Proper L-Sit

I have a hip flexor problem. I have gotten to the point of a 2 second straddle planche and 2 or 3 second one leg front lever, but my hip flexor strength seems to be lacking. My questions is this: To perform a proper L-Sit, do you need to have your hands, shoulders, and hips in one straight line that is perpendicular to the floor? When I do L-Sits, my butt and hips go back so that I'm in kind of a 'lifted pike' position. I am sure this is some kind of problem with hip strength, but someone please correct me if I am wrong. Another problem I have, which may be a compression problem(again correct me if I am wrong), is that I cannot do an L-Sit with my palms on the ground. It's hard even on my fingertips! This is an annoying problem because I would like to one day do an L-Sit press to handstand. Thank you for any help from anyone.

The ability to perform an L-sit with the hands in line with the hips is a relatively advanced L-sit variation (Building the Gymnastic Body, pg 28). Your current inability to perform an L-sit on your palms is a problem of not yet enough core strength compounded by a lack of sufficient shoulder girdle strength, with perhaps some flexibility issues present as well.

At this point in time, I would not be overly concerned. Continued periodic exposure to training L-sits will automatically focus on correcting these strength/flexibility deficits.

Yours in Fitness,

Coach Sommer

Thanks, Coach!