Day 4

The magic pill for perfecting your handstands

The fitness industry is full of “magic pills” – secret protocols, the greatest exercises you’ve never tried, hacks they don’t want you to know about. These kitschy marketing tactics promise to fix all your problems and get you to finally achieve your goals when everyone and everything else has failed you. But the grounded reality of these “magic pills” is they are merely existing cues, exercise variations, or programming styles repackaged with trendy terms or presented with conviction by a lone genius fitness guru.  And just like the more grounded instruction in fitness, these things will work for some people, some of the time. These things are wonderful when they help people succeed, but are not magical panaceas that can be given to everyone.

The same is true in the world of handbalancing. These magic pills usually show up with arbitrary strength benchmarks like the 2 minute hollow hold, technical cues, or novel drills. Heck, even we have our own go-to drills (wall tuck slides anyone? #tucklife) that we believe most people could benefit from training.

But such magic pills come about, even from coaches with the best of intentions, through the logical fallacy of survivorship bias. Say a coach gives has 10 people train under their method, 5 find it helpful and stick with it for years, achieving notable success.  But what about the other 5 who didn’t find it helpful? They’re likely drop off in six, twelve weeks ending up merely as a churn number in a spreadsheet. Because of the success of the former, the coach might come to believe the method is the handstand magic pill, “This is it. It has to be done this way.”  Why? Because everyone who survived the coaching has got results this way. But looking at the numbers, a pill that only works 50% of the time suddenly seems a lot less magical doesn’t it?

However, there is one true magic pill: consistency.  It’s not sexy, you have to take it regularly for years, and some will see the benefits of it more quickly than others. You of course might find certain exercises from Instagram, cues from a coach, or particular conditioning routines help fast-track your progress and break through training plateaus – but it’s only by training these things frequently and repeatedly that you make lasting progress.  And when you look back and see all you’ve achieved from being consistent with your practice, that’s what feels truly magical.

Handstand Factory does not offer magic pills (although we do have some fun exercises to try on Instagram). Rather we like to think of our offerings as guides to keep you on track towards your goals. Our Push online program serve as a roadmap to your first freestanding handstand.

With all that said, being 4 days into handstand training motivation could be waning. So without further ado let’s start the training session:

This session focuses on the form of the straight handstand.

The straight body holds help with tension in legs(pointed toes, engaged quads and glutes) and gives you a reference for how to keep the line through the body in handstand. The headstand is a good way to get the feeling of where your legs and body should be. The balance is easier in headstand than handstand and you do not have the limiting factor of the shoulders. If you can be straight in a headstand and not in handstand, the issue is in all likelihood in the shoulders.

Lastly, try to replicate the straightness of the body in the handstand focusing on the form with shorter hold times.

  • A: Straight Body Holds
    • 3 sets
    • 15-45 second holds
    • 90 seconds rest between sets
  • C: Headstand
    • 3-5 sets
    • 5-10 second holds
    • 60-90 seconds rest between sets
  • B: Chest-to-Wall Handstand or Incline Body Line Drill
    • If you are comfortable being inverted choose the chest-to-wall handstand, if not then do the incline body line drill at a challenging, but secure angle.
    • 3-8 sets
    • 10-15 second holds
    • Rest as needed between holds
Straight Body Holds

Key Details:

  • Straight body is not the same as dish or hollow body.
  • Work the segments of the body separately to get the them nice, then combine them.
  • Make sure the body looks like your handstand line and not a boat shape.

Description:
To note on the straight body holds is that, while they replicate the handstand line, they provide a force to the body that is at 90 degrees to the forces experienced in the handstand. So while we need to train this position and have good familiarity with it, it is not the be-all and end-all of line development.

We teach this movement in various stages, aiming at getting the sections really nice before combining them. You can work on one section of the body in one workout or combine them as you see fit.

Initially, this position will require some body tension to hold, that may initially be experienced as a lot of strain. The goal is to develop a feeling of being “held” in place but with minimal effort. We like to think of it like a tuned guitar string: it is tight but it has the potential to react to a force applied to it. As opposed to I have made my body into stone.

Headstand

Key Details:

  •  If you’re a complete beginner, use some cushioning for your head.
  • Make sure stage one is mastered before moving to the next stage.

Description:
The headstand is a classic position, crossing multiple genres, art forms and cultures. We teach the headstand in three stages. Stage one is the knees-on-elbows headstand, stage two is the tuck headstand and stage three is the straight body position. For the three stages, refer to the video.

You want to feel comfortable and in control at each stage of this movement before progressing to the next stage.

To set up, we recommend making the triangle as demonstrated in the video and placing your head and arms as indicated. You don’t want any sudden movements at any stage of the progression.

In all three stages of the headstand, you want to maintain about 30 percent of uour weight in your hands. If at any time you don’t feel any pressure in your hands, return to the initial position, or you run the risk of falling over.

Chest-to-Wall Handstand

Key Details:

  • Begin with a little bit of distance from the wall.
  • Look at the floor.
  • Push high through shoulders and try to stack shoulder over the middle of the hand to the degree you can. Do not push chest towards wall and open t-spine.
  • Keep toes pointed, legs locked and glutes tense to practice the pelvic tilt.

Description:
The chest-to-wall hold is the go-to exercise for developing capacity, form and a feeling for the handstand. This exercise does not teach you much about balance, but it is essential for developing correct body placement, building specific strength and acclimatising you further to the feeling of being upside down.

Make a checklist when you go up into the handstand, where you make sure your toes are pointed, legs and glutes are squeezed tight, shoulders pushed up and that you are looking at the floor. The toes should be the only thing touching the wall. You want to make sure your shoulders are placed over your hands so you are not opening them too much and pushing your chest out towards the wall.

Incline Body Line Drill

Key Details:

  • Take your time to set up nicely here, elbows locked as best as you can.
  • Push shoulders high and inline with the torso as best you can.
  • Make sure to not sag in the mid section.

Description:
This drill is a great introduction for new handstand trainees.

Its main feature is that it gets you on your hands in a manner that most people can achieve. It is incredibly safe in that, if you need to exit quickly, you can just step off the wall. It also uses less wrist extension than holds that are closer to the wall. So if you need to work on your wrist flexibility, this will start getting you inverted while your wrist development catches up.

One of the main things to work on here is finding all the alignment cues from the straight body hold in this position. It is not a resting position where you are wedged into the wall but it is alive, meaning that the shoulders are working, and you are pushing through the arms. The body is, in other words, tight and not sagging.

Some things you can play with is deliberately sagging then finding the line again so you begin to build up a sensation library of what things might feel like when you lose the line and how you might be able to restack your position while inverted.