Plate Pinching is one of the main forms of testing Pinch Grip Strength. Plate Pinching involves placing two or more plates together so that the outside plates are facing smooth-sides-out, and then lifting them in a Pinch Grip.

I’ve always wanted to be able to Pinch Two 45-lb York Plates. I’ve pinched several sets of 45-lb plates over the years, but pinching two old-school York 45′s is a feat altogether different.

I only know of two Grip Monsters who have ever pinched two old-style York 45-lb plates with one. One is Richard Sorin, shown to the right. I can only imagine how many times he had to pull the feat off so the camera man could get the shot right.

Richard Sorin is probably the only man with a great enough love for strength exploration and pushing ones own limits to even try this feat. If you’ll remember, he is also the originator of the feat of strength and definitive test of open hand strength, pinch grip lifting the Blob, which is a half of a 100-lb Old School York Dumbbell. I have tons of information on that feat of strength here on the site as well if you are a newcomer: What is the Blob?

Aside from Richard, I only know of Chad Woodall as someone who has accomplished this feat.

Slide this video to the 3:00 minute mark and watch Chad stomp a mud hole in two York 45′s:

I watched him do that again at the Sorinex Summer Strong 2011, and almost got it with a pair in each hand on one attempt. He would have been the first person any of us know of to have accomplished that feat, and he was seriously close that day:

So the way I figure it, it is time for someone else to accomplish this feat, so I have put aside all of my other personal grip feat goals and am going to be focusing on this one.

To me, this is a good goal to focus on for many reasons:

1. It is a Pinching Goal, so it will support my other goals within Grip Sport, including the Euro Two Hands Pinch, Grip Medley Demands, etc

2. It is a lofty goal, meaning I feel I am nowhere close to it right now, so it will force me to think, work, and try new things, i.e. Further Challenge My Paradigms.

3. It is Wide Pinch and Open Hand Dependent, which means it involves the same qualities as Block Weight Training, and the same benefits for general hand strength as well.

The long and the short of it is that this feat is world class and I want to do it. Grip Feats are cool, especially when almost no one else in the world can do them.

So, in order to keep myself going on this, I wanted to involve someone else. Daniel Reinard, one of the most impressive newcomers to Grip Sport in the last 5 years in my estimation, is a superstar when it comes to accomplishing feats. For his bodyweight, he just may have the best all-around Pinching ability in the world, so I did what anyone else would have done in my position.

I called him out…politely of course, after all I am a Pennsylvania Gentleman.

Aside from knowing that I want to Pinch Two 45′s so bad I can taste the rust on the old ass plates, I also know that Daniel has his eyes set on pinching two 45′s as well, so I reached out to him to see if he would be interested in an on-line challenge. His goal would be to Pinch Two Regular 45′s – mine would be to Pinch Two Old School York 45′s.

Daniel has accepted, so I went ahead and made this video to show where I am at with this challenge.

As you can see, these Two OSY (Old School York) 45′s barely even stir when I hit them, so this is sure to be an interesting ride. These are so hard to lift because they are very wide and their edges are rounded so any tilting, which would generally make pinching two 45′s easier, makes OSY 45′s slide apart.

Incidentally, in the video above, I have a small section of pipe running through the plates, to keep them from sliding around. I will focus on lifting them like this first, and then graduate to a completely loose pinch of them.

Wish me luck and make sure to subscribe to my channel to see how the training goes.

All the best in your training,

Jedd

Similar Posts:

• 39 Reps with the 50-lb Blob
• Diesel Grip Challenge: Week 10
• Double Blob Farmers Walk
• Iron Master Nomination – Richard Sorin
• Woodall Grip Highlights

This is the inaugural installment of the Weekly Grip Feat Challenge.

Here are the rules for the Weekly Grip Feat Challenge.

1. Every Sunday, check DieselCrew.com to see what the Grip Feat is for the week.

2. Shoot a video of yourself by the following Friday completing the feat.

3. In the video, you must include the following phrase: “I’m ____________, and this is my video for the Weekly Diesel Grip Challenge at DieselCrew.com.” Hit the feat and upload it to YouTube!

4. Email me at jedd dot diesel at gmail dot com with the link to the video. I must receive the email with the video link no later than 8PM EST on Friday.

5. I will post all of the videos that qualify here on the Diesel site. My goal will be to post all of the videos I receive by Saturday at 8PM, EST.

6. Viewers at the Diesel site will leave comments, deciding who has the best video and who should win a prize. Voting will continue until Sunday at 8PM, EST.

7. Whoever is voted “Best Video” for the Weekly Grip Strength Challenge, will receive a special limited edition Diesel prize. What is it exactly? You’ll have to take part in order to find out!

