.png)
Dips with parallel bars, V-bars, rings or straight bars are one of the staple strength and muscle building "Pushing" type movements. They are one notch above the standard push-ups when it comes to pushing your full bodyweight. Normally, in a standard push up, you are lifting roughly 70% of your weight and thus it makes sense to progress to dips after you master push-ups.
However, if one tries to advance further in the dips, one way is to move to ring dips for that "shaky" chaos type added stability challenge. However, to build more strength, you need to overcome maximal resistance. If someone progresses to ring dips, there is going to be time when you will master that added stability component and then bang out reps and reps and then you will need to add weight to the exercise that you're doing.
Sadly, the loading most people add is on their waist with a dip belt and loads of weight hanging below. This cases a lot of shoulder impingement and shoulder pain because the weight is pulling you "vertically" down and when you perform a dip. Notice that I have purposefully highlighted" vertically" because then you are not only disengaging your chest from the movement but also putting a lot of pressure in the shoulder ball and socket region leading to shoulder pain and rotator cuff injuries because of awkward position that the upper arm gets in against the shoulder. The same problem happens when you perform tricep-dips which is essentially a vertical dipping movement.
To properly engage the chest and triceps both, you need to tilt the upper body in and then perform the movement. This will engage the chest and triceps equally and will be the safer position for strength and muscle gains. You are almost at 45 deg. upper body angle and you curl your body this way while the knees move in front.
Notice that in tricep-dips, there's a shear pressure on the shoulder socket. Performing dips this way or worse, moving your upper arms beyond parallel to the floor is a sure-shot recipe for disaster.
In similar manner, hanging weight on the waist and trying to dip will cause you to get into the same position as the tricep-dip.
This is the same reason why Pro-athletes use heavy chains hanging on their neck while dipping because the weight on your neck will force you to move down and get you in a safer position. However, not all of us performing dips outdoors or in the gym have access to these heavy chains, and hence, to get the same training effect that chains bring with them, you can use rubber resistance band loops of different sizes and tension levels that are readily available online and in stores these days.
What happens when you use rubber bands and loop them around your neck and dip bars?
These bands will pull you entire upper body down through your neck getting you in a very safe position while you dip. An added benefit is that due the elastic nature of these bands, they will want to pull you down suddenly, hence you will learn how to control the eccentric or lowering portion of the lift and on top of this, when you try to lift yourself up from the hole, the bands will tense up incrementally as you move up, hence you will also load the triceps on the way up at around lockout. This will not happen when you perform dips with bodyweight or free weights.
Please, note that bands come in different tension levels, they are quite taxing on the joints esp. the heavier (stronger tension) bands if you use them for all exercises and
Another big benefit that I have personally felt is that even though bands are helping you to perform dips correctly with added resistance, there is going to be a time when they get too tense and then progressing from there will be very tough. Hence, I would recommend hanging weights with the weight belt simultaneously while you use the bands. Yes, in this case it will be difficult for you to determine the exact load you lift, but performing heavy dips safely is more important to me. You can still note the hanging weight and then mention the number of bands you've looped and this way to progress with bands, you can add one more loop next week..and so on.
In this position, even when the weight pulls you vertically down, the bands will curl your upper body in again making the lift much safer.
Try these out, progress slowly esp. with the bands, no matter how cute and colorful they may look, they kick a lot of ass ;P. Let me know how these "loaded" dips felt.
Resources :
Comments