Have you ever watched a strongman contest and watched a contestant perform the farmers walk with a tremendous amount of weight in each hand and tried to do the same thing yourself? Have you ever tried to rip a phone book or a deck of cards in half? You probably could if you trained like the old time greats. These men had tremendous hand strength and in any real world test of strength, the strength of the hands is vitally important.

If you are an athlete engaged in a sport, be it mixed martial arts, judo, wrestling, football, baseball, and even golf, the strength of your hands and wrists can be the difference between winning or losing.

One way of developing powerful hand and grip strength is by using thick handled barbells or dumbbells, commonly referred to as thick bars. These bars are usually 2.5 to 3 inches in diameter and because they are thicker than a normal bar they put tremendous strain on your hands, wrists, and forearms. Any exercise you do with a thick bar automatically becomes a test of hand and finger strength.

One example of using a thick bar to strengthen your grip is the partial dead lift done in a power rack so that you have to move the bar an inch or so. Hold the bar as long as possible and time your progress. Another exercise is the one hand dead lift. These are full, from the floor, on hand lifts. These are done by first finding the center of the bar. You then straddle the bar and make sure you have balance before lifting. You can use your free hand to balance the bar if needed. Start light and learn the movement before increasing weight. Heavy duty hand grippers are another way to build hand strength.

These can be used outside the gym two or three times a week and over time you will be able to close the gripper more, do more reps, and hold it longer. This, along with your regular work in the gym, will greatly improve your grip strength.

Another exercise for improving grip strength is the farmers walk. This is done by picking up a pair of heavy dumbbells and walking back and forth for a certain distance, holding the dumbbells as long as possible.

These are only a few of the exercises that can be done to improve your grip strength but remember that the old time strongmen and bodybuilders did not neglect their grip. They had extraordinary gripping power and forearm development and they didn't do it with wrist curls but with heavy grip work. Spend some time working on your grip and you will see improvement in any activity that you do.