What is Hook Grip?

The hook grip occurs when your palms are over the bar, facing your body. You wrap your fingers around the bar as you would for a regular grip, but rather than having your thumb on the outside, it is trappy between the bar and your first and second fingers.

This type of grip is essential for the pull of snatches and cleans to control the bar more, alongside many other benefits.

How to Hook Grip

When implementing the hook grip, you must ensure the thumb is wrapped around the barbell, not just pinned in parallel.

From there, the fingers should grab your thumb to pull it around the barbell. This should make the hook grip feel more comfortable and is essential to reap the benefits.

If you execute the hook grip correctly, you should find gripping easier, which leads to many knock-on effects during Olympic Weightlifting.

How Can Hook Grip Improve Your PRs?

Improved Grip Integrity

For starters, you develop a powerful hook by wrapping your thumbs directly around the bar. You can use this hook grip to improve grip integrity without having to tense the rest of your body and make lifting smoothly more difficult.

Prevents Rolling

The hook grip also develops a grip that balances the bar and reduces the chase of it rolling. When you lift with a regular overhand grip, the barbell is supported by your fingers, and as a result, they all open in the same direction. This grip creates a situation when the bar rolls backward out of your hand.

Hook grip creates a counter to this tendency. The barbell will try and roll out of your hand, but with the thumb firmly in position, it reduces the chances of the barbell spinning.

Less Tension and Better Transmission

Lastly, you do not need such high levels of grip tension while you lift due to the additional security you have with the hook grip.

With reduced wrist flexor and finger tension, you can also reduce elbow tension throughout your snatch or clean pulling phases. This system improves the transmission of your leg and hip power and increases the speed of transition from phase two to phase three of your life.

Final Thoughts

The hook grip certainly isn't comfortable, and sometimes it can feel slippery and painful, especially if you lift frequently.

Professional weightlifters counteract this by using lifting tape to add protection and stickiness to their grip.

The LYFT-RX Weightlifting Hook Grip Tape is made to a professional grade and offers you the perfect amount of support and comfort to help you continue to hit new PRs. We also offer a wide range of colors so that you can pick the perfect one.