ringing round a tree

[hudsonnoah]

recently I have been looking into the Great Gama, an undefeated wrestler of over 5000 matches and he had a type of isometric training where he would hug a thick tree potentially with a belt or something to keep him on it as much as possible and practise wrestling moves basically doing twists to the sides, pushing to the front, and pulling to the back, would this help with forearm, wrist and hand strength as something similar to isometric steel bending? or am I reading into this wrong?

[Gripperer]

A few thoughts here...

The Great Gama, as with a lot of historical hero types, is probably subject to some exaggeration. Take with a pinch of salt his accomplishments including number of victories, manner of victory, level of opponent etc.

The Great Gama was probably genetically gifted and the average person will not build a similar physique using his methods. I have heard stories of him performing 5000 squats a day for beefy legs but this is probably a case of "in spite of" and not "because of." Most people will require heavier weight.

The exercise you speak of may indeed strengthen the forearms of an untrained person but it does not sound focused on developing forearm strength.

Such exercises can be of benefit but are hard to measure, and therefore progress is dictated by one's perceived level of effort. With something like steel bending, you are achieving manipulation of an object (it bends where it did not bend before). If you are to exert yourself against an immovable object, you have no reliable way to tell if your force is greater this time than the last.

For developing forearm strength I would start with traditional forearm focused exercises and experiment later.

Edited May 7 by Gripperer

[Blacksmith513]

17 minutes ago, Gripperer said:

A few thoughts here...

The Great Gama, as with a lot of historical hero types, is probably subject to some exaggeration. Take with a pinch of salt his accomplishments including number of victories, manner of victory, level of opponent etc.

The Great Gama was probably genetically gifted and the average person will not build a similar physique using his methods. I have heard stories of him performing 5000 squats a day for beefy legs but this is probably a case of "in spite of" and not "because of." Most people will require heavier weight.

The exercise you speak of may indeed strengthen the forearms of an untrained person but it does not sound focused on developing forearm strength.

Such exercises can be of benefit but are hard to measure, and therefore progress is dictated by one's perceived level of effort. With something like steel bending, you are achieving manipulation of an object (it bends where it did not bend before). If you are to exert yourself against an immovable object, you have no reliable way to tell if your force is greater this time than the last.

For developing forearm strength I would start with traditional forearm focused exercises and experiment later.

this

I have no doubt Great Gama was legit.. But some of the stories about him are certainly exaggerated.  

There are 100s of other things you can do to strengthen the forearms besides being a tree hugger... Get an axle, saxon bar, and sledge hammer you are golden.. Even grappling will if thats your thing. I can see doing it at the end of your workout for some isometric holds possibly.