Having enough wrist strength is a crucial part of an injury-free handstand training. Furthermore, not everyone has enough flexibility to keep their hand back 90 degrees for an extended period of time.
In this video by Chris Silcox you can learn several techniques to improve your wrist strength, flexibility and general upper body strength needed for various hand-balancing moves.
If you’re looking to truly make your entire body indestructible, check out this guide to improve mobility, flexibility and strength.
Here’s an awesome video compilation of various hand balancing moves from an ex-gymnast who just recently changed the focus of his training to hand balancing. Lots of presses, one arm hand balancing, handstands…
Weather you’re a fan of hand balancing, tumbling, breakdancing or gymnastics in general, I promise you’ll enjoy this video by Daniel Tsinis.
Click here to start your hand balancing training today.
If you’re just starting out your hand balancing journey, here is a quite good exercise for developing strength you’ll need to perform the handstand press. There are actually two exercises in the video by Lui Sarabia, but he combined it into one. Using an exercises ball in this way will greatly improve your core and shoulder strength, as it works in a similar manner to an ab wheel.
Lui recommends performing three to four sets of ten reps once you get used to the exercise. The video is filmed in different angles so you can really see what’s going on from all sides!
This compilation contains video footage of some of the best new and old videos on flexibility, one hand handstands, handstand pushups variations and tons of presses.
Also, get ready for walking and jumping on hands, tiger bends, two fingers 90 degree pushup, many handstand variations…And other stuff The Lost Art of Hand Balancing is all about! Enjoy.
Breakdancers, especially professional one have to be in an absolutely stunning form to be able to perform flawlessly and stay injury-free. For this they rely on incredible strength, speed, precision and endurance.
We already had one video from Simon “Simonster” Ata from Australia, but this one includes a couple of break-dance moves as well. Get ready for planche pushups (and what a great form too!), backflips, handstand presses and much more.
Little John Seidel is one of the best old-school hand balancers. In the video below you can see 24 year-old John jumping on one hand, performing various handstand presses, balancing on a stick and much more, before ending the show with an amazing one hand spin at the Cirque d’Hiver in Paris. They certainly don’t make them like that anymore.
John is truly an incredible athlete who is still doing handstands today at the age of 76! Don’t believe me? Check out the picture below from his Facebook page.
Bent arm handstand presses, of the various sorts we’ll cover below, are an awesome show of strength and skill.
The hard part about that is that they require lots of strength and lots of skill to do. That’s probably part of the allure, but it is also what makes them unattainable for most, unless they spend the dedicated practice required.
The difficult part of the skill equation is that you must balance the whole time while doing these. They’re a far cry from doing handstand pushups against the wall. I would recommend to anyone that really wants to get great at these, to spend your time building a solid free handstand first. I would say until you can hold a handstand consistently for at least 20 seconds that you should build your strength another way, as you focus on that skill. (On that note, my Secrets of the Handstand System will help you get there.)
The difficult part of the strength equation is that they have you handle your entire bodyweight with your upper body strength. If you’re a hundred pound gymnast this may not be a big problem. For the rest of us it is.
I remember working on the frogstand press early in my hand balancing career. Not only was the balance hard but each rep was like a max effort press. This makes it hard to work on the “skill” of the movement when it takes everything you’ve got to do it. And it limits the total reps you can do for practice, whether you make them or not.
All bodyweight exercises need to be progressive. That’s one of the hard parts about these. There is no clear progression. You can’t just unload your bodyweight unfortunately. So what I’ve set out to do in this article is give you ten progressively harder presses to work with.
Note: These are all BENT ARM presses. Straight arm presses are an entirely different animal, requiring more flexibility as well as a different kind of strength to do.
We start with the easiest one. Of course to do this you need to have a minimum of strength and balance. We talked about the balance part. As for strength I would recommend being able to do at least 5 handstand pushups against the wall before starting here.
The order of this list is open for some debate. Due to leverages and other factors some people may find that certain skills are easier than others. But I’ve worked with this awhile to find that it works well for me and others I‘ve trained.
1. Frogstand Press
The frogstand is known by a few different names like the crow in yoga. it’s a basic hand balancing skill that can help you on working towards the handstand. So on that note, its great that its also, the starting place for the bent arm presses. From a frogstand, with the knees on the outsides/backs of the elbows, tip forward more and press up into the handstand.
