I know this probably sounds like a cheap marketing tactic, but since I am not selling anything, I guess it isn’t. Most athletes use Olympic lifts to enhance their athletic ability. Something that I notice with many videos of athletes doing Olympic lifts, however, is that they are missing one important piece of the puzzle……….lifting straps.
What are lifting straps? They happen to be handy pieces of leather/nylon that allow to have a rock solid grip on the barbell while you are lifting.  Of course you might ask, “Joel, on what basis do you make the claim that wraps will help so much?” Well for one thing, they are banned from Olympic lifting competitions. Why? Because if they were legal it would be immensely easier to maintain a good grip on the weight (This is why Olympic lifters must learn the hook grip in order to deal with their force output on the bar).
So why is it important to have a good grip on the bar? Well if you don’t have a good grip on a bar when you are performing say, a hang clean, a few things will happen.
- You will prolong the coupling time between the eccentric and concentric portions of the lift due to ‘give’ in your hands at the explosive-isometric portion of the lift. Essentially you will teach yourself to be slower in converting your eccentric force into concentric. This is not something that you want as an athlete.
- The loss of bar speed in an Olympic lift will be proportional to the give in your hands during the lift, and by the way, even with a hook grip, it is still difficult to allow no give in a bar in a high speed hang snatch/clean.
- Wraps help especially in snatches, where your hands are placed wider on the bar, which causes your hands with an even worse mechanical advantage than normal.
- Finally, wraps teach you to use your legs/hips more, because you no longer have to worry about your grip much, therefore you have less cues to worry about over the course of the lift.
- Â I will say that wraps will have a greater effect in doing lifts from the hang than lifts from the floor, just due to the rapid reversal that happens in a lift from the hang.
So……….use wrist wraps if you are planning on creating a greater force output in the Olympic lifts!!!
Free Training Guides!
Sign up for the newsletter, get your FREE eBooks, and receive weekly updates on cutting edge training information that will help take your knowledge of athletic performance to a new level.