate some different ideas. 

[John Knowlton]

At this time it’s 3 days a week with one day a all out grip day

[Jared P]

I should clarify that by 'overtraining' I was speaking of frequency, not intensity. I train about as intense as it gets (max rep and loads to failure, every resistance training session) - studies show greater hypertrophy, strength gain, and growth hormone production with high intensity vs. low intensity resistance training. Progressive overload, mechanical tension, to failure seems to be the way to go, in my opinion - if the goal is increased strength and/or muscle mass (not everyone has this goal with resistance training - some do it for cardiovascular, bone and muscle health, injury prevention, and overall health in older age).

In terms of training frequency (i.e. training grippers 1-2 days per week vs. 5-6 days per week), studies mostly show no difference in strength gains over a weekly period (with resistance training, not specifically grip training), but there is diminished 1RM and volume load within 24h-48h post training.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32594858/
"This study determined the time-course of recovery after resistance training (RT) sessions and the association between changes in performance with changes in biomechanical, physiological and perceptual parameters. After a 4-week familiarization period, 14 resistance-trained males performed 3 experimental conditions, each one including 2 sessions with a recovery interval of 24, 48 h or 72 h, in a randomized order. RT sessions consisted of 5 sets of 8-10RM on squat and leg press exercises. The resistance was equal for the 2 sessions of each condition and repetitions were performed until concentric failure. Volume load (VL) and first set volume load (FSVL) were compared between sessions. Tests before each session included countermovement jump (CMJ), maximal voluntary isometric contraction (MVIC), creatine kinase (CK) and delayed onset muscle soreness (DOMS). (2 × 3) ANOVA with effect sizes (ES) assessed the time-course of recovery and Kendall test the correlation between variables (α = 0.05). Significant interaction was observed for all variables, except for CK, where a condition main effect occurred. Comparisons between post and pre-intervals showed VL (p = 0.011;ES = -0.90) decreased for 24 h condition, while FSVL remained decreased for 48 h (p = 0.031;ES = -0.63) and DOMS increased (p = 0.001;ES = 3.52). CMJ (p = 0.025;ES = 0.25) and MVIC (p = 0.031;ES = 0.14) performance increased at 72 h. FSVL (r = 0.424), CMJ (r = 0.439), MVIC (r = 0.389) and DOMS (r = -0.327) were significantly correlated with VL (p < 0.05). Time-course of VL showed the necessity of at least 48 h for the reestablishment of performance, though better perceptual responses were evident at 72h. Thus, both recovery intervals may be beneficial after lower-limbs RT until concentric failure, though chronic effects still need to be investigated."

Many such studies in this same vein, both with training frequency and intensity. Basically, do what feels best for you. The strength gains are shown to be similar with high frequency vs. low frequency, over a weekly timeline. For me, I prefer lower frequency in an attempt to avoid injury and to allow muscles to fully recover, before hammering them again to failure the next session.

Edited April 1, 2023 by Jared P

[Seoyoon]

1-2 times a week

Depending on the intensity, sometimes 7 times a week.