Trouble with the ring muscle-up

[Philip Kristoffersen]

Hi people!

I hope you can help me out with this one cause it is really bothering me

I started back in May last year with working on the ring muscle-up. I teamed up with a really great coach and he pushed me quite far - ive honestly never been in a better shape. I almost got the Front-Lever down, practicing my Back-Lever, can do up to 17-18 pull-ups in a row, currently doing 5 sets of 8 dips with +15kg and yet ... no ring muscle-up. 

The transition is killing me and i can barely get it to work. It bothered me so much that after 6 months of practicing i just stopped all together. Im currently working out only in bars in which ive done Muscle-Ups a couple of times, but with a great amount of kip. I read a little on the forums and i also saw a couple of videos and honestly i just wanna go back at this beast. The only annoying thing is everyone is talking about muscle-ups as if kipping is okay. I dont get it - i dont want to do a kipping muscle-up. I want a clean strict one. 

Can you guys please throw me your top 3 tips/exercises at me so i can get back into it? I really want to nail this thing so i can move onto other fun things in the rings

[Alessandro Mainente]

Philip the simple reason it is that you do not have the necessary basic strength to develop the transition which it is highly connected to triceps strength. Actually, in the GB curriculum the rings One course has a very good work for developing the muscle up. A minimum of basic strength on triceps must be developed through foundations 1-2 pushing elements.

[Miles Skocik]

On 4/27/2017 at 1:23 PM, Alessandro Mainente said:

Philip the simple reason it is that you do not have the necessary basic strength to develop the transition which it is highly connected to triceps strength. Actually, in the GB curriculum the rings One course has a very good work for developing the muscle up. A minimum of basic strength on triceps must be developed through foundations 1-2 pushing elements.

 How much strength do you need to start training muscle up. I didn't really even know about a muscle up until I could already do a one arm pull up. I did not have perfect form at first and I know its common sense that a muscle up on bars is harder than a muscle up on rings so I do not understand why you said he is not strong enough. 

[Everett Carroll]

Hi Miles,

To begin training muscle-ups, we recommend completing the entire Foundation Series. That is the prerequisite for rings training, which includes muscle-up progressions. 

[Frank Santasiero]

Phillip, I believe there could be other reasons that you could not do a muscle up. I too was never able to do a muscle up and as recently as two years ago was able to do a one arm pullup and a double body weight bench press so you would think that is enough strength. Limited should flexibility might make the movement harder. Another possibility could be that we are strong in a particular range of motion but lack strength when our arms are in that particular position.

[Alessandro Mainente]

One arm pull up and double BW are nor specific or general for GST.

The inability to perform the muscle up it is due to specific strength in the transition.one arm pullup and benchpress have nothing to do with that.

[waler white]

3 hours ago, Alessandro Mainente said:

One arm pull up and double BW it nor specific or general for GST.

The inability to perform the muscle up it is due to specific strength in the transition.one arm pullup and benchpress have nothing to do with that.

Specific strength ? It is much more likely due to technique. According to building the gymnastic body, overcoming gravity and personal experience a muscle up on a bar is harder than a muscle up on rings.If someone can do a one arm pull up and bench double bw they are strong enough to do a muscle up on rings and are failling becuase of technique. Not becuase they lack strength in any position.  

Edited May 24, 2017 by waler white

[Bas Albinus]

15 hours ago, waler white said:

Specific strength ? It is much more likely due to technique. According to building the gymnastic body, overcoming gravity and personal experience a muscle up on a bar is harder than a muscle up on rings.If someone can do a one arm pull up and bench double bw they are strong enough to do a muscle up on rings and are failling becuase of technique. Not becuase they lack strength in any position.  

If you can't get in the right position(s) to begin with and be comfortable staying there it's not just due to a lack of technique. 

[Luke Searra]

Philip,

kipping has its use, which is efficiency. By efficiency I mean kipping for high reps to get through larger numbers faster. When kipping like this the athlete will usually kip through and skip one of two of the most important parts of the muscle up. The first part being the transition (and thus will not develop transitional strength in the muscle up), and even though many athletes can high rep kip muscle ups they still cannot strict muscle up. The converse is not true. You will be able to kip if you can strict muscle-up, just like you will be able to do kipping pull-ups if you can strict pull-up. The converse here is also not true.

The best order to create the prerequisite strength to do kipping movements more safely is absolutely to build the pre-requisite strength first, which is strict movements, first.

In the Gymnasticbodies courses we prefer not to kip.

[waler white]

3 hours ago, Bas Albinus said:

If you can't get in the right position(s) to begin with and be comfortable staying there it's not just due to a lack of technique. 

A muscle up is a combination of a pull up and a dip. If someone can do a one arm pull up and bench double body weight their shoulder and all muscles required are in evrey part much more than strong enough to do a muscle up on rings. If you have serious mucles inbalances and lack flexibility maybe it would not be due to technique but that would be incredible unlikely. However in that case you would not be able to do a muscle up on rings becuase of lack of mobility/and or muscular inbalances.