8. Videos can not contain anything that may be offensive to Diesel readers. Getting pumped up is fine, but you WILL NOT BE CONSIDERED if you use racial, ethnic, sexual slurs and things like this. We do reserve the right to disallow a video if we deem it inappropriate.

To get this whole process started, we will start with Two-25′s Pinch.

Rules of the lift:

1. Show that they are 25-lb plates.

2. Position them smooth-sides-out.

3. Grip them with one hand with the thumb one side and the fingers on the other.

4. Lift them to the full deadlift position, then lower them to the floor under control.

5. For those who do not have access to 25-lb plates, 10-kg plates may be used as long as they are made of metal and are roughly the same size as 25-lb plates.

Here’s a video showing how it’s done!

Good luck and check back on Friday to see all the submissions.

Jedd

Similar Posts:

• Diesel Grip Strength Challenge – Week 7 Winner and Week 8 Feat
• Upcoming Feature at Diesel
• Build Sick Strong Thumbs – Diesel Grip Challenge Week 13
• Grip Strength Challenge – Week 11 – Towel Pull-ups
• Week 4′s Winner and Week 5′s Feat

Card Tearing

I’ve been thinking of ways to make the Diesel Crew site more interactive, and I think I have come up with a cool way to do it.

Starting next week, we will have the Weekly Diesel Grip Feat Challenge. Here’s how it will work:

1. Every Sunday, I will post a video of a Grip Strength Feat of some sort. It could be anything from Pinching, to Support, to Crushing, to Wrist Strength, or anything else in Grip.

2. You will then have until the following Friday to upload a video of yourself performing the Feat.

3. In the video, you must say your name and state the Feat you are doing for the Weekly Diesel Grip Strength Challenge, Something like this: “I’m Conway Martin, and this is my video for the 5-10′s Pinch Lift for The Weekly Diesel Grip Challenge at DieselCrew.com.” Then you just hit the feat on film!

4. You must then hit me with an email with the link to the video. I must receive the email with the video link no later than 8PM EST on the Friday of the challenge.

5. I will post all of the videos that have been submitted here on the Diesel site. My goal will be to post all of the videos I receive by Saturday at 8PM, EST.

6. Viewers at the Diesel site will leave comments, deciding who has the best video and who should win a prize. Voting will continue until Sunday at 8PM, EST.

7. Whoever is voted “Best Video” for the Weekly Grip Strength Challenge, will receive a special limited edition Diesel prize. What is it exactly? You’ll have to take part in order to find out!

8. Videos can not contain anything that may be offensive to Diesel readers. Getting pumped up is fine, but you WILL NOT BE CONSIDERED if you use racial, ethnic, sexual slurs and things like this. We do reserve the right to disallow a video if we deem it inappropriate.

500-lb Axle Deadlift (Photo – Kevin Cronin)

I think this is going to be a very fun and interactive feature here at the Diesel Crew site. I look forward to seeing all of your videos.

            Two Hands Pinch

By the way, I’m not wasting any time getting started. The first Weekly Grip Strength Challenge will be posted here on the site on Sunday afternoon, January 2nd, 2011.

So get your chalk, and get ready to do some serious Grip Training in 2011.

Remember, the first challenge will be here this Sunday – don’t miss it!

If you have questions, please leave a comment below.

All the best in your training!

Jedd

Similar Posts:

• Diesel Grip Strength Challenge – Week 7 Winner and Week 8 Feat
• Week 4′s Winner and Week 5′s Feat
• Sledge Hammer Finger Walking
• Build Sick Strong Thumbs – Diesel Grip Challenge Week 13
• Grip Strength Challenge – Week 11 – Towel Pull-ups

On Saturday, November 13th, the final leg of the World’s Strongest Hands Series took place.

The Series involves three events: the Two Hands Pinch, the Wrist Developer, and the Vulcan Gripper.

This has been an outstanding way to truly test ourselves against one another all across the globe.

As you know, going in, I was the World Record Holder in the Two Hands Pinch, 256.04 lbs, which I set in December of 2009.

From the beginning of the WSH Series, Grip Sport athletes have been gunning for the record, one of the most highly regarded records in all of Grip Sport.

In August, September, and October, no one, not even myself was able to eclipse the mark. While I felt excellent at Leg 3, a severely torn spot of skin on my thumb kept me from setting a new mark.

But Leg 4 proved to be a day of Pinch Heroics, especially in Stafford, England and Crooksville, Ohio.

Since the individual contests take place at different times and in different time zones, the British competition took place roughly 5 or 6 hours before the one I attended in Crooksville, Ohio. I went to bed Friday night with a strong feeling that David Horne and Laurence Shahleai would be very close to the record. That feeling was still with me in the morning when I awoke.

