Today is your lucky day. Last week I spent 3 hours chopping firewood with my old man, and while I consider myself a true Finn, clearly my body wanted to remind me that I hadn’t done that activity in about a year by making my right forearm absolutely useless for 3 days. So, my injury is your gain, because you get some practical tidbits on how to keep your forearms and wrists feeling healthier in the long run so you can keep making strength and muscle gains. Yes, I’m selfless and awesome like that.
Common Reasons for Wrist/Forearm Pain
RSI (Repetitive Strain Injury)
Weak grip strength
Weak forearm flexors/extensors
Carpal tunnel syndrome
Tendonitis
Being royalty and having to wave at crowds every day
Some of these problems rear their ugly heads as a by-product of your profession, because you don’t train the muscles in your forearms more frequently, or most often due to repetitive action that exceeds the tolerance for the muscle.
In simple terms, a lot of injuries are simply down to a mismatch between workload and tolerance. These kinds of things pop up in training or outside of the gym all the time, not just when you’re chopping firewood.
The good news is that you can reduce the likelihood of forearm and wrist issues by implementing a few very simple things into your training, and it won’t take a crazy amount of time. But before we get to that, let’s have a recap of what the forearm muscles actually do.
The function of the Forearm Muscles?
Flexion and extension
Rotation (pronation and supination)
We use these muscles every day without thinking, but most of the time they’re not subjected to that much stress opening pickle jars and tying shoe laces. This is why when you engage in a form of activity that puts a lot more demand on the muscles than they’re used to, they’re going to rebel and tell you to f**k off.
"The best tonic for soreness is to do the movement that got you sore in the first place."
That quote by Dan John sums it up best. Once the pain subsides, more of what caused the problem in the first place is probably going to be the solution. Just applied in moderate doses to give the muscles time to adapt. Looks like more wood chopping for me.
The muscles in the forearms are like any other, so we should be thinking about creating some kind of progressive stimulus to strengthen them.
Quick note: static stretching tends to get over and self-prescribed by coaches and gym-goers and it's an easy but often ineffective solution to help with injuries. I'm not against using forearm stretching to help alleviate pain and discomfort but the bulk of the rehab and/or strengthening should come from targeted training.
Here are 2 things you can do in literally your next session to help.
Strengthen your grip
I remember when Fat grips became all the rage. Touted as the best thing to develop your grip strength, I bought myself a pair and used them for every arm and back exercise. Did it work? My internal jury is still out.
It’s not that they’re bad. They just might not work in the way they were intended because they’re going to severely limit the load you can use, which means you’re forearm muscles aren’t holding onto as much weight. A thicker grip will make you have to grip harder, but all your other muscles will get a lower stimulus. Who wants a stronger grip but weaker lats and smaller arms?! Get outta town.
An easy way to improve grip strength without adding specific exercises is by not using your straps all the time. If you have 4-5 back exercises in a session, perform 1-2 of those without straps as long as grip strength isn’t the limiter. Then when you feel like you’re having to sacrifice load because you can’t hold onto the handle or bar, get the straps involved.
The best exercises to develop your grip are going to be heavy deadlift variations, loaded carries, split squats and lunges, rows, and pulls. Anything that involves using a lot of weight. Straps are great, but it’s good to use just what yo’ mama gave you every now and then to get the job done.
Add in direct forearm work
It was the year 2013 when I discovered my all-time favourite forearm exercise. The gym where I picked this exercise up was Gym 21 in Liverpool, a real dungeon run by a former Mr. Universe (Bill Jones), full of convicts, bouncers, drug dealers, and competitive bodybuilders. In short, it was a great training environment.
The exercise in question was deceptively simple. Check out the video below:
The way I like programming this is by increasing the length of time each week.
For week 1 I might start with 2 x 1 min of rotating back and forth, then in week 2, I’ll add a set. Then I’ll increase the weight by 1kg and repeat the process. Trust me, you won’t need a lot of weight at all, and if this is new for you, starting with 2.5kg and rotating it for a minute will be a struggle. Enjoy the greatest forearm pump you’ve ever had.
We still want to make sure we cover all our bases with forearm training, so adding in a rotational component is going to be needed. Again, with these variations, I like to go by time as the variable I track because there’s something about tracking reps with these exercises that just makes me go to sleep. I much prefer to have a stopwatch counting down the time while I go through as many reps as I can.
That’s it
Pretty simple, as most pre-emptive strategies should be.
Looking after the oft-neglected muscles in the forearms will make a big difference in your training long-term because you never know when an injury can strike. Best to be prepared when it does.
Was this time reading well-spent? If yes, I’m glad, if no, there’s nothing I can do about it. Please share and leave your comments below.
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