Strengthen Your Fingers With These Exercises
“Your fingers are important for all the functions of your hands, so enough care should be given to them accordingly”
When we exercise, most of us only focus on areas that would make us strong and look good. We concentrate on the important areas like chest, arms shoulders and so on. But this is only until one or both of our hand shaped fingers start hurting. If you choose powerful forearms and injury- free strong hands, then why differentiate when it comes to your fingers? After all, your fingers are important for all the functions of your hands.
Finger Movements
The fingers are capable of extension, abduction, circumduction, flexion, opposition (thumb) and adduction and reposition (thumb). Fingers can be flexed by curling them. They also get flexed when you perform deadlift or bench press by grabbing a bar. And extension is when you straighten your fingers out, trying to extend them backwards.
When you hold a basketball with your fingers, the movement is called abduction. So, bringing all your fingers close together is adduction. And when you move a particular finger in circle it is called circumduction. After extension, if you return your thumb to its resting place, it is called reposition.
Just doing the above movements for 15-20 times with or without holds is good enough to warm up and strengthening in the initial phases of exercising, for rehabilitation and for the elderly. However, for progression, more advanced exercises that offer functional benefits are incorporated.
Exercises To Strengthen Your Fingers
Wrist Flexion Push-Ups
Stand with your palms. shoulder width away on the wall, like for a regular push-up against the wall. The only difference should be that your fingers are spread wide and at the end of the push-up, your wrist is flexed on top. This extends the fingers against resistance, placing a good amount of stress on them. Now, lower your body back towards the wall and repeat. Make sure your fingers are evenly spaced and take equal pressure, while performing this exercise. This exercise can be advanced by performing the push-up on the table and after that, on the floor.
Fingertip Push-Ups
It is important here to ensure that your weight is evenly distributed on all of your fingers. Avoid putting the thumb wrongly and spread your fingers out.Now, lower your body to the ground. This works wonders in making your fingers strong. Come up with your fingers in the same position and repeat.
Holding Exercises
Hold a wide bottle with your finger tips for 20 seconds and then relax. Repeat this for 10-15 times. The same can be done with a plate of five, ten or fifteen kilos. Using two sandwiched plates, works the holding capacity of your fingers.
Squeezing
Any stress ball and soft ball may be used for this same purpose. Hold the squeeze for 10 seconds and relax. Repeat for 20 times.
Rubber Band Exercises
Wrap an exercise rubber band around your two fingers and perform abduction of your fingers by spreading them wide from one another, against the resistance of the rubber band. Hold the position and come back to the normal position. Repeat 10-20 times for three sets. The same rubber band can also be used for finger extension exercises too.
Pinch Exercises
Squeezing stress balls or heavy plates with only your fingertips, as in to make a pinch and holding the pinch hard for five to ten seconds for ten reps and three sets of the same will also strengthen your fingers effectively.
Other Ways To Strengthen Finger Muscles
Performing exercises like a waitress press with pressing a plate that rests on your fingertips overhead, or lifting a weight pin with plates loaded with one hand or doing finger curls with a plate by holding the plate only with fingers and curling the wrist are all ways to strengthen your fingers along with your wrists and forearms.
While doing these and other exercises for your upper limbs, your fingers also get trained very well, but using isolated exercises for your fingers will place extra effort on them, making them extremely healthy.