I have been blessed with lovely feminine and slender wrists and ankles. They’re a feature that I’m really proud of – I always have been. However, my slender wrists are also a potential weakness in the complete system that makes up my body mechanics. My hands are an interface with everything I do in the gym and elsewhere. I use my hands to work, cook, lift the barbell, grasp the pull up bar.
Historically I have had problems with my wrists and elbows including a form of tendonitis when I was a teenager, brought on from too much writing when I was studying and playing my violin for a couple of hours a day. A couple of months ago I found myself unable to complete my farmer’s walks during my strongman workout because I’d been gripping the handlebars of my bike too tightly earlier that day and the farmer’s bars were creating searing pain through my wrists.
These are a couple of extreme examples, but the wrist, forearm and elbow are often overlooked in our attempts to build strength. Many of us are guilty of neglecting these areas in favour of building upper arms, traps, lats, glutes and other muscles that are visible and improve our appearance, but if we neglect this important section of our musculature too much there is a real risk of long-lasting injury to the wrists and elbows as well as a possibility that we will end up limiting our progress on other exercises due to the lack of strength in the forearm.
Grippers - one of many ways to build hand strength
I’ve found a few brief articles that focus on these important areas which are worth reading as a reminder not to neglect them.
- I’ll start with an article originally written by Chuck Coker in 1962. The article focuses on hand strength, although good hand strength ultimately impacts on the wrist joint and forearm strength as well. In addition to looking into why hand strength was historically less of an issue and why it is so important across all sports (even swimming), the article provides several ideas on ways to develop hand strength without necessarily investing in equipment. I particularly liked the idea of the paper crusher – a dual use for the newspaper!
- Bill Starr wrote an article for IronMan Magazine about the wrists and elbows. He discusses the risk that they can easily become overtrained, provides some basic anatomy lessons on both joints and works through the injuries he has had and the exercises that he used to successfully rehabilitate himself.
- Finally, another article in Iron Man Magazine about forearm training and straining – the problems faced by trainees, such as tennis elbow. This article focuses on how these injuries arise and is worthwhile reading since it is easier to prevent something from happening if you are aware of what you are doing that could cause an injury in the first place.
Not many links but certainly an important area that none of us should neglect. Have you had any injuries with your lower arms and are there any successful rehab exercises you used that aren’t featured in these articles?
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Great links for the weekend! // Jun 4, 2010 at 21:03
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