We hate sounding like your mother, but do you ever wonder why we always tell you to wrap your hands around the bar, including your thumb? How about why your feet should be pointing straight ahead? One obvious answer is safety, but there's acutally a lot of other reasons as to why you should follw the fitness rules. Listen up, and pay attention as to what mistakes you could be making in the gym, and reasons why you should avoid them.
The suicide grip is when you bench press without your thumbs wrapped around the barbell. If the barbell slips when you press, it will crush your face, neck, or ribs.
But it’s not only about safety, the suicide grip is also a weaker grip compared to having your hands wrapped around the bar. To set a new personal record and really add pounds to your bench press, squeeze the bar as hard as possible -- stabilizing the movement as well as engaging other muscles.
When you see someone walking around the gym with a big back, you can guarantee they can jump up and kill 15-20 pull-ups without even breaking a sweat. See the connection? Pull-ups and chin-ups are two of the best mass builders for the back. Targeting the lats, shoulders, biceps and grip, these exercises have so many different varieties, you’ll never get bored.
Modifications:
- Change the grip; wide, narrow, alternated
- Change the grip again; towels, thick ropes, two fingers, three fingers, gloves
- Overloaded; dip belt, med ball, sandbag, dumbbell, kettlebell
- Change the movement; side-to-side, slow negatives, holds, explosive
Sumo deadlifts, conventional deadlifts, beyond the range (from a deficit), rack pulls - it doesn’t matter, just do them. The back not only works antagonistically to stabilize the torso (and spine) it works to lock out the weight to finish the movement. Deadlifts, by definition, are an exercise where you can move big weight.
Modifications:
- Implement: barbell, trap bar, dumbbells
- Stances: Conventional, wide
- Range of Motion: Beyond the range (deficit), partial – rack pulls
- Overloaded: Bands, chains, straight weight
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