The pushdown is one of the most effective tricep-building isolation exercises you can do.

It's normally done with a straight bar, an angled bar or a rope attachment.

The Trainnox Ergonomic Pushdown Handles are designed to replace the traditional rope attachment, taking the normal design of the rope and end stopper and replacing it with easy-to-grip ergonomic handles.

Does this make the exercise more effective and easier to perform? I'll tell you...

 

Get your Trainnox Ergonomic Pushdown Handles here

 

What do the handles look like?

The basic idea behind these handles is to upgrade the design of the traditional pushdown rope.

So instead of this...

You get something that looks like this.

Your hands fit snugly into the one-size-fits-all grips (which unless you've got giant gorilla hands or tiny little hands, it should work just fine).

Then just attach the handles to the high pulley, just like you would a regular rope attachment, grip the handles, and start doing pushdowns

 

How well does it work?

I actually REALLY like these handles. I never really did like the feel of the traditional rope attachment for pushdowns...I don't feel the need to use a rope attachment again for these, now that I have this one.

The ergonomic grip feels very comfortable on the hands and allows you to spread the hands at the bottom for that extra bit of contraction very effectively.

In terms of setup, it's actually very hard to grip these wrong. It might take a few grips and regrips the first time you use the handles, but once you get it, it feels very natural.

The rubber is solid and not slippery. They've done a great job of molding it to the shape of a human hand/grip.

 

What other exercises can you do with it?

It's great for pushdowns and it's excellent for overhead cable extensions, too.

I also tested it with low pulley cable kickbacks. It worked just ok for those. The rope part isn't long enough to get around your legs, so you have to do partial, pumping reps for that one, coming only about halfway up. Still pretty good, but not full range.

You could potentially do pulldowns or rows with this handle as well. They're durable and well-built so I don't see even fairly heavy weight being an issue for using these with those exercises.

 

Anything else to be aware of?

I also tested these with cable hammer curls...they don't work at all for that because the grip would need to be turned upside down. Trainnox DOES sell an ergonomic bicep handle for that purpose as well.

A key thing to watch out for when using these (or any rope attachment, really) is to make sure that the ends are even and one handle side is not higher than the other.

 

Bottom line, I love the concept.

This is an excellent piece of equipment that I'm definitely happy to recommend. I like using it WAY better than a traditional rope attachment, and I think it makes the exercise more effective.

 

Get your Ergonomic Pushdown Handles here...(get 5% off with this link!)

 

 

 

 

 

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