We’re neck deep in the Open, and you may have learned a hard lesson by now that you need to take care of your hands for your workouts or you’ll pay the price.

When CrossFit was in its early days, ripped hands were a mark of honor, but as CrossFit training becomes more efficient, well-defined and intended for daily workouts, you need to take care of your hands to make sure you can keep moving through your workout, and keep training throughout the week.

Hand ripping typically occurs when doing gymnastics movements like pull ups, toes to bar, or muscle ups as a result of not managing calluses on the skin that build up over time. When we work with our hands around barbell, dumbbells, and pull ups bars, they become rough and calloused as the skin hardens and becomes thick. This is completely normal, but it makes ripping more likely when we do a workout that contains a high repetition scheme.

How you take care of your calluses is a little different for everyone. Some of our top ways to do this include a callus shaver, a pumice stone, and covering your hands with grips. A callus shaver is one of the cheaper options and uses a razor blade to safely and effectively cut off the thick, hard calluses from the skin. A pumice stone is best used in the shower when hands are wet and the skin is softer to rub away the dead and thickened skin. You might also consider investing in grips that cover the palm of your hands for doing gymnastic movements on the pull up bar. These grip may reduce your friction with the bar, but are highly effective at protecting the skin on your palms.

What your favorite way to take care of your hands that we missed?