N-Gage Grips

Straight barbells can sometimes cause stress in the joints due to the rigid hand and grip positioning they demand. Joints must move naturally through their range of motion to prevent injuries and maximize performance.

Specialty barbells, such as Swiss bars, multi-grip bars, and EZ-bars, as well as nearly all commercial weight machines, are designed to accommodate more natural positioning of the joints by offering angled (not straight) handles.

N-GAGE GRIPS are a fraction of the cost but offer the same benefits as these specialty bars by creating a more ergonomic grip position to help relieve stress in your joints.

Lifting form directly impacts both the effectiveness of your workouts and the likelihood of injury. Joint stress caused by the restrictive hand positioning offered by straight barbells can cause form to break down.

N-GAGE GRIPS, some specialty bars and some expensive weight machines allow for more ergonomic hand positioning and therefore help promote a more natural range of motion during lifts.

N-GAGE GRIPS also allow each lifter to customize their grip position and grip angle to their specific physiology to further optimize form.

Your body adapts to the stress it’s exposed to. When you consistently perform the same exercises, with the same sets, reps, and intensity, your muscles become more efficient at those movements, which can eventually lead to a plateau in size and strength gains.

Variation will help avoid plateaus, muscle imbalances, and overuse injuries. By incorporating different exercises, rep schemes, training methods, or tempos, you force your body to adapt to new demands, keeping your progress moving forward.

N-GAGE GRIPS offer a simple yet effective way to incorporate more variation into your workouts. Performing your favorite lifts with a slightly different grip angle, grip width, and grip thickness will engage different muscle fibers leading to more strength gains.

Thicker bar diameter requires a stronger grip, which significantly increases the activation of muscles and mechanical tension in your forearms and hands. This leads to greater muscle growth in the forearms.

The increased grip demand sends stronger signals to the central nervous system to recruit more muscle fibers. This phenomenon is sometimes referred to as neural (or muscular) irradiation, where engaging one muscle group more intensely (in this case, the grip muscles) can cause greater activation of other nearby muscle groups (e.g. biceps, triceps, chest, shoulders, & back).

N-GAGE GRIPS larger grip diameter will increase upper body muscle recruitment, increasing the mechanical tension placed on those muscles, which in turn promotes hypertrophy.

The hands are involved in almost all athletic movements, especially in strength sports, contact sports, and sports like football, baseball, basketball, and tennis.

A variety of studies have demonstrated grip strength's relationship to both general and sport-specific performance outcomes.

Optimizing grip strength by training with larger diameter bars or using tools like N-GAGE GRIPS will help lead to improved athletic performance and improved overall strength.

Athletes who focus some portion of their training to grip strength will be rewarded with physical advantages over their competition.

A larger diameter bar increases demand on grip strength which leads to a higher degree of motor unit recruitment in the muscles responsible for gripping.

When more motor units are recruited in the forearms and hands, the central nervous system (CNS) increases its overall activation to help support the lift.

This heightened neural drive can then "spill over" into other muscle groups (a phenomenon called irradiation), leading to increased activation of the larger muscles involved in the lift, such as the biceps, triceps, shoulders, back, or chest.

The thicker diameter of N-GAGE GRIPS can increase neural drive and motor unit recruitment resulting in higher force production and more efficient and coordinated lifts.

This improved coordination can translate into better overall force production when you return to standard-diameter bars, as your nervous system becomes more adept at engaging muscles under load.