Should women use lifting straps?

Nikkiey's view is simple: if your grip gives out before the muscle you're trying to train, your grip is limiting the workout. Straps or hooks fix that. She admits some people see them as a crutch, but she calls them a clutch, something that helps. In her own deadlift workout she wears a belt to support her back and Versa Gripps straps for her grip on the heavy working sets.

She highly encourages straps on dumbbell Bulgarian split squats and dumbbell RDLs in particular. On a day she forgot hers, her grip gave out on the RDLs before her legs did, and she says she could have done far more reps with straps. That's the point: they let you keep good form while handling heavier weights, so your legs and glutes do the work.

One nuance from the same client session: heavier is not the goal by itself. Nikkiey's order of priority is form, then connection to the muscle, then weight. If you're not feeling the target muscle, she says drop the weight. Straps help you load the muscle, but they don't replace good technique.