I did not let this feeling get to me. Instead, I focused harder on my goal. I knew I HAD to break my own record in order stay on top of the list.

Sure enough, my feelings of a fallen record were true – both David Horne and “Big Loz” had both broken my record by slim margins. Horne (pictured to the left) broke it first, lifting an estimated 256.22 lbs. Then about twenty minutes later, Loz hoisted an estimated 256.39 lbs. This of course, was unknown to me because results of individual contests are not publicized until all of the contests are complete and results are sent in…

I was not sure how well I’d be able pinch, because my thumb had been torn so bad over the last several weeks that I could not do much training on the Euro Pinch device. Instead, I had to do some other forms of pinch training that did not aggravate my tear.

For my first attempt, I started out with 237 lbs – this is usually a very safe weight for me, and I believe I had lifted weights in this neighborhood in the previous two Legs of the Series. Sure enough, 237 came up very easy. So easy, I think I probably could have hit it for a double without resetting my grip.

After a short bit of deliberating, I decided not to take an intermediate jump from my first attempt to the next and I went straight for a new record. Twenty pounds were added and I lifted it fairly easily as well.

So now I had broken my previous record, but I was not sure if it was a big enough jump to put me ahead of anyone who might have broken the record earlier on, so I asked for 5 more pounds to be added.

On this attempt, I channeled the spirit of Mister Perfect, Curt Hennig (“Now You’re Gonna See … a Perfect Plex”) and said, “Now you’re gonna see…a new World Record.”

I made sure to have my feet lined up properly and my mechanics dialed in, but I came just short of touching the loading bar to the stick. Getting cocky always bites me in the ass…

After a short break, I tried this weight again. I challenged the crowd to get louder, as I told them it was too quiet on the attempt before.

This time when I applied my Grip, I squeezed the damn implement as hard as I could, visualizing that my fingers were going to indent the outside steel plates. And this time, the implement came all the way off and knocked the target stick off the marker stand.

I was such a relief to hit 262 that I gave a scream that rattled the scrolled steel hanging on the inside of the garage.

I would have liked to have gotten 262 on the first try and then tried 264 as this would have been an even 120 kg, but I was happy with what I got because I figured it would probably be a large enough distance to over-take anybody that might have set a new record before me, or after me, as Aaron Corcorran, from Tucson, Arizona, has in the past lifted 254 lbs in an unofficial attempt.

So, I am blessed to have set another record.

How long will it stand? That is impossible to say.

But one thing I can say is I appreciate all of the support you give me here at the site, on Facebook, on YouTube, and by email. Having so many people behind me is a great feeling and it does make a huge difference, so thanks to all of you.

In particular, thanks to my family who puts up with my frustration when I have a rough workout. Thanks to my parents who have always supported me doing this underground sport. Thanks to my buddies at Diesel for pushing me when I do make it up to train. Thanks to Brent Barbe for continually pushing me via email and coming up here to train several times a year, driving roughly 5 hours at a pop. Thanks to Mike Rinderle and Rick Walker who keep my cell phone inbox filled with texts urging me to keep pushing forward. Thanks to Chris Rice, for holding the contest – I feel so much better competing when i don’t have to run the show as well.

I am sure I am forgetting some key people, but if I don’t mention you here, don’t think it’s because you’re not important. Every single time I get a text, email, or a Facebook/YouTube message from you guys, it makes want to get downstairs to my gym and get my hands on the Euro Pinch. I thank you all.

Thanks for checking out the post today. I have many more videos uploaded and more to put up tomorrow, so please check out the footage on My YouTube Channel.

All the best in your training.

Jedd

P.S. By the way, even though I did very poorly in the first leg, I managed to finish #5 in the world at the end of Leg 4. Ka Kuh!

P.P.S. Click the banner below to sign up for my Nail Bending Newsletter…

Similar Posts:

• World’s Strongest Hands Leg 3 Results
• Diesel Video – The New Two Hands Pinch Record
• New Pinch World Record
• Worlds Strongest Hands 2012 Information
• World’s Strongest Hands Series

History is Made – A New Record in the Two Hands Pinch

As you saw in one of the recent posts below, this past weekend I set a new world record in the Two Hands Pinch – 256 lbs.

CHECK OUT THE VIDEO AFTER THE JUMP

It’s been a long fight for me to get this record and I am very happy and appreciative of all the support I have gotten from all of you.

I also realize that many of you reading this may not know what the hell I am even talking about, so I thought I would put together a short post for you to explain – here’s a brief history of what I know about the Two Hands Pinch.

Two Hand or Two Hands?

First off, it’s written both ways – Two Hand Pinch and Two Hands Pinch. The European competitors seem to refer to it as the Two Hands Pinch, so I have adopted that as well. You might also see it abbreviated as 2HP.

