Clean Grip Width - What Hand Placement Works Best
The width of your grip can make or break your cleans—at the very least, it can make them a lot easier, or cause you unnecessary trouble.
As a starting point, I recommend a grip between half a fist and a fist-width outside the shoulders.
This is wide enough to support strong posture and bracing, but not so wide that it’s likely to create insecurity in the rack position.
From here, you need to experiment with widths until you find what works best for your proportions and mobility. Be sure you test those grips with heavier weights, which will highlight problems not always noticeable with light weights.
The benefits to a wider grip are a higher contact point, quicker turnover, less distance to lift/get under the bar, the bar naturally staying closer, and its makes a solid squat posture easier.
The drawbacks are that the first pull may feel a bit harder, and the rack position may be less secure.
The benefits to a narrower grip are a potentially easier first pull and more secure rack position.
The drawbacks are a longer distance to lift/get under the bar, a lower contact point, a slower turnover, and more difficulty keeping the bar close and maintaining solid squat posture.
In other words, a wider grip is more likely to work better, but you won’t know without trying.
Wider Benefits
Wider Drawbacks
Narrower Benefits
Narrower Drawbacks
Even with effort over time to improve your mobility, there’s no guarantee you’ll be able to replicate your favorite lifter’s grip or rack position, or even get to what you believe would be truly optimal for yourself.
You may never be able to have anything more than your fingers under the bar in the rack position—remember that in spite of what inexperienced social media personalities or click-baiters will tell you:
A) The ability to have a full clean rack grip is dependent ultimately on proportions, not mobility;
B) You do not at all need a full grip in the rack to be successful.
So again, experiment to find what works best for you, not what someone else does or has told you is the One True Way.
As a starting point, I recommend a grip between half a fist and a fist-width outside the shoulders.
This is wide enough to support strong posture and bracing, but not so wide that it’s likely to create insecurity in the rack position.
From here, you need to experiment with widths until you find what works best for your proportions and mobility. Be sure you test those grips with heavier weights, which will highlight problems not always noticeable with light weights.
The benefits to a wider grip are a higher contact point, quicker turnover, less distance to lift/get under the bar, the bar naturally staying closer, and its makes a solid squat posture easier.
The drawbacks are that the first pull may feel a bit harder, and the rack position may be less secure.
The benefits to a narrower grip are a potentially easier first pull and more secure rack position.
The drawbacks are a longer distance to lift/get under the bar, a lower contact point, a slower turnover, and more difficulty keeping the bar close and maintaining solid squat posture.
In other words, a wider grip is more likely to work better, but you won’t know without trying.
Wider Benefits
- Higher contact point (easier bar-body interaction)
- Quicker turnover
- Less distance to lift/get under bar
- Bar naturally closer in turnover
- Easier to maintain good posture in squat
Wider Drawbacks
- Harder first pull
- Possibly less secure rack position
Narrower Benefits
- Easier first pull
- Possibly more secure rack position
Narrower Drawbacks
- Longer distance to lift/get under bar
- Lower contact point (harder bar-body interaction)
- Slower turnover
- Harder to keep bar close in turnover
- Harder to maintain good posture in squat
Even with effort over time to improve your mobility, there’s no guarantee you’ll be able to replicate your favorite lifter’s grip or rack position, or even get to what you believe would be truly optimal for yourself.
You may never be able to have anything more than your fingers under the bar in the rack position—remember that in spite of what inexperienced social media personalities or click-baiters will tell you:
A) The ability to have a full clean rack grip is dependent ultimately on proportions, not mobility;
B) You do not at all need a full grip in the rack to be successful.
So again, experiment to find what works best for you, not what someone else does or has told you is the One True Way.