2. Straddle Press
Usually the straddle press is done with the arms locked out, but that doesn’t mean it can’t also be used in a bent arm variation. Spread your legs fairly wide with the hands placed on the ground. Bend the elbows, taking your full weight onto the hands. Bring the legs around and up as you push up into a handstand.
3. Headstand Pushup
Start in a tripod headstand position with your legs straight overhead. From here press up with the hands until you come to a handstand. To make the press a little easier put the hands a little wider than shoulder width.
The starting position for this press.
4. Pike Press
Similar to the straddle press, the only difference in this movement is that you’re legs are kept straight and together. This decreases your leverage, forcing you to counterbalance out further and makes it harder to do.
Just after the start when the legs raise off the ground.
5. Handstand Pushup
Kick up into a handstand with the hands shoulder width apart. Lower down touching your nose to the ground and press back up. This can be done with a straight or a curved back, they just change the angle of the press slightly.
6. Tuck Press
Start sitting on your knees (seiza position) on the ground. Press your arms into the ground lifting your body off. Tilt forward, bending the arms then press all the way up to a handstand. This move forces you into a lower starting place and is thus harder to do.
The starting position of the tuck pressup.
7. Belly Roll Pressup
There is some skill involved in this movement. You need to learn how to use your momentum and make a good transition as you do it. This is best to do on a padded surface. Start on your knees with the hips straight. Roll forward, arching the back. Your hands will come touch the ground above your hips. Use the momentum to help you press up into the handstand.
One of the steps in the belly roll to handstand.
8. Tiger Bend
Start in a forearm stand, that is balanced across the length of your forearms and hands. This requires a curved back position. Shift your weight forward so that you can come onto the hands in the bottom of a freestanding handstand pushup position. Press up. This requires a more narrow stance of the hands and thus requires significantly more strength.
9. Elbow Lever Press
Start in an elbow lever position with the body held horizontal over the ground your weight resting fully on the elbows. Raise the legs up as you start to press with the hands. The hands will need to rotate on the ground to move towards a regular position as you press up.
From here press up to a handstand, rotating your hands along the way.
10. Prone Press
Start laying on the ground stomach down. Place your hands by your hips. Lift your whole body and press up to a handstand in much the same way as the lever press. Since you’re starting lower and must support your entire weight, without the elbow support, this one is quite a bit tougher.
This list was made to exist without any tools, like stacked objects or handles. With those added in, you could build out the list a lot further. Also there can be more intermediate steps like playing with hand width more to make each move more or less difficult.
Also note I have not yet personally achieved steps 9 and 10. As I work more towards these I may find some better intermediary steps.
This video features 13 different ways to get up into a handstand.
Specifically, as a yoga practice these are known as Uttanasana, Bakasana, Titthibasana, Adho Mukha Svanasana, Konasana, Navasana, Kukkutasanana, Padmasana, Supta Kurmasana, and Urdhva Prasarita Eka Padasana.
And if you don’t speak ancient languages you’ll see a
This post is about moving from a handstand to crow position. The crow is the common name used in yoga, for what I generally refer to as the frogstand. It is also called a bakasana.
You’ll notice here the strap around her arms. This is a prop used to help keep the arms in the proper alignment. I’ve never tried it out myself, but it looks like it could be helpful in preventing the arms from flaring out.
Moving from the handstand to crow is easier then going the opposite way, the crow to handstand as is shown in the following video. Of course this can then be done with lowering back down in the same manner.
The handstand to crow and vice versa can be done with straighter arms or arms with more bend.
Here is a new handstand exercise that I’ve been playing with lately – the tuck handstand.
What is this move? First you get up into a handstand then you get into a tuck position while keeping the arms straight.
This can be done from a curved handstand or a flat one. You’ll notice there’s quite a bit of arch in the lower back as I do it in the video here. An even more advanced version would be to round the back and hold the position. By keeping your body more vertical then horizontal it is quite a different position then the tuck planche.
What this move requires is the shift your weight forward, planching the shoulders slightly. I found that by bending the legs at the knees first and then bending at the hips it was easier to get into this movement.
Here is a picture of the tuck handstand. If your thighs only go to parallel with the floor as they are here its pretty easy to hold. Lowering them even more makes it tougher. And going into the round back position is the hardest.
Photo by Natalie Anfield - Kamloops Photography
My thoughts are that this move would help with straight arm pressing movements.
Have you done the tuck handstand before? Any other similar handstand exercises you like to do?