Edited May 24, 2017 by waler white

[Frank Santasiero]

Philip,

If it is worth anything I will try to supply you with some additional information about my experience with muscle ups. First off I think we all agree that you need sufficient strength to do pullups and dips which we both have. Since I take an adult gymnastics class, I have the luxury of training on rings in a harness which takes some of your body weight away. I have trained these with my bodyweight less about 40 pounds and at this level I can do a slow controlled muscle up and really feel the proper technique. I mentioned flexibility in my prior post because during the transition I feel an intense stretch in my shoulders. I should disclose that I am 52 years old and have the flexibility of a steel rod. Since January I have been doing all 3 stretch courses and I feel that improved flexibility in the shoulders makes the muscle up easier. The bridge series in conjunction with the foundation series as Everett suggests might be your quickest route to a muscle up.

[Johan Tideland]

I am definitely no expert at this subject but I feel like there seems to be some confusion on the thread regarding how a muscle up work, I will try to explain what I know about it.  

As far as I understand a muscle up requires 3 things (simplified), a pull up, a transition between pull & push and lastly a full ROM dip. Many people here seem to have the impression that a muscle up only requires a pull up and a dip. If something has 3 components you can not finish it if you only have 2 of them. 

The transition requires strength just as pushing and pulling does BUT the transition is nether one of them (or both) since its is a TRANSITION. Therefore no amount of pulling or pushing elements (regardless of how impressively strong they are) will prepare you for the transition since it is SPECIFIC and must therefore be specifically trained. 

Some people choose to call the strength component of the transition by "technique" and thus I feel like confusion appears quite often.

This has already been explained by the forum coaches but I just felt like it needed to be repeated after reading the development of the thread.

Johan

   

[waler white]

2 hours ago, Johan Tideland said:

I am definitely no expert at this subject but I feel like there seems to be some confusion on the thread regarding how a muscle up work, I will try to explain what I know about it.  

As far as I understand a muscle up requires 3 things (simplified), a pull up, a transition between pull & push and lastly a full ROM dip. Many people here seem to have the impression that a muscle up only requires a pull up and a dip. If something has 3 components you can not finish it if you only have 2 of them. 

The transition requires strength just as pushing and pulling does BUT the transition is nether one of them (or both) since its is a TRANSITION. Therefore no amount of pulling or pushing elements (regardless of how impressively strong they are) will prepare you for the transition since it is SPECIFIC and must therefore be specifically trained. 

Some people choose to call the strength component of the transition by "technique" and thus I feel like confusion appears quite often.

This has already been explained by the forum coaches but I just felt like it needed to be repeated after reading the development of the thread.

Johan

   

There are so many things wrong with this. 

 "No amount of pulling or pushing elements will prepare you for this" Than why is it that when many people learn the form without any prior training or how they have to move their body to do a ring muscle up they can a muscle up ? The idea that nothing can prepare you for the "transition" is ridiculous. Even if that were true you could skip the transition all together by merly pulling hard enough with proper form. and How can you possible claim that no pushing or pulling will prepare you for a muscle up ? A muscle up is basic skill that is not even intermediate level. 

Edited May 24, 2017 by waler white

[Alessandro Mainente]

17 hours ago, Johan Tideland said:

I am definitely no expert at this subject but I feel like there seems to be some confusion on the thread regarding how a muscle up work, I will try to explain what I know about it.  

As far as I understand a muscle up requires 3 things (simplified), a pull up, a transition between pull & push and lastly a full ROM dip. Many people here seem to have the impression that a muscle up only requires a pull up and a dip. If something has 3 components you can not finish it if you only have 2 of them. 

The transition requires strength just as pushing and pulling does BUT the transition is nether one of them (or both) since its is a TRANSITION. Therefore no amount of pulling or pushing elements (regardless of how impressively strong they are) will prepare you for the transition since it is SPECIFIC and must therefore be specifically trained. 

Some people choose to call the strength component of the transition by "technique" and thus I feel like confusion appears quite often.

This has already been explained by the forum coaches but I just felt like it needed to be repeated after reading the development of the thread.

Johan

   

well said.

[Coach Sommer]

On 5/24/2017 at 3:36 PM, waler white said:

There are so many things wrong with this. 

 "No amount of pulling or pushing elements will prepare you for this" Than why is it that when many people learn the form without any prior training or how they have to move their body to do a ring muscle up they can a muscle up ? The idea that nothing can prepare you 

Hi Waler,

You are 100% wrong.  In fact you could not be more wrong if you had tried.   Johan however is spot on.

Dip and pullup strength are only a part of the equation and the transition does indeed require specific strength and mobility work.  

Yours in Fitness,

Coach Sommer

[GoldenEagle]

Other than what has already been stated. 

In addition to the required upper body strength and assuming you have ample wrist and shoulder mobility plus ample forearm strength to maintain a proper false grip. The rings muscle up transition begins with internally rotating your lower arms while your upper arm remains externally rotated. 

_{(Footnote: The posted link goes to a description of the proper false grip found in a previous publication of Coach Sommer's.)}