OAHS and parallettes

Unfortunately, I recently developed a ganglion cyst on my right wrist, I've had a couple in the past and always just smashed it on the edge of a table... but unfortunately it seems to keep coming back. Anyways, because of this, doing handstands on the ground and on blocks really irritates my wrist, but I've found that parallettes cause me no pain whatsoever.

 

Since it's probably going to be a while before I can return to doing handstands on the ground/blocks (even decline blocks irritate it), I was wondering why in the first place handbalancers prefer blocks to parallettes so much? I'm not far enough in my training to work oahs, but I noticed that you never see anyone preforming one armed handstands on parallettes or even p bars... Is it just more difficult to balance?

One arm is completely doable on paraletes, its just that its slightly harder to balance it. On 2 arms you basically only need to correct over- and underbalance while on 1 arm you need to deal with balancing in all directions at once. On a bar you have less sensitivity sideways than you do on a block or floor which makes it tricky. Its by all means doable it just requires practice to get used to. I play with it sometimes and I tend to balance more from the hips than normal when I do on a bar.

 

For your ganglion you should probably take it easy as you say. If it persists and you are dedicated about your practice you might want to get it checked up. I had on both wrists years ago but they never bothered me and dissapeared. After I started really taking care of my wrist warm ups I have never had much wrist trouble the last years, even though I do at least 1-2 hours of handstands a day more or less 7 days a week

Very good to know oahs is possible on parallettes! So purely out of curiosity, why would you say blocks are so much more popular in the handbalancing world than parallettes? 

 

Thanks for the advice, I definitely will take it easy on my wrists for a while, I'm just thankful that I found some way to continue standing on my hands. I hope that one day I can work up to practicing the volume that you do! It would be great to have endurance to practice 7 days a week, I can feel myself getting rusty even after a couple of days off.

For OAHS on p-bars, here is ex-champion still in shape (and this press to hs through planche is great as well):

Have seen that guy and his 1 arm there is pretty good. The very casual planche press is totally bad ass.

 

Blocks are practical for several reasons. You get a better grip and are able to use more force with your fingers which for many matters a lot. You also have the block walking exercises and to do handstands on canes you should be soild on blocks first . Like you might know, canes are easier due to the movement of the cane, but you need to be comfortable with the grip of a block to start working on it. Blocks in general are also a bit easier on the wrists for some people since the fingers curl around more. Then you also have certain tricks with blocks like the drop that Encho does.