Tag Archives | Logan

Acrobatic Conditioning Report is coming…

I’m hard at work finishing up a Special Report I’ll be releasing next week. I was almost done but then your questions from the survey came in and I realized there was a lot more ground to cover.

So if you want your questions answered head on over to the survey.

Trampoline Handbook
Trampoline Handbook on Amazon

It’s real short. And I know it asks for two questions but if you only got one that’s good enough.

This report is on what I call Acrobatic Conditioning. Its going to cover ways to train to improve your tumbling skills even if you’ve never worked on them before. How you can get started and where to train.

I’m about to go write more but I just want to take the time to answer at least one question here.

“Which skills should I attempt to learn first? and Should one master the handstand before attempting skills like cartwheel, round-off, and handsprings?”

Hand Balancing and Tumbling skills are related but definitely separate skill groups. You don’t really need to be good in one to do the other. That being said many tumbling moves move through the handstand position.

It can help to work both hand balancing and tumbling at the same time though you certainly don‘t need to be a master the handstand first.

As for which skills to work on that is easy. Start with what you can do and move on from there. If this is just basic rolls than start with that. Any moves where some part of you stays in contact with the ground would be next on the chain like cartwheels, roundoffs, and handsprings.

Of course the aerial moves like flips take a bit more work and are something you have to be careful with. More on that later.

But the idea is like with any other training. You work tumbling progressively.

Alright back to the report. Oh, and there’ll be new videos soon too.

Good Luck and Good Tumbling,
Logan Christopher

P.S. Seriously hit up the survey if you haven’t already.

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Foundational Rolling Skills

How we got on the subject I can’t tell you at this point. I was at a birthday party and one of my friends told me they couldn’t do a somersault. Really!?! Maybe I was naïve but I thought EVERYONE could do this basic move.

But the truth is not everyone can. I’m sure you have no problem with this skill but the reason I am teaching it here in this video is to set up the idea of using and actually working on your tumbling skills. Everyone should be able to do the somersault. Not everyone necessarily has to do handsprings or front flips.

[youtube:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pSUUFXhf5XU] 

Trampoline Handbook
Trampoline Handbook on Amazon

But if you want to it begs the question; how to you move up to the more difficult skills?

The easiest method is by taking the basics and adding twists to them. This will build your control and make you a better tumbler.

This is just the tip of the iceberg. But it should give you something to play with and start sparking your own creativity.

More on this subject later but if you haven’t already, be sure to take this really small survey. Only three questions total. Won’t take much time but it’ll really help me out. Take the Survey here. Thanks!

Good Luck and Good Tumbling,
Logan Christopher

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Do you know your Hand Balancing Terms?

A few things for you today.

First up is another article. I had an idea for this a little while back. It’s a glossary of all kinds of hand balancing terms as well as alternative names for many moves.

You can check it out here: Hand Balancing Glossary.

Instead of finishing it up myself, why don’t you help me out? There’s quite a few terms up there but it’s by no means complete. At the bottom you can submit your ideas on terms to add.

So why don’t you help out and make the glossary full?

Secondly, in my last message I encouraged you to comment on the blog.

I was happy to see many people sign up but there was only one comment.

You can read what Ari thought here:

https://lostartofhandbalancing.com/blog/comment-on-the-hand-balancing-blog/

Thanks Ari. If there was any difficulty in the process let me know and I’ll look into making it easier.

But don’t worry if you didn’t post your thoughts, I’ll be sharing plenty of great stuff in the future that you’ll want to comment on.

Here’s a question to think about?

Are you spending more time upside down these days than you were last year or less? If you want to get good it should be the former.

Good Luck and Good Hand Balancing,
Logan Christopher

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

P.S. The Secrets of the Handstand Quickstart Guide should be hitting your mailbox soon if it hasn’t already for those of you who ordered. I’m anxious to here your initial impressions so send your thoughts my way. Just click reply and let me know what you think.

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What is the Perfect Handstand?

There are two new articles up. But first a question from Larry in Hawaii.

“I am a little confused on the perfect handstand? which from what Ive read leads up to the one-handed handstand…Is it maintaining a perfectly straight body shown on page 92 or is it what is pictured on page 78 of “the true art and science of hand balancing” in fig.4 showing correct body position?? My goal is to balance on one hand. I have drawn out the diagram pictured on 16 of ‘how to do a one handed handstand’…hands seem kinda close…but above all what kind of body position am I striving for??”

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

Are you confused too? The first article answers this question in detail. If you‘ve ever thought you had to have a straight bodied handstand to do a one hand handstand the answer might surprise you.

Either way thought there are a few drills revisited that can help you alter your position.

Check it out: The Perfect Handstand

The second article is actually a small download. This one is for beginners.

The Ten Biggest Mistakes People Make When Learning the Handstand

And a small housekeeping note. The first Secrets of the Handstand Quickstart Guide packages will be mailed out tomorrow. If you want yours to go out with them order today.

Good Luck and Good Hand Balancing,
Logan Christopher

P.S. If you’re having any trouble with the download just go to Hand Balancing Articles page and you’ll see it there.

