The Case for Cheap Gym Straps

Unless you are an arm wrestler, a serial forearm flexer, or have a medical condition affecting your back, your grip will tire before your back muscles do. This is not usually a problem, but during a pulling exercise, the only thing keeping you attached to the bar is your grip — and that is going to give out far, far earlier than your back does.This, simply, is the case for any grip device or aid: A strap of some variety that connects your wrist to the bar and sharply reduces, or completely removes, the need for your grip. As with every bit of gym gear, there are many expensive fancy options, but you can do a lot with the cheapest straps.The cheapest, simplest, and best-value option is the classic loop strap. Available from dozens of companies — mine are Bear Grips’ $14.90 padded straps — these use a single piece of fabric sewn into a loop at one end, often with padding at the wrist. Slip your wrist through the loop and place it close to the bar. Wrap the loose end around the bar toward your wrist, then close your hand over it. One more twist and pull of the wrist, and you are tightly attached to the barbell or dumbbell.They are pretty great straps, and for most people, for most of their lifting lives, these will be enough. They hold a lot of weight, they are highly adjustable, you can use them for a ton of exercises, and you can quickly unravel them if something goes wrong — and they only cost between $10 and $20 for a pair.The disadvantages come with those. Though they are relatively easy to set up with a tight, secure fit, that does take a while as you wrap, unwrap, and rewrap for every set — and that tight grip also means they can bite into the wrist when you are moving serious weight. And yet, for the same reason that they are easy to release, they also are not the best for truly heavy loads, as they can loosen mid-set. I have never had them release unintentionally, but that is partly because I intentionally grip hard when using them, which also means I am devoting some energy that should be going to my back into my hands.Even so, for most people, these are a great cheap option that will take most of their lifts. If you want something more secure for heavier lifts, figure-eight straps give unbeatable security for basically the same price, about $20. Each strap has two loops, one of which you put around your wrist to start. You then pass the strap under the bar and slide your hand into the second loop, leaving the bar hammocked between them beneath your wrist. They are just as easy to put on as the standard strap, but far faster once you get the hang of them, and you can actually keep them double-looped to your wrist between sets for exercises such as lat pulldowns. You slide each hammock onto the bar between sets, and you are good to go.The advantages are the same as the disadvantages here: once you have looped in, that bar is attached to your wrist, and it is not leaving you until you put it on the ground and manually detach it. That makes figure-eight straps ideal for heavy lifts such as deadlifts, but it also demands good form and sensible loading — because if you mess up, you are bound to that bar and going down with it. You cannot quickly release them, and they also are not particularly useful for movements where you want active grip movement or need some mobility — Olympic lifts, for example. Even so, they are great as a second set of grips, particularly for lifts where the weight causes issues with the classic ones.

The Case for Cheap Gym Straps

The Case for Cheap Gym Straps

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