A pretty good group of submissions this week. Many of them were very, very close in performance as well. You need to check them out.

Special recognition for Elizabeth Horne, who took on the challenge while also being 6 months pregnant!!!

Richard has participated in many challenges. This week proved to be somewhat tough for him. The first thing I noticed was the angle of his index fingers. This is a tell-tale sign that the thickness is too wide. With narrower plates, I am sure Richard would have done better. Either way, great job Richard and thanks for competing again!

Chris Vaughn – 0:06, 0:10, 0:11

Chris, admittedly, had a hard time with this challenge, and as he pointed out after his first attempt, Strongman Training can sometimes neglect the thumbs. What’s good is that he has identified this as an issue. If he continues to work on thumb strength, I think he will see better performance on Farmer’s because his thumb will be a stronger auxiliary unit, and also even on Log performance this can make a difference in the initial row, roll, and press control. I also like that Chris gave it multiple tries. Did you notice that he got better every single time – 6, 10 and 11 seconds! Remember, the performance of the lower arms is very neurally dependent. As Chris’s hands got more used to this test of strength, his performance went up, most likely through neural learning! I encourage others to do this and see if it helps your performance in these challenges! Great job bro.

Josh McIntyre 0:50

Unfortunately, Josh got distracted right in the middle of this event this week, as some evil chick walked between him and the camera. As he speed-swiveled his head to see who could be so disrespectful as to walk in front of the camera while the Diesel Grip Challenge was going on, he must have subluxed something in his cervical spine because instantly the plates started slipping. Let’s hope he recovers quickly, DIESELS!

I look forward to Mike’s videos every week. Last week he was introduced by a face he had drawn on his hand. This week, he performed the sickest stare-down on a camera I’ve seen since Meng was wrestling on mid-90′s WCW! Awesome bro.

Darren Shallman – 0:53

Darren has sent in a bunch of submissions and you can really tell that he is going to be a very well-rounded Grip Sport Competitor. He has told me that he plans on attending all three legs of the World Series of Grip 2011 at Dave Thornton’s Iron Grip Palace in Michigan, so I am really looking forward to see how he makes out. Good luck, bud!

Paul Tompkins – 0:56

Paul is right up there near the top every week. His background is in powerlifting and Olympic lifting. It’s great to watch him give it his all every time he sends in a submission. Keep it up, buddy!

Elizabeth Horne – 1:04

Outstanding, performance, Elizabeth! Guys, if you don’t know of Elizabeth, she is the top Women’s competitor in the world. Every once in a while she pops up on the scene doing something incredible for anyone, not just for performance by women – for anybody. Great job and thanks!

Mike turned me on to this challenge a couple of weeks back when he posted on his Facebook a picture of him doing this with the Legion of Grip shirt on. He used a couple of very thick 45′s for this which makes this challenge even tougher! Good job bro.

Jason trains with a group of dudes in the mornings and every week they do their own little Grip Challenge. I am hoping some of the other guys throw their hat into the ring for some off the upcoming challenges. Good job, Jason!

Scott Goguen – 1:19

Scott says he has been following the site for a couple of years now and has found Grip Training to be something he wants to continue to pursue. He did a damn good job with the medley a couple weeks back, one hand deadlift last week and he was very strong this week as well. Great job Scott!

Ken Theissen – 1:34

I have been following Ken for quite some time, especially for his impressive mace swinging feats. Dude is very strong. I would love to see this compete in a contest sometime – you can just tell he is an athlete to the core!

Thanks again everybody and congrats to Ken Theissen on his win this week – awesome job!

Check back soon for next week’s challenge!

All the best,

Jedd

• One Hand Deadlift Submissions
• Block Set Gripper Wild Card Submissions
• Wild Card Qualifier – Two Hands Pinch
• The Grip Strength Challenge – Medley
• Classic Strongman Feats Tournament – Week 2 Submissions

A couple weeks back I blogged about how I was going to start taping my workouts and posting them to YouTube so that I could get help from you all and so that I could spread the word about Grip and Strongman training.

If you missed that post, you can read about it here: ===> Training my Ass off in my Garage – Fire Walk with Me. I have had a lot of fun putting these together and my workouts have just gotten better and better.

So I had to let you all know that I was able to accomplish something HUGE in my Grip training last night.

For the first time ever, I was able to lever my 16-lb hammer, free standing, from the vertical position, down to my face, and back up again. I did it very strictly, meaning I didn’t bounce it around or anything. My hand dropped a bit which makes it easier, but I was very happy to be able to get it back to the vertical position, regardless.

Sledge hammer levering is great for strengthening the wrists for nail bending and card tearing.

I must warn you, levering a heavy sledge hammer is not a walk in the park. Dominating a lighter hammer for multiple can make you think you are ready to jump up a couple pounds, but once that hammer head starts moving downward, it can feel totally different.

If you try sledge levering, watch your lips. The moment that hammer gets near parallel, it starts picking up speed in hurry, and you can’t just call time out and stop it.

The Hardest Block Weight I Ever Saw

I was also able to get some good work in on my GIGANTIC half 115-lb block weight.

If you’re not familiar with block weights, the most common type is half of a dumbbell, Block weights are great for hand strength because they force you to generate strength in an open hand position, training you to engage your finger tips and your palm.

Anyway, back to the half 115-lb hex block weight.

In like 2004, a very strong grip dude named Shane Larson from North Dakota sent out 3 of these half 115-lb block weights. He sent them to 3 of the top block weight lifters at the time – Sean Dockery, Heath Sexton, and me.

These half 115′s are freakin’ HUGE, my friends!  The slope on these things is over 7 inches across, meaning from the end of one side slope to the end of the opposite side slope is over 7 inches.  I have a hard time even getting a purchase on the vertical sides of this hunk of iron and my hands are pretty damn big.

I’ve had this thing for 5 years and have only broken it off the ground a handful of times and I was able to do more than that last night.

In fact, nobody in the world has ever lifted one of these block weights to a full deadlift!

So check this video out.

This one is my bench workout and my Grip stuff.

This one is just my grip stuff – it’s the same video, just I auto-started it after all the bench footage.

Right at the end of the video is when I start ramping it up for this killer half 115-lb block weight. Wait for it, it’s worth it.

-Jedd-Similar Posts:

• Levering a Giant Hammer
• This Week’s Challenge – Sledge Hammer Deadlift
• Diesel Grip Strength Challenge – Week 3 Results & Week 4 Feat
• Grip Strength Training – Block Weight Lifting
• Isometric Hammer Work for Bending Success