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Posted by: sigma7 May 27 2008, 09:48 PM

i dont if this is such a good idea but i have been putting weights on my left wrist so that when im on the fretboard, it puts strees on my hand. Im hoping it will build by wrist speed and dexterity. Any comments or recommendations?

Posted by: Eat-Sleep-andJam May 27 2008, 09:52 PM

Hmm....I wouldnt do that. It sounds a bit dangerous.

I think the best way to build wrist speed, and dexterity is good old fashion practice.

Posted by: ZakkWylde May 27 2008, 09:56 PM

Amen to that

And if you need strength in your arm you can always go and work out...

Posted by: Hisham Al-Sanea May 27 2008, 10:00 PM

i dont think thats will help you if you want something from sports to help your speed ...building your arms muscles

Posted by: sigma7 May 27 2008, 10:02 PM

its not like a 10 pnd weight. Its just a small chain i got from a bleach box set. haha

Posted by: Bogdan Radovic May 27 2008, 10:12 PM

Well ok But the good ol' fashion way is much better in my opinion - practicing finger fitness and dexterity exercises .

Posted by: Ivan Milenkovic May 27 2008, 10:19 PM

I also don't recommend practicing like that. The brain will develop a whole different muscle memory with those wights, and without them you will not be as precise. Don't do it.

Posted by: Scott Gentzen May 28 2008, 03:02 AM

While I don't have any problem with wrist weights in general, it's kinda working the wrong muscles if you're looking to strengthen your wrists. Most of what'll be affected by your wrist weights is above your elbow.

I've had a problem with weak wrists ever since I broke my right wrist in 1984 or so. My right wrist gets sore and hurts a lot when I work it a lot, so over the years, I worked them less and less to the point where they ache when I did pushups.

Over the last couple months, I've been doing wrist curls with my hand weights...palm up and palm down on both hands. It's helped with my pain and soreness so far. I don't know if it's helped my playing at all...I'm doing other exercises with the guitar for that.

Posted by: beebo May 28 2008, 05:16 AM

Does that actually help your speed...im just wondering. I've been trying to get stronger and i've been doing just curls and i started out at about 100 to 120 *50-60 on each arm* and now i can do *80-105 on each arm* 210 max and still rising but, my point is i've somewhat increased my speed and this is.... maybe a good theory to discuss?

Posted by: Juan M. Valero May 28 2008, 07:35 AM

I did it and believe me it didn't help. So I recomend not doing this kind of exercices.

Posted by: Jenkinson May 28 2008, 10:23 PM

Lift weights!

Posted by: Danilo Capezzuto May 29 2008, 06:07 PM

Nice one, this way you'll increase strength and gain some money to spend...

Posted by: Ctodd May 30 2008, 02:09 AM

not only do i think this is a bad idea, i think its a terrible idea....

i thought about doing something similar... I thought about attaching weights (small wieghts, like fishing sinkers) to each of my fingers and then walk around with my hand our wiggling my fingers (as if I was walking like a zombie)

anyway

My step mom then told me about some pianist or something that did the same thing i did, ya know, to get the finger strength up. any way, he did it so much that he destroyed his fingers, ruined them.

And he wasnt able to play again....

Posted by: beebo May 30 2008, 05:18 AM

I lift weights...w/o playing guitar.
The only thing it does is, i can hold the guitar better if i can't find my strap and i just feel more comfortable feeling more powerful while playing the guitar...idk maybe im just crazy or just myself!

Posted by: Ivan Milenkovic May 30 2008, 12:32 PM

lifting weights while practicing is a good thing, but not if you overdo it. When practicing a guitar, brain remembers very delicate and balanced set of muscle reactions in order to play something. When you start practicing seriously and build up muscle strength in arms it removes the delicate balance that brain remembered so it needs some time to adjust to current muscle strength. That's why most people experience a sudden (relative) decrease in guitar technique when start to weightlift.

Posted by: Marcus Lavendell May 30 2008, 01:01 PM

Yeah, that was Robert Schumann

Posted by: Ivan Milenkovic May 30 2008, 01:24 PM

Pianists were crazy back then because of the high standards - List cut the skin between his fingers to have a bigger finger range

Posted by: Marcus Lavendell May 30 2008, 01:44 PM

Yes that it really crazy!
But still, he was an outstanding pianist. Not sure if it was thanks to the cut between fingers though

Posted by: beebo May 30 2008, 03:20 PM

like the webby looking part? o.0 the crease? really? :
wow i didn't know that...i don't think that would help me i think i'll settle for just 1 to 5 even though half my friends can stretch like 1-7.

although i still am quicker so i'll take it the safe way

Posted by: Gerardo Siere May 31 2008, 01:46 AM

Seems a preety bad idea to me. Get out those lifts, what you probably need is not strenght but accuracy in your movements, if extra strenght is needed you can use fixation to let the weight of biger muscles from your arm help you, but accurracy will make posible to do anything with the less effort posible, also you need propper positioning to allow your strenght to be generated and flow. But of course, weight is very bad idea.