Building a Hand-Balancing Routine?

[Dillon Kolacz]

Hello,

 

I'm currently living in China for the semester, and I don't have a gymnastics gym to go to. Naturally, I turned to my favorite hobby - hand balancing - to keep me sane. I'd like to receive some input on how to construct hand-balancing workout/training session. Ideally my goals are to develop the following...

 

Handstand - lower to planche

Press from Planche to Handstand

Stalder Press to Handstand 

V Press to Handstand

Good amount of Free-standing handstand pushups

Bent Arm-Straight body press to handstand

One-Armed Handstand

     As well as derivatives!

 

I have seen Yuri's workshop, and I love what I see - I just don't know how to put it all into a routine! Yuri mentioned he trains for around 2 hours a day handbalancing. As someone who is new to this discipline, if I were given 2 hours to train handstandbalancing I'd be finished in 30 minutes! 

 

Just my background... Have been doing handbalancing in conjunction with gymnastics training at my University for two years. I'll be uploading a video of me demonstrating what I'm already capable of and will start tracking my progress from here on out. For the sake of input - I should mention I have what I think to be the prerequisites for training these skills. 

 

Can already do 2-3 consistent Handstand pushups/press to handstand/V/working on planche still/working on flexibility every day/1min+ freestanding handstand

 

[Dillon Kolacz]

My current routine is as follows,

 

3x2 Press to Handstand 2s Hold at top

3x30s Straight Body Handstand

3x30s Straddle Handstand

2 Minutes of Straddle weight shifting

One-Arm attempts

 

Have been doing this as my warmup every day for a month. Just want to dedicate for time for my goals! Thanks

 

After further research in this part of the forum... it seems there is some great one-armed balancing information I'd love to implement into my routine. Does anyone still have any recommendations for training the other skills I mentioned? 

 

Edit: 

 

One-Armed Hanstand

3x2 Weight Shifting... I tried and found going to 5 fingers was still pretty rough

 

Stalder Press

Stalder Hold

3x6s

 

Planche and Handstand

Negative/Press? Lowering until can’t anymore without falling and return to the top

3x2

Negatives - hard on wrists

3x1

 

Press to Handstand

5x2 Hold at top 2s

Consecutive Presses – just touching ground with feet

3x1 hold at top for 2s

 

Free-standing Handstand Pushups

3x1

 

Tuck press to handstand

3x1

 

So far this is what I've come up with following some mastery guidelines. Wouldn't mind getting another opinion on it! thanks! 

 

Also... As far as Stalder Press and V press to handstand are concerned, I tend to have a lot of trouble getting my feet past my hands. Does anyone know any drills for this?

[FREDERIC DUPONT]

You have more beer than water on your shelves

Where are you in China?

 

Have you looked at the H1 & F1 courses? These are ideal in your situation.

[Dillon Kolacz]

That's kind of embarassing - I was hoping no one would notice that. They're just bottles I swear! Honestly you can't beat 50cent beers. I'm in Beijing... not sure where Ningbo is. H1? I thought H1 was geared toward just developing a handstand? Not a one-armed or any other skill beyond basic?

 

I've finished F1 in 4/6 of the sections, and I'm going to be buying F2 this week. 

[Christian Sørlie]

  On 9/23/2013 at 2:38 PM, Kolacz said:

H1? I thought H1 was geared toward just developing a handstand? Not a one-armed or any other skill beyond basic?

Geared towards developing a SOLID handstand. I also have a very good HS, freestanding up to a minute, straddles, tucks, playing with weight shifts and flirting with some OAHS training and I tell you the mobility exercises and body line drills in H1 is are worth their weight in gold. If you can afford it, get it.

[yuri marmerstein]

At this point because you have not developed the necessary volume to really do one arm training I would split up skill and strength work. 

 

Skill sessions would be focused on improving your line, cleaning up your balance, head, leg and shoulder movements, weight shifts, supported one arm balance, etc. 

End a skill session with either some conditioning or endurance work.  The goal is to build up to between a 1:1 and 1:2 work to rest ratio.  Limit the more advanced skill work on days you are more fatigued and put in more endurance and volume training. 

 

Strength sessions work your presses and HSPU, planche pushups, hollowback variations, etc.  You can end strength sessions with endurance, HS wall runs, etc. 

 

Eventually you will build up the work capacity to be able to combine the two into one session. 

[FREDERIC DUPONT]

Ningbo is 100 miles (160Km) south of Shanghai, across the bay.

[Timothy Aiken]

Do you do any crocodile training? I would really recommend you work on elbow levers and crocodiles (one arm elbow levers) as they aren't very technically challenging and are hella fun. In addition to this, I have noticed tremendous gains in lower back strength with my current routine of 3x5 crocodile switches with 5 second holds on each arm. 

Just a thought, cheers mate

[Dillon Kolacz]

Can you show me an example of crocodile training? I don't believe I've ever heard of them!