Grip Competitions

Grip competitions have been going on in Europe for a long time. The first contests I found out about in 2003 were the ones in Europe. At that time, the one hand and two hands pinch lifts were being contested.

In 2003, I competed in my first competition and the Two Hands Pinch was contested there using two 45-lb plates placed together smooth sides out, with a pipe through the center hole and weight added onto the pipe. A year later, we held our first competition and held the same event using 45-lb plates again.

The Adjustable Two Hands Pinch Apparatus

At the end of 2004 or beginning of 2005, a legendary European competitor named David Horne, originated the adjustable Two Hands Pinch apparatus, which was two 6mm steel plates on the outside and a series of 6-mm and 10-mm rubber inserts that go between the steel plates.

The great thing about this implement is that the competitor gets to choose whatever width he or she likes best in the competition. The widths can be adjusted between 12mm and 64mm, so the implement can be modified to fit any sized hand.

Performing the Lift

The implement starts on the ground. The athlete takes his grip and then lifts it until the pipe running through the center of the implement touches a stick 16.5 inches off the ground. The athlete then has to return the implement to the ground under control. If it slips out or if he drops it, the attempt is no good.

This apparatus soon became standardized equipment which was replicated and sold to contest promoters who were interested in picking them up. There are a few apparatuses throughout Europe and a handful throughout the United States.

Other Uses of the Two Hands Pinch

While this is a very popular grip contest lift, it is also a great lift to introduce to athletes.

Most gripping, especially in combat sports, is some form of pinching. It then makes total sense to include some form of pinching in the athletic routine.

Going after a big lift in the 2HP is awesome for setting up team challenges and requires only basic equipment and some brute strength, intensity, and effort to complete.

The History of the World Record

David Horne quickly became the World Record holder in the lift. In 2005, he held the mark of 231 lbs. To me, that number sounded incredible at first. I was able to lift 220 on it in competition after a couple of years, though an I started to think about chasing the record.

As far as I can remember there has only been one person who has topped Horne’s mark, Martin Arildsson, of Sweden, who lifted 246 in 2007, topping Horne’s previous record of 243.

Chad Woodall also held the record for a time after breaking it in Germany in 2007.

Horne eventually came back and set the mark of 253 pounds in 2008.

All a while the biggest total was rising in the lift, I was driving and flying all over the country chasing it. I have been pursuing it for years, always coming up short.

One time, I lifted the record weight up to the stick, only to have the weights slide off the front of the implement, ripping it out of my hands.

In September this year, I hit a new US National Record of 246 pounds and nearly set a new record of 255, but the implement slipped out of my hands about an inch from the stick.

Finally, this past weekend, I was able to break the record at the Gripmas Carol Contest in Crooksville Ohio.

Actually the record was broken twice this past weekend. First by Chad Woodall, who lifted 255 pounds, and then an hour later, by me, with 256.04.

Here are the clips of the record being broken twice, on December 12, 2009.

Chad Woodall – 255 Pounds Two Hands Pinch

Jedd Johnson – 256 Pounds Two Hands Pinch

Chad Woodall and I have been going head to head for years now – ever since 2005 and we have always been close in the pinch. He is a great Grip athlete and always stays on top of his game. Look for more from him down the line.

I am actually taking a few weeks off of pinching to let my thumbs rest. No, I am not resting on my laurels just because I finally stand at the top of the pinch heap. The fact is, this record could be broken again as soon as this coming weekend in a contest in England.

I am taking a break, because I have been battling some nagging injuries and I need to give them time to recover so that when I do compete again, I can hopefully push my number even higher. That’s the great thing about the Two Hands Pinch. Because it is an adjustable implement, I don’t think the even will ever go away. There will always be a mark to shoot for. There will always be a record to be broken.

However, just because I am taking a break from grip training, does not mean I am just sitting around after my full body workouts.

In fact, I have been working on a secret project the last couple of months that almost no one on planet Earth knows about. Let’s just say I have been very busy behind the scenes for the last couple of months…

I’ll have more info in the upcoming weeks, but believe me, you don’t want to miss what I’ll be bringing to the forefront.

All the best in your training,

-Jedd-

P.S. Other Posts on the Two Hands Pinch:

Training the Two Hands Pinch – 245 Pounds
Contest Highlights – First Annual Woodall Competition
Metroflex Grip Write-up
Gripmas 2008

More to come as I find them in the annals…

Similar Posts:

• Woodall Grip Highlights
• New Pinch World Record
• New Personal Goal and On-line Challenge
• 245 Lbs Two Hands Pinch
• Chris Rice Pinch Lifts and Feats