How far to lean when practicing planche leans?

Adriano Flo said:

Reading this post I realise more and more what Zach said once: "planche leans are gold".

 

So, I have several questions:

 

1) Which is the development to achieve a full lean on Planche Leans with hands just before your COG? Wrist strenght& flexibility? Overall strenght? Scapular control? 

 

2) We've to work on "ideal" planche leans (hand below hips) or just 2-3cm before COG? 

 

We've to assume that everyone's different and we've to practice and experimenting, but the athlete's arm are not just too long?

 

I've started to love this movement; but I hate it when I start to think on PPP with the same lean that I have on Planche Leans, which is not even close to where I want

 

Keep the topic! It's interesting.

1) Obviously everything is going to work harder the more you lean. Wrist strength and flexibility will have to be developed if you are using hands forward and even hands sideways for some people.  With the hands back, there is a lot more stress on the inner elbows and biceps tendons and also requires more planche strength due to no cantilever from the wrists.

2) Ideally you would want to lean all the way with your hands under your COG which would mean you will be in a planche rather than a planche lean. The full lean for a planche lean is the point just before you get balanced on your hands which would probably be less than a cm from your COG.

There are also more difficult variations of the planche lean that can be even harder than the full planche. I call them "super" planche leans and they require the feet to be anchored and hands placed as far back behind your COM as you are able to. They're basically overbalanced planche leans. 

You'd better stop giving misleading info about that " super" thing being more difficult than a planche. It's obviously not. The fact of having your feet anchored gives more stability and makes the exercise even easier than the usual planche lean with feet on a piece of cloth, furniture sliders, etc

Romulo said:

You'd better stop giving misleading info about that " super" thing being more difficult than a planche. It's obviously not. The fact of having your feet anchored gives more stability and makes the exercise even easier than the usual planche lean with feet on a piece of cloth, furniture sliders, etc

I am 100% sure you are just speculating on your part and that you are wrong based on what you said about the usual planche leans with furniture sliders being harder than overbalanced (super) planche leans. They can be harder than a full planche if you put your hands far back enough. I have achieved a full planche before and still can hold a momentary one occasionally so I know what a full planche feels like.

May I ask where you are at in your planche progressions?

B1214N said:

I am 100% sure you are just speculating on your part and that you are wrong based on what you said about the usual planche leans with furniture sliders being harder than overbalanced (super) planche leans. They can be harder than a full planche if you put your hands far back enough. I have achieved a full planche before and still can hold a momentary one occasionally so I know what a full planche feels like.

May I ask where you are at in your planche progressions?

Not to sound offensive, but what's the point of the 'super' leans? Can they be done without feet on ground? If not then Id rather spend the time working on planche

If not, the only real reason I can think of them is possibly to help for floor maltese, and even if it could help it doesn't seem efficient.

Leads me to kind of wonder what the point isnof them, in a completely non-combative manner

Charm said:

Not to sound offensive, but what's the point of the 'super' leans? Can they be done without feet on ground? If not then Id rather spend the time working on planche

If not, the only real reason I can think of them is possibly to help for floor maltese, and even if it could help it doesn't seem efficient.

Leads me to kind of wonder what the point isnof them, in a completely non-combative manner

I think it's to put more load on the shoulders (holds) or triceps (push-ups).

If you lean too much during a full planche, you'll fall forward because there's too much weight on one side of your "scale / lever". However, if you anchor the feet down, you can lean forward more and load up your shoulders even more than during a normal full planche.

Perhaps the same you could get the same effect with ankle weights?

This is all just speculation. I'm sure B1214N would have a better answer.

Charm said:

Not to sound offensive, but what's the point of the 'super' leans? Can they be done without feet on ground? If not then Id rather spend the time working on planche

If not, the only real reason I can think of them is possibly to help for floor maltese, and even if it could help it doesn't seem efficient.

