Hand wraps are common practice in martial arts, especially when there is contact striking (i.e. making physical contact when punching bags or an opponent). At the beginning of your martial arts journey, it takes time to learn the correct technique, perfect the basic movements and develop your balance. In this learning phase you are a lot more prone to mistakes and (particularly in contact sports) – injury. Hand Wraps are an important safety measure when training – so learning how to correctly apply them is a crucial skill that will help you prevent injury and ensure your martial arts journey is a long one.

Hand wraps have a number of purposes:

• Protection: Acts as a cushion from impact force, an extra layer of protection for all the bones, joints, muscles and tendons in the hand
• Structural Support: Restrict unwanted movement of the many joints and small bones in the hands/wrist that prone to fracture. Proper wrapping allows the forces to be distributed across the whole hand and down the arm.
• Soak up sweat – Be sure to wash them regularly!
• Fill any excess space between your hands and the glove which will provide better grip and prevent slipping within the glove (boosting protection and structural support)

How you choose to wrap your hands can also depend on:

The type of gloves – you may only have access to whats avaliable at your gym, or when borrowing from a friend:

• What TYPE of glove are they? (different gloves provide different amounts protection/ padding)
• Are they the right size / fit? (is there alot of space between your hands and the gloves?)
• No gloves at all / Only using the wraps?

The type of contact activity

• Light or Heavy?
• Sparring with another person
• Bag work
• Training for a competition or tournament which may have specific requirements for equipment.

Generally, when wrapping in combination with the use of gloves: you’ll want to focus a bit more on supporting the wrist. Because naturally the gloves will be providing some padding for the hands, but they do nothing to structurally support the wrist.

Check out and follow along with our video demonstration to correctly wrap your hands, we are using the Morgan Hand Wraps (Available for purchase online or in-club!)