Tag Archives | Break

Bad Handstand Habits, Training Frequency + More

By admin on May 26, 2009 in Flexibility & Contortion, Handstands, Walking & Jumping

Thanks for all the suggestions after my last message. Going to answer a number of them today.

The True Art and Science of Hand Balancing

“I am just started handstands and I notice that my arms are bent it seems I have a bad habit, ideas?”

You know this is something I battled with for a long time. When doing a handstand you want to have your arms locked out the entire time.

Should you overbalance you can bend your arms to save yourself but this should only be used as a last resort. And when you’re starting out you are better off not doing it so that you learn to use your hands to balance.

So how do you break this habit? Returning to the wall and doing handstands there with locked out arms would certainly help.

Also, any time you kick-up into a handstand have your arms straight from the very start. Extend them fully and imagine they have a splint wrapped around them that forces you to keep them that way.

“Actually I am interested in high wire walking or rope walking. And in the future also slacklining. I live in Finland and I would like to know where I could buy a slackline? Sorry my bad english. Thank You for your inspiring messages.”
Taina

Its funny that you should mention this, Taina as a friend just brought to my attention trying out slack lines.

Its something I’m looking into and may feature on the site in the future. As an informal poll how many out there are potentially interested in learning this art? And who out there currently does it?

“I would like to know some good ways to build up to walking up stairs on my hands.”

Before starting to walk up stairs you need to have a good base. You should be proficient in walking on flat ground, walking down stairs, and be strong.

Because you’re walking up the stairs on your hands you are having to push your bodyweight up with mostly a single arm at a time. I’d say being able to do three freestanding handstand pushups in a row is the bare minimum.

If you’re there its just a matter of starting small and working your way up. Literally. Find small stairs and master those before moving up to large steps. The more incremental you can make it the better.

“I started trying some headstands and handstands today after perusing this site + I really enjoyed it. I lift weights regularly and was wondering how frequently i should train hand balancing, do I do it as with weights(every other day) or can I practice every day?
Thanks very much.
Stuart

This is a fairly common question. Because hand balancing requires very fine skill it is best to practice it every single day. A little practice each day is much better than a two hour session once a week.

Of course starting out you’ll need to give some time for recovery, also depending on what moves you are practicing and how tough your other workouts are.

But once you have a foundation some practice every day is the best way to go. If for some reason you are unable to train everyday, not to worry cause you can still make progress with less practice.

Well that’s plenty to chew on for one day. So until next time…

Good Luck and Good Hand Balancing,
Logan Christopher

P.S. Many of these topics are covered in much more detail in Professor Paulinetti and Bob Jones’ hand balancing book.

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You've got Questions, I've got Answers

By admin on August 23, 2008 in Bridging, Flexibility & Contortion, Handstands, Presses & Pushup, Tumbling

Been working on a new project. Hours of filming straight at a time. It’s rough work doing that much volume but the payoff should be great.

More on that later on, plus a few sneak peak video clips.

Right now, gonna dive into the mailbag to answer a few more of your questions. We got some good ones today.

“Quick question. I’m having trouble going past 30 seconds holding a handstand. My balance is constantly improving, so is strength (i can rattle off 12-15 pressups at a time – sometimes I’ll do 3 sets of 11). Just not getting why I hit a wall around 30 or so seconds in a free handstand. gotta run, Thanks for the great info”
Andy Moose

My first impression is that your hitting a wall because you think you’re hitting a wall.

There is nothing physiologically that changes after the half minute mark. If you can’t break it you just need a few options to work through it.

Set a goal to make 40 seconds. Maybe even visualize yourself doing it. But most importantly believe in your ability to do it. Do not think you’ll fail at 30 but that you can go on to 60 and eventually you will.

“how do you go back into a crab and flip over sucessfuly”
Gabrielle

I put out a video a while back showing how to do a similar move from the bridge position. If you haven’t seen it you can check it out here – Gymnastic Bridge Turn-Over.

The short answer is that it requires strength and flexibility in the shoulders to do this move. You have to be able to post your weight on the one arm while you rotate your body around.

“HI Logan,
A skill that I’m working to regain is the backward rolling summersault. I think I did it as a kid, but it is escaping me now. Any suggestions to implement the back roll without risking neck strain?”
thanks
Jeff

Many people can’t do a backwards roll because it hurts their neck. The problem lies not in the move itself but in weakness.

If you build up your strength this move will not be a problem. In Tumbling Illustrated there’s even a back extension roll up into the headstand without the use of the arms. How’s that for neck strain?

In my opinion the best exercise to strengthen the neck is the wrestler’s bridge. Tried and true. And if you move from a laying down position to the top of the bridge you cover the same angles of pressure you need for the backwards roll.

You can avoid the problem by doing backwards rolls over the shoulder or you can address it and make you neck strong. Your choice.

And if you want to have a really strong neck (when most people don’t even train theirs) stay tuned to what’s coming soon.

Good Luck and Good Hand Balancing,
Logan Christopher

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Tumbling Tip to Train Relaxation + A Deadline

By admin on May 13, 2008 in Tumbling

Today is the last day you’ll be able to get your hands on the Tumbling Course for the launch price of $49. After midnight tonight (PST), it goes up to $79.

I know I’ve been mentioning a lot. But I don’t want someone to come after me in an angry manner because they failed to see it coming. This is your last chance!

Now on to a great comment from a reader. About why you NEED to have the most basic tumbling skills.

Also a great tip for training yourself to relax through tumbling moves and not tense up. Something I’ll be practicing myself. I wish I had thought of it.

Hey Logan

This looks like a great course I will be ordering it soon.