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How to Kick-up into a Handstand

The kick-up is one of the most important skills you have to learn if you want to do a handstand, next to balancing with your hands and keeping your body tight.The question is, how consistent is your kick-up?I didn’t figure this out right away when I started, but if you can kick up the exact same each time then getting into and holding a handstand is easy.

If your kick-up is all over the place, then there’s no wonder why you have a hard time getting into a hand balance.

Of course, there are several different ways to kick-up. I cover all the basic ways for the beginner and even more advanced variation in the April issue of the newsletter.

My favorite regular kick-up I learned from Bob Jones in The True Art and Science of Hand Balancing. That one is shown here.

Tumbling Illustrated
Tumbling Illustrated on Amazon

[youtube:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=usTC0oXqXtI]

There are a bunch of fine details that make a kick-up work. I am not gonna lie and say that I never miss a single one, but after concentrating on this for some time I no longer hit only one handstand out of ten like I use to.

If you’re having trouble with yours, start practicing. Better yet get the newsletter and learn all about how to get it done, the best method of practicing, and how far you can take it.

I wish it was ready to go right now, but I’m just putting the finishing touches and final edits on it before it the newsletter and DVD’s go to press.

In the mean time, I hope you enjoy these video clips.

Good Luck and Good Hand Balancing,
Logan Christopher

P.S. You can learn more about Bob Jones’ 4-step method of kicking-up into a handstand here.

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Break-thru your Plateau

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.

Hand Balancing Made EasyHandBalancingMadeEasy_on_Amazon

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

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Frog Stand

The frog stand makes it easier to learn the handstand by training your hand balancing skills in an easier manner.

[youtube:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vp86vFUlV84]

They call it hand balancing for a reason after all. The frogstand lowers your center of gravity and makes this learning the skills of manipulating your balance with your hands easier.

If you can’t hold the frog stand for at least a minute you have no reason to go after a free standing handstand. That’s my stance and I’m sticking to it.

But it’s not the only move. In fact there’s four. Master these and the handstand becomes much easier to learn.

You want to know what the four are?

Okay, it’s the frogstand, headstand, forearm stand, and handstand against the wall. But make sure you do them right.

Tumbling Illustrated
Tumbling Illustrated on Amazon

The Secrets of the Handstand Quick Start DVD covers all four lead-up stunts and much more.

Good Luck and Good Hand Balancing,
Logan Christopher

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Yoga Headstands

Yoga headstands, known as Sirshasana, are different than the standard gymnastic headstand. Instead of resting your palms flat on the ground you interlock your fingers and place them behind your head.

[youtube:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5rh-lIyJgqk]

The headstand is a great stunt. Very much underrated. Here is a more difficult variation of the headstand. In fact this would be an excellent exercise to move you forward to holding headstand with no hands at all.

I would recommend you start off this move against a wall as your base of support is quite a bit smaller than the regular headstand.

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

Kicking up can be tricky too. Instead of kicking up you may want to raise your legs from the floor at the same time. Good ab move too.

This is just one clip from the Handstand Quick-start Guide. I’ll be putting more video up as development continues.

As this is the first informative video, please let me know what you think.

Good Luck and Good Hand Balancing,
Logan Christopher

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Doug Hepburn Handstand

This is one of my favorite pictures of all time with Doug Hepburn balancing a 205 lb. barbell plus a 145 lb. man doing a handstand on top.. Just recently I came across the same picture from another view. A perfect blend of strength and balancing.

Doug Hepburn Handstand Balance

Not any strong person could hold this. Besides the 350 lbs. of weight it is really the responsibility of the under-stander to keep the person in the handstand balanced.

If you haven’t heard of Doug Hepburn you may want to check him out. Suffice to say he was an all-around strongman, setting many weightlifting records in his time, and this was starting crippled at a young age.

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

What most people don’t know is that he was also a fine hand balancer.

Early in his career he was capable of twelve reps in the handstand press and five reps in the tiger-bend.

That’s some strength there.

Seeing and hearing about people like Doug Hepburn and Bert Assirati all doing hand balancing you can’t possibly think that hand balancing is only for the small framed.

Large size is no excuse.

Good Luck and Good Hand Balancing,
Logan Christopher

P.S. Can’t say that being small doesn’t help though. Professor Paulinetti weighed around 110 lbs which made the One Arm Planche possible. To duplicate some of his feats check out The True Art and Science of Hand Balancing.

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Photo Montage with Paulinetti, Jones and more

[youtube:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wosNb3MuO7w]

I threw this video together this morning. A little bit of a test run for my editing software, which I am still in the process of learning.

It shows some of my favorite shots from The True Art and Science of Hand Balancing as a photo montage. Kind of a commercial.

Walking and Jumping On Your HandsWalking and Jumping On Your Hands on Amazon

If you don’t own the book you’ll definitely want to see these pictures. I said it once and I’ll say it again, “The pictures in this book alone are worth the price.”

Not to worry as there will be more informative clips coming soon.

Feel free to post your comments directly on youtube, give it a rating, or whatever. Here’s the page for that – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wosNb3MuO7w

Good Luck and Good Hand Balancing,
Logan Christopher

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