Tag Archives | Hand Positions

Hand Positioning For the Handstand Part 2

By on January 18, 2016 in Hand Balancing, Handstands

Allright! Here is part 2 of the Hand Positioning for the Handstand Post. Here is some great insight on small tweaks you can make to increase your hold time and balance. The basic beginner position if you have good range of motion in the wrists is to try and keep the middle fingers parallel to eachother.

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If that becomes difficult and you are even having trouble kicking up, try turning your hands out.

Learn How to Back Flip in 31 Days
Learn How to Back Flip in 31 Days on Amazon

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The hand position can cause stress on the wrist, elbow, shoulder, and base of the neck if your range of motion is compromised.

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A simple turn of the hand can reduce the restriction in the upper extremities and make hand balancing a whole lot  easier!

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Check the video below for more detailed info!

Make sure to get the Handstand Mastery Course!

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Handstand Pushups and Handstand Hand Positions

By on May 31, 2008 in Handstands

Got two more handstand questions I’ll dig into today. I have to admit the quality of the questions has stepped up recently at least for the most part. Submit yours at https://lostartofhandbalancing.com/question.html.Here we go. The first one is from Ari.

“OK, Logan, I can balance on my hands, and I have the strength to do handstand pushups, but maintaining balance in an HSPU seems almost impossible. As I lower from the handstand my weight always starts to move to the ventral (stomach) side and unless I bend my legs at the knees so my calves counterbalance the weight, I lose my handstand. How do you maintain a straight bodywhile doing a handstand pushup?”

The first step is to make sure you have the strength to perform the move. When most people do handstand pushups against the wall it’s in an alignment that makes the pushup easier than the form you have to take for a free standing handstand pushup. This is a big topic in and of itself that I’ll have to dig into another time.

The important thing is to have an excess of strength. It’s not good to be burned out after two attempts, since you need to ‘practice’ the move. Onto the balancing.

It is going to be slightly different depending on how straight or arched you are. The thing is that your body will be at an angle and not perfectly vertical from the ground. When your head touches the ground it should be in a triangle formation with the hands. Like the headstand except you don’t rest on the head.

Because of this the upper body and lower body are on different sides of your center of gravity. As if you were lowering down toward the planche.

The most important thing you have to do in order to keep the balance and not fall toward the feet is keeping yourself toward overbalancing. The pressure must be toward your fingers at all times. If you go toward your palms you’ll lose it.

The True Art and Science of Hand Balancing
The True Art and Science of Hand Balancing on Amazon

Of course the body has to be kept real tight at the same time. But keep the weight toward your fingers and you’ll be able to stay balanced while doing the pushups.

And here’s one from Ron.

“I’ve been doing handstand training for the past 4 months. For the purpose of experimentation, what are the effects of different hand positioning? In other words, if you spread your hands wider apart, does that provide any benefits, as opposed to keeping the hands at shoulder width?”

Here’s the words of Professor Orlick, from the beginning of chapter 11 in Hand Balancing Made Easy.

There is a two-fold purpose for learning these (that is handstands with different hand and arm positions). The first is for the stunts themselves, they look good, impress your audiences and give you personal satisfaction.

The second is for excellent balance they develop. When you vary the position of the hands you are forced to balance less and less with the fingers and hands themselves and more and more with the body as a unified whole. This may not be clear to you right here but after you learn a few of the stunts which are described you will understand exactly what is meant.

He then goes on to list 14 handstand exercises with different hand and arm position and even more in the next chapter. For details on the exact ones check out Handbalancing Made Easy.

But that explains it well enough. Changing your arm position will work your balance to a higher degree. These variations are good to throw into the mix from time to time.

Good Luck and Good Hand Balancing,
Logan Christopher

P.S. Just to let you know there’s going to be changes to a few of the products next week.

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Handstand Positions, One Hand Balancing and more

By on April 5, 2008 in Handstands, One Hand, Planche

Dipping into the mailbag today to answer a few questions. If you’ve got something on your mind, send it my way. You can easily click here to ask away.Here’s a good one from Rose talking about the new 10 Handstand Mistakes report.

“I really love the guide, but some things, to me, are a little confusing. Like where exactly should you bend your back, and what will it feel like when you hit that perfect thing? Is that just something that should be experienced simply by experience? And also, on my hands, I have a hard time really keeping the balance depending on the position of my hands…if I’m leaning forward slightly, or if my fingers are even the slightest moved…Is there anything you can write in there about your experiences with hand positions? Other than that, I can’t really think of anything. Thanks! :D”

Where you bend your back will be dependent on you. Yes you have to experience it but you can learn a lot from looking at pictures and of course watching video.

Most of the bend is in the low back, and personally I feel like I get ‘locked in’ to the right position whenever I do a handstand. Keep at it and you’ll get the feel.

As for the hands, there is much you can do with them. Honestly any position you take with your hands is doable for the handstand, whether its on the fists, hands backwards, or just the thumbs.

But the standard position is hands flat on the ground with either the middle or index fingers pointing forward. Work on this position first and foremost until you have build up your balancing ability.

Once you have a decent handstand feel free to mix up your hand positions. Professor Orlick gives you 25 different hand positions and 10 different finger positions to work on it Hand Balancing Made Easy. Many of these I had never even though about trying.And here’s one from Aldy.

“I can do straddle planche well enough, but I cant do one handstand balance. what is d secret of one hand handstand and one hand planche. for notes, I am not learning gymnastic, because in my country gymnast is not popular. Thank You!!!”

The secret? Alright you asked so I am going to give it to you. The secret is…You have to work up to it progressively.

First off, congratulations on doing the planche. That is a move few can do. But there is a big difference in the planche and the one hand handstand. One requires more strength while the other requires much more balance. And you have to be progressive in your balance training.

Jim Bathurst and I talked at length about this in the interview for the Hand Balancing Mastery Course. Basically you are going to have to train a bit differently for each. Just like you would train the free standing handstand and handstand pushups against the wall differently you should do the same here.

And like the normal handstand, the way I teach it, you have to work on a series of lead up stunts that will give you the ability to balance on one hand. There are many helpful variations that lead up to the one hand handstand. Professor Orlick lays them all out in as easy to use manner in How to do the One Hand Handstand.

I am working on my own plan, exactly what is working for me, but details on that another time.

Since this is already running long I’ll have to save more for next time.

The True Art and Science of Hand Balancing
The True Art and Science of Hand Balancing on Amazon

Good Luck and Good Hand Balancing,
Logan Christopher

P.S. If you want to get all of Professor Orlick’s works plus the interview with Jim and more than click here.

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