Leads me to kind of wonder what the point isnof them, in a completely non-combative manner

No offense taken. There really is no point in doing the 'super' planche leans other then to get stronger, but there are other exercises you can use like planche presses, weighted planche, maltese, etc. It is simply another 'tool' you can use and looks pretty cool in it's own right. It probably is not the most efficient, but it is a challenging exercise and will build more strength. I actually only play around with these 'super' planche leans occasionally and do actual planche progressions as my main planche work along with planche push-ups.

They can be done with feet on something elevated as long as you can still anchor or braced them to keep them in place. If you are doing the push-up version of the elevated one then the top will be the hardest part of the ROM in contrast to the hardest being at the bottom ROM for the non-elevated one.

I was just angry at Romulus for accusing me of giving out false or misleading info (when I wasn't) despite his ignorance of the matter.

I hope you add my 'super' planche leans and 'super' PPP clips in the community compilation. 

Cody said it well. Full planche with ankle weights give a similar effect as there will be extra lean to decrease the leverage.

Zach Armijo said:

This "super planche lean" would be better spent as a Maltese lean as Charm was getting at. To me, adding anchors for the sake of a further lean makes the exercise even more....one sided.... You take away one element which is most people's weakness, just to over load another element. Well rounded training is what people should be focusing on and not unproven "super" exercises. You can make any exercise harder than it needs to be, but it doesn't necessarily make it an improved variation. You aren't going to strive for a 2x width FL just because it is harder. It's just a waste of time.

This is correct as well. I never argued against this. Perhaps you can give it a try some time for fun and let us know how it felt for you. I was just telling people that there can be even more difficult planche lean variations than normal planche leans with the full lean.

2X shoulder width FL helps with victorian.

Zach Armijo said:

You take away one element which is most people's weakness, just to over load another element.

That was my impression. I'm all for strengthening to ridiculous levels, but I can't say I'm really on board with these... seems to take out so much else of what a planche trains.

Still, maybe I'll be found wrong once you get the results in on them. How's the elbow coming along?

My elbows are feeling great! Not as strong as before, but safe enough to do hands back planche (straddle and up) up to a moderate amount of volume. I held a hands back full planche for about 2 seconds earlier today without discomfort in the biceps tendons. I had some trouble balancing and got weaker in the planche static from not training it for more than half a year so I'm not really consistent at being able to hold it. I actually cautiously tried a super planche lean with locked arms for the first time this week and the stress on the elbows/biceps tendon was intense and I wasn't even sure if I was straight or not since it wasn't recorded and there was no spotter at the time. I am still going take my planche training slowly to get my biceps tendons even stronger first before doing high volume or maltese training.

I think the "super planche leans" still train much of what the planche trains because both are shoulder flexion and you still try to protract and all. Just that the angles are slightly different which would probably place more emphasis on different fibers although I believe the same muscles will be working harder overall since it's even lower leverage than a full planche. It also takes balance out of the equation which means you are not working the skill component of the planche and that your lower back will not be working like in a planche although the core is still working. So I for sure don't recommend it as a replacement for the planche. I only recommend it as something you try for fun occasionally or as a supplementary exercise along with planche and other planche skills at most. 

Speaking of floor maltese and maltese leans, you can try the maltese version of the "super planche lean" (super maltese lean) once you achieved a maltese to increase difficulty.   Of course I'm sure as discussed that there are more better efficient exercises like maltese press to Japanese HS, weighted maltese, Azarian maltese, etc.

B1214N said:

I am 100% sure you are just speculating on your part and that you are wrong based on what you said about the usual planche leans with furniture sliders being harder than overbalanced (super) planche leans. They can be harder than a full planche if you put your hands far back enough. I have achieved a full planche before and still can hold a momentary one occasionally so I know what a full planche feels like.

 

May I ask where you are at in your planche progressions?

Sorry for the late reply. Yes, congrats on your bent arm planche, the one Coach said you couldn't be sure of your COM...

And you are right, I can't do a straddle planche, though I did gymnastics when younger, at my present rusty level, I can do only a mere tuck planche. But I can do your "super" stuff, so that's exactly why I "ignorantly" got to the conclusion that the planche is more difficult, at least for me.

