Standing Olympic Plate Hand Squeeze

What it is

This isolation movement builds formidable grip strength, primarily targeting your forearms and secondarily engaging your biceps. You stand holding a weight plate by its ridge in each hand. The exercise involves slowly lowering and raising the plates using only your finger and hand strength.

Technique tips

• Maintain a neutral grip with your palms facing inward.
• Keep your arms extended but do not lock your elbows.
• Focus the effort on your fingers and forearms, not your shoulders.
• Control the downward phase as slowly as the upward phase.
• Inhale while lowering the plate, exhale while squeezing it up.
• Avoid letting your fingers completely lose their hold on the plate.

How to track your progress

Log the weight and reps of each set. Straddly turns every set into an estimated one-rep max, so a heavier single and a strong set of eight both count as progress, and it flags a personal record the moment you beat your best.