I learned many tumbling moves from my Ju Jitsu and Judo training, I think people need to learn this valuable tool.

I remember my instructor telling me a woman who use to take her son to his Ju Jitsu class use to watch them tumble and do break falls.

Well one day she fell down a flight of stairs and was able to walk away from that fall with a few bumps and scrapes, due to her learning how to tumble in her sons class and without ever practicing them.

She told him that if it wasn’t for her being able to tumble she would have broken her neck or back.

So tumbling is not just for exercising only but it can be good for your health and well being, also for self defense purposes as I teach my students to tumble as opposed to break falling, this way they can pop up off the ground and fight standing up instead of staying on the ground and fighting from there if they are knocked down.

That’s not a good place to be in a street fight.

Here is a tip I learned that helped me in tumbling; when rolling in any direction always hum as you do it, as you roll if you catch yourself not humming you tightened up your muscles in that area.

Which means you have to either loosen the muscles in the area or relax more, then when you can hum all the way through the movement you have mastered the roll.

Well take care Logan

Daniel
www.SuperHeroSystems.com

Thanks Daniel. Its true that you need to know how to roll should you ever need it.

For some reason I always picture having to roll out of a car going high speeds on the freeway, but falling down stairs is a better example, and much more common.

If you don’t know how to roll safely and effectively, take the time to learn it. If you never move beyond those rolls that’s alright. Just learn those necessary skills.

But if you want to move beyond the basics than you know where to start. (Although this course does teach the most basic moves, as well as everything progressing up to the most advanced.)

Get the Tumbling Course here.

Once again, last chance to get it at this price. Don’t put it off any longer.

Good Luck and Good Tumbling,
Logan Christopher

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Break-thru your Plateau

By admin on March 20, 2008 in Tumbling

What do you do when you hit a plateau?

Sometimes you just can’t seem to make anymore progress. You know, things were going great and you were progressing quickly then all of a sudden you’re stuck.

There are a couple of ways around this.

First you can just keep going. Many times if you continue to work hard, in time you will bust through it and continue to progress.

But most of the time you need to shake things up.

The beauty of this is that there are so many ways to approach your training.

You can change when you train, how long you train, and of course how you train.

The how you train can be broken into further groups ready for change. The skills you are working on. The sets, rep, or time on the exercises. Focusing on similar but different exercises and more.

If you training is feeling stale (not to be confused with boredom, but that’s another problem all together) you should implement one or more of these changes.

Even if your training is going good, a change for the better can supercharge your gains.

Which one exactly and what to do is going to depend on you and your goals. And in every case what you should do will be different.

You may be the kind of person you loves to figure out your own program. Or you may want someone to hand you a template for you to work from. Either way what’s coming soon will help.

How would you like new things to focus on every single month? A few tricks to work on to build your abilities?

This monthly program will be ready sometime next week. Before then I still have another video or two to share with you. If you missed the last couple you can check them out below.

Good Luck and Good Hand Balancing,
Logan Christopher

Comments { 6 }

Handstands and Hand/Grip Positions

By admin on January 3, 2008 in Handstands

First off I want to remind you that the New Year’s Sale is still going. Check Hand Balancing New Year’s Sale to see how you can save 20.08% off of everything. It ends Saturday so if you’re putting it off you better do it now before you forget.For today I’ll dig into the question bag and answer another one.

When I think of how handstands are done with flat palms, I think of how pushups are also done with flat palms. Similarly, both have been done on a bar (pronated grip) or on a set of parallel bars (neutral grip). I have seen variant pushups done with a reversed grip (supinated) and indeed, I think this is the position people take for doing planches. There are also pushups done on fists, on the back of the hand instead of the palm (wrists flexed instead of extended as usual) and on fingertips. While I did hear of some shaolin master doing a supported handstand (with wall) on two fingers, I have never seen these variations addressed in any guides. Are you familiar with anything like that, attempted any of the difficult variations, or have ideas about them?
-Tyciol

This is more than one question so I will break it apart.

Handstands can be done with a variety of grips. Of course you have the standard extended wrist position. But every other way you can move your hands is a way you can do handstands.

Parallel bars do add extra dimensions, and having something to grip can help you be stronger, but similar positions can be taken on the floor if you make your hands into fist.

The supinated grip, where your fingers are pointed back the opposite way of normal, makes a handstand much harder to do. Planches could be done like this, but more often you just turn them slightly out from the normal straightforward location.

Fingertip handstands is a big subject that I will cover in some more detail soon.

As far as do any of the books cover training for this stuff, the answer is absolutely.

In Hand Balancing Made Easy, Professor Orlick covers all of the various hand positions you can do in a handstand. In total I counted 35 exercises covering different positions for the fingers and hands.

When you master all these you can balance from just about any position. If you can do a normal handstand try turning your hands. Just a few attempts at doing a handstand with your hands backwards and you will understand the benefits. Great for flexibility too.

You can get this book alone at or as part of the Hand Balancing Mastery Course.And in The True Art and Science of Hand Balancing, Bob Jones brings you through the progressions he used to master his famous Thumb Stand.But don’t order any of these from the page itself. Get your discount at the Hand Balancing New Year’s Sale

. The sale ends on Saturday.Good Luck and Good Hand Balancing,
Logan Christopher

P.S. I dug up and old picture I had forgotten about of an interesting feat my friend and I performed. You’ll get to see it next time.

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Tag Archives | Break

Bad Handstand Habits, Training Frequency + More

You've got Questions, I've got Answers

Tumbling Tip to Train Relaxation + A Deadline

Break-thru your Plateau

Handstands and Hand/Grip Positions