Tag Archives | Palms

Planche and Hand Position

By on July 20, 2009 in Flexibility & Contortion, Hand-to-Hand, Planche

A few comments were raised about the hand position in Rafael Guerrero’s planche in a previous post.

Why was he up on the fingertips? Is this necessary to do a planche in good form?

Unless you have hyper-flexible wrists you won’t be able to do a planche with the fingers pointing forwards and flat on the ground. Most people turn their wrists out to the sides to alleviate this sort of strain or come up on the fingers.

But there are other ways to do a planche with the hands not taking as much stress as these other pictures by Rafael show. You can do it on some sort of parallel bars.

Planche on Bars
Or completely on the fingertips.

Top Planche on Fingertips
Even in a hand-to-hand balance.

Top Planche in High Hand to Hand Balance
But if you do have the wrist flexibility you can do it on flat ground with the palms flat on the ground and facing forward. In the True Art and Science of Hand Balancing the chapter on planches showcases W.H. Mering doing just that.

And if you’re seeking to build incredible strength like these planches show I have an important announcement later this week. Stay tuned!

Good Luck and Good Hand Balancing,
Logan Christopher

A few comments were raised about the hand position in Rafael Guerrero’s planche in a previous post. (If you missed that you can find it at https://lostartofhandbalancing.com/blog/the-true-planche/.)

Why was he up on the fingertips? Is this necessary to do a planche in good form?

Unless you have hyper-flexible wrists you won’t be able to do a planche with the fingers pointing forwards and flat on the ground. Most people turn their wrists out to the sides to alleviate this sort of strain or come up on the fingers.

But there are other ways to do a planche with the hands not taking as much stress as these other pictures by Rafael show. You can do it on some sort of parallel bars.

Or completely on the fingertips.

Even in a hand-to-hand balance.

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

But if you do have the wrist flexibility you can do it on flat ground with the palms flat on the ground and facing forward. In the True Art and Science of Hand Balancing the chapter on planches showcases W.H. Mering doing just that. Check out the book for more.

If you’re seeking to build incredible strength like these planches show I have an important announcement later this week. Stay tuned!

Good Luck and Good Hand Balancing,
Logan Christopher

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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.

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.

Hand Balancing Made EasyHandBalancingMadeEasy_on_Amazon

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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Yoga Headstands

By on March 11, 2008 in Uncategorized

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.

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.

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

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

Good Luck and Good Hand Balancing,
Logan Christopher

Comments { 1 }

Handstands and Hand/Grip Positions

By 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.

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Trampoline Handbook on Amazon

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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Handstand Lead-up Stunts (The Two Arm Elbow Planche)

By on November 17, 2007 in Handstands, Planche

In Handbalancing Made Easy, Professor E.M. Orlick explains that there are a number of stunts which will  teach you many of the aspects that are needed for a good handstand. Two of these stunts are covered in the downloadable guide. These are the headstand and frogstand. Today I want to talk about one more of the 21 covered in the course.

In his own words these are the benefits on mastering all of these stunts.

The following lead-up stunts constitute stepping stones to perfection. They serve a multiple purpose and are of inestimable value. Taken alone each is a stunt in itself and worth learning even if you had no interest in handbalancing. All of them have something in common to the handstand and thus, pave the way for good handbalancing.

Each accustoms you to the upside-down position of the handstand, each helps to develop the strength, balance and muscular coordination necessary to handbalancing. Many form the very basis of the advanced stunts which will be dealt with later.

Anyone who sincerely desires to become an expert at the art of handbalancing should master each and everyone of these lead-up stunts. Even if you can hold a fairly good handstand now you should practice these stunts, for no matter how good you may be there is always room for improvement.

The Two Arm Elbow Planche.

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

Two Arm Elbow Planche

In addition to being an excellent lead-up trick the two arm elbow planche plays an important part in advanced handbalancing. Many difficult stunts can be built around it.

To perform the trick kneel on the floor, bring both elbows together and place them in your stomach and turn the palms of the hands facing upwards. Now lean forwards slowly and place the hands flat on the floor with your fingers pointing backwards. Arch your back slowly until your toes leave the floor and you will be doing the two arm elbow planche.

You will find the balance a little difficult at first but just keep on practicing. The stunt can also be performed on the edge of a table or on the end of any ordinary bed.

I have also heard this move called many other things, from an elbow lever to a half-arm planche. The obvious next step, and much more advanced, is to switch to doing this move on a single arm.

Why is this stunt helpful? It trains the balancing aspect on your hands from a low center of gravity. You also have to keep a decent arch and your body tight or else you will touch the ground with more than your hands.

Looking back I realize just how helpful these lead-up stunts are. I was going after a handstand before I could easily hold a headstand. Logically, you should go after the easier stunts first before tackling the more difficult.

The great thing about this course is just about every stunt and move shown leads in to the next one. If you want to get the One Hand Handstand then you have eight different lead-up stunts before you even attempt it.

On that note don’t forget you can get early access to ordering the Hand Balancing Mastery Course by signing up for the VIP List at Hand Balancing VIP List

And you can win yourself a free copy by sending in your success story. Don’t forget to do it soon because the deadline for entries is midnight on Monday, November 19th.

Have fun with this one and until next time…

Good Luck and Good Hand Balancing,
Logan Christopher

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