This morning I had quite a delightful surprise waiting for me at the office. And after a long and arduous weekend of kicking my own butt at the Can-Fit-Pro Fitness Conference in Toronto, I definitely deserved a treat!

Craig, at Flexsolate was gracious enough to send me a few pairs of their Flexsolate Grip-Free Lifting Straps to try out in my own gym. Now I hardly lift to the degree of Gunter Schlierkamp, the Former Mr. Universe who endorses Flexsolate straps, but I thought “hey, I’m doing a service to those who can’t lift quite what Gunter can!”

Before I get into my review of the Flexsolate straps, I think it’s important to tell you what they do exactly. You see the purpose of these straps is to eliminate the excessive use of muscles, not needed for a particular exercise. This way you’re able to focus on, or isolate, the muscle, and only the muscle, you want to work out! For example when you perform bicep curls you’ll often notice that you’re forced to call on extra stabilizing muscles that you’re not necessarily trying to target with an exercise – like the wrist flexors and the anterior deltoids. In fact, you may want to conserve these muscles for future exercises in your workout that are actually meant to target those particular muscles. However if you’re forced to use them now to perform your bicep curls, you may be diminishing the effectiveness of this exercise and your overall workout.

Think of it like this, if you’re trying to build muscle you will include exercises in your workout to specifically target the muscles you’re trying to build. If you need to call too much on your stabilizing muscles, you may diminish the effectiveness the lift has on the muscle you’re trying to target. For example with a bicep curl:

1. You won’t be using your biceps muscles to their full advantage because of help from the stabilizing muscles.
2. And, if you need those “extra” muscles to help you lift now; how will they feel later on when you need them for their own isolated lifts?  

So that’s where the Flexsolate Grip Free Isolation Straps come in. They make it possible to target exactly the muscle you want to, and work it to its full potential while saving other muscles for their own isolated exercises.

So how did the Flexsolate straps fare in my workout?

I don’t normally use lifting straps in my workouts because I circuit train using mainly body weight and plyometric training. However I have used straps in my past workouts when my goal was building muscle.

I first used the Flexsolate Grip Free Isolation Straps for my lat pull downs. I slid the straps easily over my hands through the wrist cuffs. The straps rested across either palm, and along the inside of each of my index fingers. Then I simply looped the ends over either end of my lat bar. The straps were very comfortable during the exercise. And I know that if I was lifting a tremendous weight, like Gunter, I would have appreciated the lack of strain that pulling the bar down would have on those extra muscles I was using in my neck (traps) and along my arms (biceps, delts, etc).

I also tested the Flexsolate straps during my bicep curls using the low pulley on my cable machine. For this exercise I again slipped each strap onto the carabiner hooks in lieu of the biceps/triceps bar. Then I looped each wrist cuff over my thumb and the palm of my hand.  By turning my hands slightly in 45 degree angles away from one another I found that my curls were comfortable, and again demanded less stress from my stabilizing muscles (my delts, traps and wrist flexors).

Conclusion:

I would recommend Flexsolate straps for those whose goal it is to build and sculpt particular muscles. If you’re a body builder and lift extremely heavy weights, the Flexsolate straps will precisely focus on the muscle you want to work out – effectively targeting that muscle, and reserving your stabilizers for their isolated lifts.

Even though I lift much less then Gunter, I give the Flexsolate straps 2 thumbs up – from 2 arms that were able to do 5 additional bicep curls on either arm! Yeah!

Click here for more information on Flexsolate Grip Free Isolation Straps