Training with a Jackhammer?

by those strict definitions, how is an HB workout isometric? there is some movement in the fingers, arms, etc. think about a typical spring problem. release support and there is movement of some sort - nothing is infinitely stiff.

you might as well add velocity and damping to your force equation while you are at it :). maybe thermal forces too (my hands get sweaty sometimes).

kenr I feel like by your definitions literally no excercise is isometric.
In the scheme of things I feel like if your joint angles for the muscles being targeted are roughly the same then we're talking "isometric". If you're working in some decent ROM then it's not isometric. The position and ROM of the muscles you're not targeting doesn't really matter.

kenr wrote: isometric

You keep using that word, I do not think it means what you think it means

Mark E Dixon wrote: You keep using that word, I do not think it means what you think it means

Pretty much any Princess Bride reference is a good Princess Bride reference in my book!

Optimistic wrote:Long ago I spent a few weeks after graduation running a jackhammer on a blasting crew, breaking up granite ledge to prepare building sites for foundations. At the end of that time I went out bouldering, and was just astounded at how much my finger strength had improved: I felt like I could hang on anything.

Just curious how hard you were climbing before and after your weeks of jackhammering and also if you were doing any training for climbing before this?

will ar wrote: Just curious how hard you were climbing before and after your weeks of jackhammering and also if you were doing any training for climbing before this?

The weeks of jackhammering was something like 27 years ago so the memories are pretty dim other than just the visceral reaction to going bouldering and being amazed at how strong I felt. These were problems I'd been doing for years and suddenly they all felt really different. But back then (around 1987?) we weren't aware of grades for the problems so I can't gauge that. Other than the occasional set of pull ups, bouldering was the only training we did for climbing.

Then, as now, technique and mental control are much more significant barriers for me than strength, but I lead harder now, easy 10 trad on a good day as opposed to 7. Give me another couple of decades and I'll be storming the 12's!

-KenR
You missed what I was saying: The OVER LARGE grip makes it more difficult to hang on to which makes it (as you noted) a good method of grip strength training. There is no need for 99.9 percent of the population to increase the diameter of the grip. That diameter is also one of the sources of injury, especially to the arm holding down the trigger.

I don't object to using jack hammers as a training device. They are just murderous as a tool for work, where you really aren't in control of how long you have to hang on to the beast. What I object to is the lung damage from dust exposure, hearing damage, nerve damage from hanging on to a vibrating object, tendon damage for the same reason, and disc damage. Other than that, I think it might be a great training tool.

Mark Dixon wrote:
No specific resistance type appears more advantageous than another,... amen to that brother. Hanging on is hanging on, and let's face it, the tendons and muscles don't know why we are hanging on, or what to, just that we are. The body responds to the fact of overload, not the cause of that overload.

I don't know why everyone is hung up on specificity: If specificity was everything, then weight training wouldn't help anyone with any sport, running wouldn't improve cardio endurance for hiking or climbing, and jackhammering wouldn't improve grip strength.

caribouman1052 wrote:-If specificity was everything, then weight training wouldn't help anyone with any sport, running wouldn't improve cardio endurance for hiking or climbing, and jackhammering wouldn't improve grip strength.

Not every wieght traing exercise is helpful for every sport.

And there are some smart folks who believe that running is detrimental to climbing.

I'd guess the grip strength produced by jack hammering doesn't carry over to climbing very well. Even if it did, I'd bet that the same amount of effort on a hangboard or campus board would be more productive.

But if anybody wants to actually try it and report back, I say go for it! The variability in the way people respond to training is amazing. It just might work.

Edited to add:
After thinking it over, it seems like holding the JH handle might be pretty close to the hand position used in a full crimp and might actually be more climbing specific than I thought. So maybe this isn't such a harebrained scheme as it seems.
Time for a JHTM?