Anyway, I don't think it should be something to recommend to someone training to develop a planche, as others mentioned about its relevance...

In case of doubt, it may be better to discard the inventions and follow the program...

That bent arm planche was just used to try to determine where my COM would be approximately and it's because I didn't want to hurt my elbows due to my injury and I haven't trained the locked arm planche in many months because of that.

I am absolutely certain that you are doing the super planche lean and or super PPP wrong if you think it's not harder and that you can only do a tuck planche at your current level. You don't just anchor your legs and do a planche lean, you aim to place your hands behind your COM or at least make the lean equal to or greater than a full planche at the top of the lean. So either you have misunderstood or you are lying. Why don't you make a video doing the super planche lean or super PPP and show us.

I also did say originally that they can be harder than a full planche and that is true if you put your hands far back enough since there is no limit until your arms get leveled with your body. The one I was doing already felt harder than a full planche.

I never even once recommended it as a replacement to planche or any planche exercise. I only recommended as a difficult variation you can try for fun occasionally or as a supplementary exercise at most. The planche is more like a prerequisite for this rather than the other way around if you are doing it right.

I never said anything about not following the program (I assume you meant Foundation) or told anyone to not follow. The choice is their's anyways and who cares really if some people aren't following one program. You can't expect every gymnast or coach to do the exact same program worldwide. I see nothing wrong with doing something out of the ordinary or making inventions just for fun or testing. It's not like I do these "super" things frequently anyway like I said before and it's not distracting me. I'm pretty sure someone probably has done what I did before so I probably didn't even invent it. I only train GST to get stronger and as a hobby and like to enjoy my journey along the way. 

I also have to say that your earlier comment about planche leans with feet anchored are easier than planche leans without it due to more stability to be bullshit. There really is no noticeable difference between the two since they both have the feet supported which takes balance out of the equation.

Ok, man, let's end this discussion? I don't have any intention to follow up with this, since I told you, I consider it irrelevant for planche development and thought you were doing much ado for nothing by recommending it...

Sorry for the criticism and thank you for your time.

Just to add to my apology, since I accused B1214N publicly without proper self-experience, let me correct myself when I said I could do his exercise. After filming myself I realized my lean was far from enough, I can't even hold my hands below my COG!

As the saying goes "By the mouth the fish dies", need to take more care of what I say. 

So what would be the most effective way to get to a maximum planche lean on the ground? It seems like training planche leans as the primary exercise for planche would help the most. Or would training the progressions help more?

Frahebede said:

So what would be the most effective way to get to a maximum planche lean on the ground? It seems like training planche leans as the primary exercise for planche would help the most. Or would training the progressions help more?

Both will help as they are almost the same thing. 

My apologies for resurrecting a dead post, but I have to know: is there a formal trait that a planche lean has to have to be considered "proper"? Is there a shoulder angle or hand placement that defines it? Or is it just a vague estimate... "Put your hands around here-ish. Protract. Don't pike. Presto."

https://www.gymnasticbodies.com/forum/topic/19748-spl-pe-5-planche-lean/#entry189916

The link is broken! Is that simply a form check? Is there somewhere else I can view it?

The link works fine for me. If you own Foundation and are logged in, you should be able to access it. The post is called "sPL PE 5 planche lean" and is at the Courses forum/Foundation One Wiki Project.

I am logged in and own Foundation and Handstand One, but I still don't have permission...

Go ahead and send support a message, use the Help tab on the right end of the main menu above.

I have a question. If I have achieved a solid 5x30sec planche lean, next up should I progress to the next progression the Elavated planche lean or the norma planche lean with more "lean" in it ?

Progress, otherwise you'll be on PE5 forever!

Once you've finished the leans, and moved on to PE7 etc, keep the leans in your warm-up.

Rebelos said:

I have a question. If I have achieved a solid 5x30sec planche lean, next up should I progress to the next progression the Elavated planche lean or the norma planche lean with more "lean" in it ?

Post a form check or just check yourself if your form is really solid and with enough lean, and decide if you move on or stay there.