Improved Quality of Life

It is easy for forget how often we use grip in our day to day life. As we age, our grip strength decreases gradually (1), until it can get so weak that carrying a bag of groceries can become too challenging and eventually picking up a glass of water can be too hard. These physical characteristics cannot and should not be taken for granted, this is why resistance training is so important, to lay a foundation of strength before the aging process begins. This will enable us to continue to perform our day to day tasks for as long as we are able, including carry our groceries and suitcases for as long as possible.

Sports Performances

There are so many sports where grip is a crucial element of performance. In a study on hang grip strength and elite performance athletes, hang grip strength was found to be an attribute of elite athletes. (2)

In contact sports like wrestling and MMA, an ability to grip the opponent can be the difference between winning and losing. In other contact sports like rugby and American football grip is also a crucial component in some contact situations. Then there are other sports where grip strength is one one of the most crucial physiological characteristics, most notably, climbing and bouldering. Not to mention sports like Crossfit and Hyrox where grip endurance can easily be a limiting factor to performance.

Lowers Mortality Risk

Low levels of grip strength are highly associated (3) with high levels of mortality. Which means that grip strength is an excellent biomarker for health and risk of death. This likely isn’t specifically related to grip strength specifically, more as grip strength as a marker of general physical strength. As we age and undergo sarcopenia (age related muscle loss) we become more susceptible to many causes of death, making grip strength an excellent biomarker for health and longevity. This means you should be striving to increase your full body muscle mass, not just your grip strength.

Improve Pull Up Performance

When performing pull ups, the last thing we want to be the limiting factor is grip strength or grip endurance. In order to prevent this from being the case, you can train your grip strength to ensure that grip is not the limiting factor when performing exercises like pull ups and other rowing exercises. If your grip is very weak and it is blocking you from performing enough repetitions to accumulate fatigue in the pulling exercises you are performing, I heavily suggest you use straps to ensure you are getting the desired training stimulus while training your grip on top of this.

Lifting Heavy Object

If you want to be a strong individual, you are going to need to build a strong grip strength. The deadlift is a perfect example of an exercise where having a strong grip strength is crucial to being a strong deadlifter. A study found that there is a very strong correlation between grip strength and upper body and lower body strength, stating “The literature indicates that there is a strong linear relationship between maximum HGS (hang grip strength) and maximum upper- and lower-body strength in non strength sport athletes.” (1) There is no coincidence that individuals who have strong grip strength typically have strong upper and lower bodies.

Remember, you can use lifting straps once you have reached the point where grip is the limiting factor, as the goal is to train strength when training deadlifts, but all warm up sets should be done without straps till grip is the limiting factor. This will effectively train grip strength.

Training Grip Strength

Training grip strength can be done using many different methods that I have discussed in multiple different articles including exercises for grip strength , methodologies for training grip strength and a detailed look at grip strength and longevity . Below are three example exercise you can use to increase your grip strength:

References