Head positioning in handstands can vary greatly and still lead to a good handstand. But when leveraged consciously, it can become a useful tool to improve your balance, create aesthetic shapes, and build strength towards high level handbalancing skills.
Here's some simple ideas that can help bring more consistency to your handstands day-to-day. You can think of these as rituals, bringing you into the mindset and preparing the environment for an ideal session.
Hand positioning for handstands is largely a personal preference, but if you are working towards specific handbalancing skills, playing with variations in your stance and grip will be necessary, and maybe even reveal your optimal hand positioning.
There is nuance to improving your handstand hold time, mainly in two areas, specific upper body strength and balancing skills. And while key to longer handstand holds is better endurance and strength, building that strength doesn’t have to be boring.
The elbow has a lot of genetic variation which leads to different form compensations to find a good handstand hold. Combine this with the load-bearing demands from handbalancing, elbows can be prone to overtraining or injured. We have advice on how to address your arms’ anatomical quirks and tried-and-true injury prevention measures for your elbows.