Tactical Grip Training CAPT Mike Prevost, USN

A tactical athlete needs both excellent grip strength and grip endurance. Whether you are training for a selection course or doing the job day to day, grip strength/endurance is going to be one of the most important qualities you can develop. People are routinely limited by grip strength on obstacle courses and tactical challenges. There is a physiological reflex that shuts down your pulling muscles when your grip is about to go. It takes considerable concentration to overcome this reflex, so most people never notice it. As a result, in many lifts (like pull ups) people are limited by grip strength, even though it feels like the pulling muscles are giving out. Don’t believe me? Try doing pull-ups with wrist straps and see what happens. Did you do better than usual? I thought so. Increasing grip strength makes you stronger overall, in a very real world, tactical sense. This is usable strength. "But I train with barbells and have a double bodyweight deadlift. I should have enough grip strength/endurance, right?" No, not really. Barbells and dumbbells (and most other strength equipment) is designed to be as easy on your grip as possible. Consider the diameter of the bars, the knurling, the balance. They are designed NOT to challenge your grip, so that you can lift more weight. Nothing in real life is that easy on your grip. In real life your are pulling and dragging odd shaped objects like the collar of somebody's shirt, a rope or some odd shaped piece of gear. You are pulling up on tree branches, ropes, fences, walls, windows etc. If you can't hold on to it, you can't lift it, drag it or climb it. Because this could be a life or death situation for a tactical athlete, dedicated grip strength/endurance training is important. One could argue that it is the most important strength/muscular endurance quality for a tactical athlete. There is nothing unique about training the grip. We train grip just like we train any other movement. If we want to train pressing strength and muscle endurance (think bench press and pushups) we would focus on heavy loading and higher repetitions simultaneously in our program. We will do the same thing here. Remember, there is a link between strength and muscle endurance but they are different. Research has shown, for example, that the correlation between bench press strength and pushups performance is rather poor. You need to train both qualities if you want to excel in both qualities. Grip Strength The first step in training for grip strength is to throw away your wrist straps. As a tactical athlete you are concerned with tactical performance, not gym performance. Sure, your lifts may go down a bit without wrist straps. But you will not have wrist straps in a tactical situation. The second step is to incorporate 2 of the 4 methods below into a workout done 3 times per week. Pick only two per workout but mix them up. Remember, this is strength training, not muscular endurance training so 3 times per week is plenty. You can add this workout on the end of your normal strength training program, or do it later as a separate session. If you do this at the end of your strength training session, your muscles are already warmed up and ready to go. If you do this as a stand alone session, use a light resistance gripper and do 2-3 sets of 10-15 reps per hand for a good warm up before you start. This is critical. Hanging: Simply, hang from a bar, a rope, a ledge, anything that you can hold on to. Mix it up. You are going to really have to load up to make this a strength session. You should not be able to hold on for more than 10 seconds. If you can, you need more load. A backpack full of sandbags works great. Aim for 3-5 sets of 6-10 seconds. Add load as you start to exceed 10 seconds and repeat. Pinching: Pinching is a bit different than holding. The smaller muscles of the fingers get involved to a much greater degree. In this case you are holding a heavy object by pinching it between your thumb

and the remaining 4 fingers. Weight plates work well but you can use anything really. Try some thin objects, some thick objects and some odd shaped objects. Again, if you can hold it for more than 10 seconds, add load. Just like hanging, aim for 3-5 sets of 6-10 seconds. Crushing: The best tool for crush grip training is a good gripper. Do yourself a favor and just buy a good gripper right away. Cheap grippers do not last and their spring tension starts to decline over time. The best grippers in my opinion are the Captains of Crush grippers by Iron Mind. They will last you a lifetime. They come in many different resistances and you cannot max out their number 4, unless your name is Magnus Samuelson. For gripper training, make sure you are warmed up (again, 2-3 sets of 1015 with a lightweight gripper works great), then perform 3-5 sets of 3-8 repetitions. You will have to increase reps when you get stronger until you get a stronger gripper. 3-8 reps is ideal for strength. You will still get strength benefits up to 12-15 reps though. Aim for failure on the last set or two. When you can do more than 15 reps with a gripper, it is time to get more resistance. That is it. Don’t do more than that. This is strength training. Ballistics: Ballistics that challenge the grip like heavy one arm kettlebell swings or kettlebell snatches or barbell snatches have the advantage of training grip as well as other qualities. If you are using one of these methods during your normal training program, consider adding only 1 of these grip strengthening methods. However, in this case we are not talking about high rep ballistics. For grip strength, low rep (3-8 reps) ballistics are best. For example, doing heavy one handed kettlebell swings with a load that allows you only 5 reps before your grip gives out develops grip strength. Doing sets of 20 kettlebell swings develops grip muscular endurance more than grip strength (though there is a little carry over). Kettlebells work great because of the fat handles. Wrap a towel around the bell handle or use an oven mitt to increase the challenge. You can turn an "endurance" kettlebell into a "strength" kettlebell by soaping up the handle. Be careful though and do this outside! Perform 3-5 sets of 3-8 repetitions. Grip Muscular Endurance The mistake that most people make in training for grip endurance is that they keep the rep range (or hang/pinch time too close to the strength range. In this case we want to steer well clear of that range. If we are too close to the strength range, and this has the effect of adding another strength session. This can lead to overtraining, tendonitis and sluggish results. I provide a bit of guidance on muscular endurance ranges below. If you are training grip strength 3 times per week, you only need to train grip endurance 2 times per week. Three times would be OK. This can be done on off days without affecting your strength workouts if you keep the reps/time in the muscular endurance range and do not overdo it. Pick two of the methods below for each session. Mix them up. Hanging: Hang time needs to exceed 60 seconds. 2-3 minutes is ideal. If you cannot hang for that long, you need to find a way to lighten the load or you will be running too close to the strength training range. If you are going to be doing 2-3 minute hangs, two sets is plenty. Again, try handing from many different objects and surfaces. Pinching: Just like hanging, aim for a load that you can hold for more than 60 seconds. Again, 2-3 minutes is ideal and two sets is plenty.

Crushing: Use a gripper that you can get in excess of 20 reps with. 30-50 reps is ideal. Perform 2-3 sets of 20-50 with each hand. No need for a warm up since the loading is light. Ballistics: 20+ rep ballistics are great for grip endurance. 2-3 sets work great. Putting it all together If you were doing strength training on Monday, Wednesday and Friday you might add the grip strength training to the end of your session and do grip endurance on Tuesday and Thursday. If you were training 4 days per week (i.e., Monday and Thursday upper body, Tuesday and Friday lower body), you might consider doing grip strength on Monday, Thursday and Saturday and grip endurance on Tuesday and Friday. Remember, pick only two of the methods above and stick to the loading plan. Be cautious about adding more because the hands can be delicate and can develop tendonitis quickly. You may not be able to do your job with tendonitis. Start slowly and build volume and load carefully. Grip strength develops quickly when you start to target it directly. Tools What follows are photos of tools for grip training just to give you some ideas to work with. Some of these are homemade, some are commercially available. There is no need for anything fancy though. A couple of grippers and stuff you have hanging around the house will be enough. Some of these items can be made at home. Hanging

Pinching

Crushing

Ballistics

Other