Hand pain is a common problem amongst combat athletes I’ve trained and fighters in general. Personally, I have a good grip and strong hand bones, so my wrists generally don’t get rolled. But even still, when I hit anything in training for any length of time, it’s always my hands that go first.
For the last month or so I’ve been using Radius Wraps. I heard from a friend that you could punch steel with these wraps. I laughed of course, since I can already punch steel. That’s not my personal issue. But my knuckles do get a deep ache once I start in on a bag. No matter how I wrap my hand and whether I use an MMA glove or a boxing glove, my hands will ache after a few minutes and the wind goes out of my sails.
So I was intrigued to test out these wraps. I noticed immediately what sets these apart from other wraps is the Radius Roll, which is what the company calls the knuckle guard. The roll is made out of antibacterial, closed-cell foam. It absorbs the impact of the punch, distributes it more evenly across your hand, and then rebounds back to its original shape. When you first get these, you will cut the Radius Roll to the width of your knuckles. You then insert it into its little pocket on the wraps and finish wrapping your hand.
Wrapping your hands with a Radius Wrap is pretty straightforward. Many people who have hand pain and are used to spending a lot of time padding their knuckles will probably find this wrap easier and less time-consuming. Once you get used to it (which doesn’t take long at all – it took me only one try), you can do a standard wrap job with ease. I used to spend all kinds of time folding wraps across my knuckles to create a makeshift pad that helped prevent hand pain for maybe an extra minute. None of that extra work was necessary with the Radius Wraps.
I started using these wraps in training and, unbelievably, I had no hand pain at all. I’ve been punching stuff for almost twenty years now in a variety of disciplines and this is the first time my hands didn’t ache in as long as I can remember. So I decided to test my friend’s assertion about them. I first when to a concrete wall and punched gradually harder. No problem. Then I went over to a stack of metal weight plates and punched them pretty hard. Just fine. No pain. Awesome.
Another thing I noticed was the quality of the material. As a cotton-synthetic blend, the wraps can be machine washed in cold water and air dried. Additionally, I haven’t experienced any chafing or other irritation. For most wraps, a little irritation when you put them on tightly and start sweating is par for the course, but this effect is definitely reduced with this material. Radius Wraps also uses a micro Velcro that doesn’t collect cloth like normal Velcro and is less abrasive against the skin.
The only possible negative issue is that the wraps may not fit into some tighter-fitting gloves. They should fit into your normal gloves just fine, but I occasionally box unwrapped, with smaller gloves, and it takes more time to get the gloves on when I’m wearing these wraps. This is mostly nitpicking, though, and most readers won’t notice this issue.
So there you go. I test-punched brick and metal, and I ran through a punching bag with ease and experienced no pain for the first time ever. I could actually get in a real solid workout without worrying about my hands. The Radius Wraps are a great product, and with a sixty-day money back guarantee, I think every serious combat athlete should give them a chance.
Radius Wraps are available for $19.99 at RadiusWraps.com.
