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