When we talk about stress balls the first thing that comes to our mind is stress reduction. But squeezing a stress ball gives a pump to your forearms and hands and many people get curious whether squeezing a stress ball builds muscles or not.
Well, firstly I hope you are talking about forearm muscles and not any other muscles because it makes no sense that a muscle grows when there is no pressure or it is not even used.
So, I hope the main question would be whether squeezing a stress ball grows forearm muscles or not?
So let’s discuss…
Does squeezing a stress ball build muscle?
Technically, stress balls are made for stress relief and anxiety but they can be a good workout for your forearm muscles.
A lot of people don’t know but squeezing is one of those movements that help the forearm muscles to grow.
If you are familiar with hand grip, you know that you have to squeeze the hand grip to strengthen your grip.
But when you squeeze a hand grip your hands are not only performing the movement, but your forearm muscles also get contracted.
This makes your forearm muscles get pumped which ultimately leads to muscle breaks in the forearm. And just like other muscles in your body, forearm muscles also grow when you get proper nutrition with these hand exercises.
This is the same with stress balls. When you squeeze the stress ball, it contracts the muscles of the forearms. If you squeeze stress balls for several repetitions daily you will definitely see a growth in your forearms.
The most growth while squeezing stress will be on the upper part of your forearm. Many people think that they can grow their wrists with the help of a stress ball.
Well, that is totally wrong because growing a wrist is very difficult, actually you can not grow it. However, you can grow your forearms which are just above your wrist by squeezing a stress ball
Stress ball comes in different sizes and toughness. Stress balls are usually very easy to squeeze. If you want your forearm muscles to engage them you have to as many reps as you can until you start feeling burn in your forearms.
To get better results or hard squeezing exercises for your grip and forearms, you can use a tennis ball and try to squeeze it as hard as you can.
A tennis ball is good for people who have big hands and strong grip. For People with decent grip and small hands, a stress ball is a good way to start working on their grip and forearms.
But do know that, you have to do more reps and only stop squeezing a stress ball when you feel any burning sensation in your forearms.
Lastly, hand grips are best to build your grip strength and your forearm muscles. You can check more about it in this article- Are Hand Grips bad for You?
Mistakes to avoid
Don’t get too dependent on a stress ball for growing your forearms as it does not always give you desired results.
Some people might not get any benefit from squeezing a stress ball and they don’t see any growth in their forearms.
Well, this can be because your forearm muscles need specific exercises for each muscle or the second reason would be because you have genetics that don’t allow your body to build muscle at specific parts of your body.
There are people who train their calves and forearms 3 times or more in a week with heavy weights and still don’t see any growth.
Well, this is mainly because of genetics. Every person’s genetics is different. One person can put muscle on forearms easily by squeezing a stress ball while another person can easily build a chest but he might not see any gain in his forearms even after doing specific forearm exercises. This is mainly because of genetics and you can not do anything about that.
